that awful sensation arising from a serious meditation upon the circumstanding objects, which offer themselves to our senses, has always produced a due acknowledgment of the littleness of our intelligence, compared with the incomprehensible extent of the power of God. In unenlightened minds it led to the monstrous tenets of superstition. Let us consider a traveller, who enters for the first time the principal theatre of a populous city, upon which all, that the skill and judgment of the machinist can create, is displayed. Surrounded with a crowd of people, with whom he has but a few hours to spend, he converses slightly with some of them, contracts short and temporary acquaintances, and inquires about the wonders which strike his eyes; for he hears the rumbling noise of thunder, and sees, with tremor, the forked lightnings rend the clouds in the middle of winter; hè sees the Sun rise at night; the snow fall in the heat of summer; and thousands of metamorphoses cause his astonishment ;-lost in admiration, he wishes to know the hidden springs which put all these marvels into motion; he interrogates every one about him, and receives no answer, they are all as ignorant as himself, and he leaves the house as wise as he came. Such is the melancholy condition of man upon Earth. Encompassed with the wonders of the creation, he looks about, and seeks for one who can lead him into the secret; but he learns merely enough to be conscious of his want of knowledge. His own existence is a problem to him, and his sole consolation is, that after death he may steal behind the scenery of this wonderful stage: and, in the bosom of the Almighty, enjoy for ever the universality of that knowledge, for the attainment of which he

pants and labours here in vain.-But, is there no way of lessening the thickness of that cloud, which is spread before our eyes; and although we cannot come at the perfection of all sciences, and discover the secret springs and laws which this universe obeys, is it not possible at least to dive a little deeper than the surface of things? Yes; and it is the study of nature alone, which can afford these enjoyments and advantages. The wisest of men, as he is called, Solomon, had made it a principal object for the occupation of his great mind. So did Socrates, and all the sages of antiquity; and since them innumerable authors have consecrated part of their industrious lives to the investigation of the works of Nature.

Keeping constantly at equal distance from blind partiality for established systems, and the delusive aim at originality, we have adopted what we found unquestionable and instructive in others; and yet in many places we have vindicated to ourselves the liberty of thinking and of proposing the result of our thoughts, not only as modest doubts, but also as useful suggestions, which in better hands, and aided by the light of experience, may eventually assume the shape of certainty. Our unceasing object has been to point out, wherever an opportunity occurred, the goodness and wisdom of Providence, or Nature; for, as we are intimately persuaded that nothing is ushered into existence or preserved alive, but by the will and special care of the supreme Intelligence who created all, the words Providence and Nature are syno nimous with us, and therefore we use them indiscriminately. The votaries of modern Philosophy have, in several instances, inverted the order of things, and placed effects for causes in the uni

verse.

They have supposed and asserted, that the habits of animals are determined by the organs they possess; and contend, for instance, that the young duck seeks for the pond, because his feet are palmated; and that the frog and lizard adopt an amphibious station, because the ventricles of their hearts have a communication, which allows the blood to circulate without the help of respiration. We are told also, that turbots, soles, flounders, and all the individuals belonging to the order of pleuronectes, have their eyes on one side, from the progressive and long habit of lying flat on the ooze, at the bottom of the sea. -We differ entirely from these system-makers; and although such names as Buffon, la Cépède, and several others, stand conspicuous among them, we have combated that unfounded and dangerous doctrine, upon the double ground of its having an erroneous supposition for its principle, and, for its effect, a direct tendency to materialism. No; the habits of animals are not the result of fortuitous conformation. The bird does not fly in the air, because he has wings; the fish swim, because he has fins; and the quadruped walk because he has feet. These animals, antecedently destined by the God of Nature, the Omnipotent Creator, to keep their respective stations in the world, were intentionally provided with the requisites for this purpose. Sent from his plastic hands into the forests, the wolf obtained sharp teeth to devour his prey, and the stag was endowed with swiftness to shun his enemies; intended to people the deep recesses of the ocean, the fish received fins to cleave the opposing fluid; and the painted wings of the bird were granted him, because his destination was to inhabit and adorn the aërial empire. These

arrangements must be considered a priori; and as originating in the will, wisdom, and power of God.

These attributes of the divine essence are so conspicuous in every part of the creation, that it is hardly necessary to point them out to any reader of intelligence and sense; yet we have lost no opportunity of placing them under a point of view still nearer to young minds, that have not yet acquired the habit of reflecting. We have explained every where, as clearly as possible, the workings of Nature concealed from the vulgar eye, and from the sight of the unthinking; and have developed, as far as it lay in our power, that most admirable impartiality of Providence toward the creatures, in the bountiful repartition of his gifts. We have carefully shown, how a sort of intellect and spontaneity has been granted to those, that are deprived of instinctive and involuntary endowments; how cunning and ingenuity have been given in compensation for want of strength and of bulk; how the oyster, deprived of locomotion, and of means of attack or defence, has been stationed in a strong fortress; and why the horse and the dog, who nearly understand the whole language of their keepers, cannot make for themselves a bed, while the goldfinch and the linnet evince such curious talents in the fabrication of their nests. From the almost human intelligence of the elephant, to the instinct of the ant-lion; from the wings of the eagle, that carry him through the immense regions of the air, to the rough and uncouth covering of the limpet, fixed at the side of a rock, in the profundities of the sea; the reader will find frequent occasions to admire, real cause to adore, and constant motive to love and praise the infinite goodness of the Creator: and this,

being one of the principal points considered in this publication, will repay our anxieties, and reward our labours in the recomposition of the work.

We meet every where, in ancient and modern authors, either in poetry or in prose, allusions and references to animals, which never had any existence, and are entirely the offsprings of allegory misunderstood, or of mere imagination. Several of these beings have a meaning, which is not obviously intelligible; and as the works, in which their fanciful nature is explained, are not at hand to every body, we have thought, that a clear and short Appendix, in which the subject should be treated briefly, but in a new point of light, and explained by ideas as well founded as they may appear original, would not fail to be pleasing to the public; and we have placed it at the end of the work.

A defect, which is observable in all publications apon Natural History, is, the want of proportion between the different figures of animals; but there is no remedy; for after several experiments, it has been found utterly impossible to adopt, within the short hmits of a 12mo or 8vo page, a standard of size, or comparative scale, which might have answered the purpose; and all our predecessors, in the interesting task of delineating the generality and individuals of the brute creation, have been obliged to submit to the tyranny of necessity. The striking difference, which exists between the bulk of the elephant and the body of the hardly perceptible mite; between the hugeness of the whale and the smallest cockle-shell lost in the sand of the ocean; admits of no proportionable admeasurement, in works adorned with plates or cuts of common sizes; and we have provided, that the printed