Upon Life and Death.

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for the due order and preservation of the whole; that partial evils are always to be disregarded; and that all tends to show the glory and perfections of God. We shall then adore and bless his name, though desolation impend and destruction threaten; we shall repose upon him with confidence, and though the final termination of the world may seem to be at hand, and the mountains, hurled from their bases, be plunged into the sea, He will be our protector, our sup porter, and sure resting-place.

FEBRUARY X.

Upon Life and Death.

Gop has observed the most exact and wonderful order in the life and death of man; both are measured and regulated in the best manner: and nothing is more evident than the wisdom of God in the popu lation of the world. In a given number of years, a proportionable number of people of every age dies. Out of thirty-five or thirty-six living persons, one dies each year; but the proportion of births is rather greater; for ten who die, in the same period of time, and among the same number of persons, twelve are born. In the first year, one infant out of three generally dies in the fifth year, one out of twenty-five; and so on, the number of deaths lessening till the age of twenty-five, when they again begin to increase. How evident is the care which Divine Providence extends over his creatures! From the very moment of their entering the world he protects and watches over them; the poor as well as the rich enjoy his protection. Let us not then anticipate the hour of death with fear, nor render unpleasant our time with apprehension; but firmly rely on the all-sufficient arm

of God, who will support us through life with tender care, and when it seemeth meet, enable us to resign our bodies to their native dust with firmness, in the confidence of our soul, divested of its cumbrous load, winging its flight with joy to the regions of eternal glory. Let not the supposition of a long life, arising from a present good state of health, make you forgetful of the duties you owe to God and to one another, under the idea that there will be time enough allowed you to prepare for the awful change. Life is extremely uncertain: though from strength of constitu. tion some individuals may not be so liable to illness, they may be hurried off by accidents; and no man, however strong, is secure from contagion. But a much more powerful motive than fear should excite us so to act, that our deeds shall always find favour with the Almighty; the pleasure arising from good actions, which is a constant reward and source of pure delight to the virtuous, the sensations of which are unknown to the wicked, who exchange the only true enjoyment we are capable of for false and fleeting pleasures, whose consequences are sorrow, disease, and death.

FEBRUARY XI.

Formation of Ice.

WHEN water is exposed to the influence of cold air, it gradually loses its fluidity, and becomes a solid body, which we call ice. This change, which at this season of the year comes so frequently under our notice, is well deserving of attention. Ice is of less specific gravity than water; for if we put a vessel containing water, the surface of which is frozen over, into a temperate heat, the ice soon detaches itself

from the sides of the vessel, and floats on the top of the water. One cause of its lightuess is the increase of volume; for although the general law of cold is to contract, in this instance, at the time of congelation, such an expansion takes place, that vessels are fre. quently broken by the power of the dilatation, the violence of which is sufficient to cleave a globe of copper of such thickness as to require a force of 28,000 pounds weight to produce a similar effect.

When the ice first shoots in crystals over the sur face of the water, it is transparent; but as it increases in thickness, becomes opake, which is owing to the air contained in the ice occasioning a more frequent refraction of the rays of light. Exhalations continually arise from the ice, even during the greatest cold. It is found from experiments that, during the most intense cold, four pounds of ice lose one pound weight by evaporation in the space of eighteen days.

The manner in which ice begins to form is very curious; when it slightly freezes, a number of needleshaped crystals shoot in all directions from the inner circumference of the vessel, making numerous angles, and uniting together, form upon the surface of the water a very thin pellicle of ice; to these succeed more, which multiply and enlarge in form of plates, and being increased in number and thickness unite to the first pellicle. As the ice thickens, a multitude of air-bubbles are seen, and the greater the degree of cold, the more these increase. When it freezes very

strongly, a thin crust is formed, which shoots from the circumference to the centre; under this others are seen of a triangular shape, with the base parallel to the sides of the vessel, and these soon increase so much that a very thick mass of ice is formed.

By frequently reflecting upon these phenomena, we shall be more and more convinced of the beauty

of nature, and of the harmony and regularity that pervade her minutest productions, all tending to fulfil the views of a just and wise God; and though we have not the satisfactory consolation of knowing the full extent of those views, the little we are permitted to understand of them is enough to excite in us the desire of adoring the all-wise Creator, and celebrating his power, whilst we magnify his holy name.

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FEBRUARY XII.

Spherical Figure of the Earth.

It was once generally supposed that the earth is a vast plain; but were this the case, its external boundaries might be arrived at, and in approaching any place we could not discover the tops of towers and mountains till we have seen their bases. The earth is incontestibly proved to be a globe, though not exactly spherical, for it is rather more elevated under the line, and flattened towards the poles, something resembling the figure of an orange. But this deviation from a true sphere is very slight; about fifty miles, a difference scarcely perceptible in a globe whose circumference is 25,020 miles, and diameter 7964. The rotundity of the earth is demonstrable from its shadow in eclipses of the moon being always bounded by a circular line, and by its having been frequently circumnavigated; besides, if it was not spherical, how would the stars appear to rise and to set sooner to the countries eastward than to those more to the west.

Here we have fresh cause to admire the wisdom of the Creator, who has organised this earth with the greatest perfection, with a form so well adapted for

Spherical Figure of the Earth.

79 the benefit of the inhabitants. Light and heat, which are so necessary to the creation, are by this means distributed with uniformity, and in a more equable degree throughout the earth. It is from this that the due return of day and night is ensured, and that the degrees of heat and of cold, of moisture and of dryness, are rendered so regular and constant. The water is equally distributed over the earth, and the winds every-where cause their salutary influence to be felt. Had the earth any other figure, we should be deprived of all these advantages: some countries would be like a paradise, whilst others would be in a state of chaos; one part would be buried by the waters, and another parched by the fervour of the sun. Some countries would be exposed to furious tempests, which would devastate and destroy them; whilst others would be exhausted for want of fresh currents of air. One part of the world would be condemned to endure a perpetual heat, and another would be deprived of the sun's rays.

If we did not here acknowledge the all-powerful hand of a wise and beneficent Creator, we must be guilty of the greatest pride and most consummate iguorance! Should we deserve to be the inhabitants of an earth so admirably arranged and exquisitely fashioned, if, upon seeing its beauties and matchless order, and enjoying a thousand blessings, we denied. the existence of an all-creative Power, or were want. ing in acknowledgements for his mercy and goodness? May we never be guilty of such base ingratitude; but, filled with sentiments of awe and sublimity at the sight of God's wonderful works, may we ele. vate our thoughts to heaven, and fixing our minds upon the Divine Power, humbly adore his wisdom and goodness.