his assumptions require the greatest mathematical knowledge to satisfy us of their truth. It cannot be expected of us, therefore, in this work,' to follow him. It will be enough that we give a plain account of the facts which he has elaborately proved.

The moon has been found, like all the rest of the planets, to attract,' and to be attracted by the earth. This attraction prevails throughout our whole planetary sys ein. The more inatter there is contained in any body, the more it attracts; and its influence decreases in proportion as the distance, when squared, increases. This being premised, let us see what must ensue upon supposing the moon to be in the meridian of any tract of the sea. The surface of the water immediately under the moon, is nearer the moon than any other part of the globe is; and therefore, must be more subject to its attraction than the waters any where else. The waters will, therefore, be attracted by the moon, and rise in an heap ;` whose eminence will be highest where the attraction is greatest. In order to form this eminence, it is obvious that the surface, as well as the depths, will be agitated; and wherever the waters run from one part, succeeding waters must run to fill up the space which they have left. Thus the waters of the sea, running from all parts, to attend the motions of the moon, produce the flowing of the tide and it is high tide at that part wherever the moon comes over it, or to its meridian.

:

But as the moon travels onward, and ceases to point over the place where the waters were just risen, the cause of their rising will cease to operate, and they will flow back by their natural gravity, into the `ower' parts from whence they had travelled; and this retiring of the waters will form the ebbing of the sea..

Thus the first part of our subject seems pretty obvious, since, in general, it requires no great sagacity to conceive that the waters nearest the moon are most attracted, or raised highest by its influence. But the other part seems more difficult to be accounted for, namely, how there came to be high tides at the same time, on the opposite side of the globe, and where the waters are farthest from the moon.

To comprehend this, therefore, it must be observed, that the part of the earth, and its waters, that are farthest from the moon, are the parts, of all others, that are least attracted by the moon: it must also be observed, that all the waters, when the moon is on the opposite side of the earth, must be attracted by it in the same direction that the earth itself attracts them; that is, if we may so say, quite through the body of the earth, towards the moon itself. This, therefore, being conceived, it is plain that these waters which are farthest from the moon, will have less weight than those of any other part, on the same side of the globe; because the moon's attraction, which conspires with the earth's attraction, is there least. Now, therefore, the waters farthest from the moon, having less weight, and being lightest, will be pressed on all sides, by those that, having more attraction, are heavier; and the heavier waters flowing in, will make them swell and rise in an eminence dir ectly opposite to that on the other side of the globe, caused by the more immediate influence of the moon.

In this manner the moon, in one diurnal revolution, produces two tides, one raised immediately under the sphere of its influence, and the other directly opposite to it. As the moon travels, this vast body of waters rear upwards, as if to watch its motions, and pursues the same constant rotation. However, in this great work of raising the tides, the sun has no small share; it produces its own tides constantly every day, just as the moon does, but in a much less degree, because the sun is at an immensely greater distance. Thus there are solar tides and lunar tides. When the force of the two luminaries concur, which they always do when they are either in the same, or in opposite parts of the heavens, they jointly produce a much greater tide, than when they are so situated in the heavens, as each to make peculiar tides of its own. Thus their united attraction forms the high spring-tides; but their divided attraction forms the lower neap-tides.

This theory being well understood, it may be readily brought to explain the various appearances of the tides, if the earth was covered with a deep sea, and the waters uninfluenced by shoals, currents, straits, or tempests But in every part of the sea, near the shores, the geographer must lend his aid to correct the calculations of the astronomer. For by reason of the shallowness of some places, and the narrowness of the straits in others, there arises a great diversity in the effect, not to be accounted for without an exact knowledge of all the circumstances of the place. In the great depths of the ocean, for instance, a very slow and imperceptible motion of the whole body of water will suffice to raise its surface several feet high; but if the same increase of water is to be conveyed through a narrow channel, it must rush through it with the most impetuous rapidity. In the English Channel, and in the German Ocean, the tide is found to flow strongest in those places that are narrowest; the same quantity of water being, in this case, driven through a smaller passage. It is often seen,

therefore, pouring through a strait with great force, and, by its rapidity, considerably raised above the surface of that part of the ocean into which it runs ** *

This shallowness and narrowness of many parts of the sea, give rise also to a peculiarity in the tides of some parts of the world. For in many places, and in our own seas in particular, the greatest swell of the tide is not while the moon is at its meridian, and directly over the place, but some time after it has declined from thence. The sea, in this case, being obstructed, pursues the moon with what dispatch it can, but does not arrive with all its waters till long after the moon has ceased to operate. From the same causes, also, we may account for the Mediterranean, the Baltic, and especially the Black Sea, having hardly any sensible tides. These, though they seem to us very extensive, are not, however, large enough to be much affected by the influence of the moon; and as to their communication with the ocean, through such narrow inlets, it is impossible, in a few hours time, that they should receive and return water enough to raise or depress them in any considerable degree.

In general, therefore, we may observe, that all tides are much higher and more considerable in the torrid zone, than in the rest of the ocean; the sea in those parts being generally deeper, and less affected by changeable winds, or winding shores. One of the greatest tides we know of, is that at the mouth of the river Indus, where the water rises: thirty feet in height. How great, then, must have been the amazement of Alexander's soldiers at so strange an appearance! They who had always before been accustomed only to the almost imperceptible rising of the Mediterranean, when made at once spectators of a river rising and falling thirty feet in a few hours, must have felt a mixture of surprise and apprehension. The tides are also remarkably high on the coasts of Malay, in the straits of Sunda, in the Red Sea, along the coast of China, and Japan, at Panama in America, and in the Gulph of Bengal. But perhaps the highest tide which is known is in the bay Fundy, in North America, where the water rises and falls at least sixty feet.

The tides at Tonquin are, however, the most remarkable in the world. In this part there is but one rise and one fall in the course of twenty four hours; whereas, in other places there are two. Besides, there, twice in each month, there is no tide at all, when the moon is near the equinoctial, the water being for some time quite stagnant. These, with some other odd appearances attending the tides, were considered by many as inscrutable; but Sir Isaac Newton, with peculiar sagacity, adjudged them to arise from the concurrence of two tides, one from the South Sea, and the other from the Indian Ocean. Of each of these tides there come two every day; two at one time greater, and two at another that are less. The time betwen the arrival of the two greater, is considered by him as high tide; the time between the two lesser, as ebb. With this clue, that great man solved every appearance, and so established his theory as to silence every opposer.

This statement of the cause of the tides has been controverted by many: but nothing equally satisfactory has ever been brought forward in its place, Mr. Saint Pierre, in his book called Studies of Nature, has quite discarded the Newtonian theory of the tides. erroneous in principle, and quite insufficient for phenomena: and he substitutes the liquifaction of the the polar regions, and the greater length of the polar than of the equatorial axis of the earth.

He says it is explaining the ice and snow of

The character of this gentleman is respectable. His constant attention to final causes, and the proofs he brings thence of the being, wisdom, and goodness of Deity, shew his piety. And we esteem him the more, because of his fortitude in resisting the influence of national example in the days of French infidelity. Piety has not been often found among French philosophers for near an hundred years; but since the revolution in France the senseless atheism of ancient Greece has again been brought forward. without disguise. St. Pierre has resisted this impiety, and we admire him for it. But he has failed in proving the earth to be a prolate spheroid. Experience has proved it to be an oblate spheriod. And as for the quantity of ice and snow in the polar regions, if there was twenty times as much, and it was all to melt in a day, there could be no

perceptible difference from it; it would only fill the space which it before occupied in the waters. Let any person put a quantity of compressed snow into a vessel, and note the exact height of it; when the snow is melted, he will find the water of the same height as the snow was. As for ice, it is well known that when dissolved it lays in less compass than in its frozen state. St. Pierre's theory of the tides, therefore, must fall, and that of Newton stands unshaken.

TO BE CONTINUED.

LIFE

OF

MR. JOHN HOWARD,

CONTINUED.

MR. Howard's son was by himn intended for the ministry, amongst the

Protestant Dissenters; but every prospect which parental partiality might have, formed was blasted by the visitation of Providence, for the unhappy youth was deranged, and his father consigned him to the care of Dr. Arnold, who kept a house for the reception of lunatics, at Leicester: but the young man never recovered his senses.

Whether this circumstance took place before or after Mr Howard had entered upon that eager career of benevolence, to which the remainder of his life was dedicated, we cannot certainly say; but it is probable that it happened a little before. The private affections of his heart had now no longer any claim upon his attention; and, naturally as the thoughtless and vicious part of mankind fly from sorrow to dissipation and noisy pleasure, so do the pious and benevolent endeavour to lose the remembrance of private anguish in exertions for the public good.

In the year 1773, he was named as sheriff for the county of Bedford. The circumstance of his being a dissenter would have excused him from so troublesome an office, if he had chosen to have pleaded it; but he wished to serve the office, as it would enable him to know the state of the prisons and prisoners in the county. On this occasion there were some scruples in his mind relative to the safety of discharging the office" without conforming to the established communion, which he could not conscientiously do. But having consulted some friends of eminence in the law, he thought there was not so much danger of the penalty for nonconformity being inflicted upon him, as to deter him from his' benevolent design; accordingly he served the office, in doing which the case of prisoners came immediately before him.

A sense of duty induced him personally to visit the county jail, where he observed such abuses and scenes of calamity as he had before no conception of; and he soon exerted himself in order to a reform.

With a view to obtain precedents for certain regulations which he purposed, he went to inspect the prisons in some neighbouring counties;

but finding in them equal room for complaint and commiseration, he determined to visit the principal prisons in England. The further he proceeded, the more shocking were the scenes presented to his view; which induced him to resolve upon exerting himself to the utmost to procure a general reform in those horrid places of confinement; considering it as of the utmost importance, not only to the wretched objects themselves, but to the community at large.

He had three objects in view in his attention to the prisons in England -first, to put a stop to that dreadful distemper called the jail-fever, which raged so shockingly in many of the prisons as to render them in the last degree loathsome and dangerous; a distemper by which more had been taken off than by the hands of the executioner; and which, in several instances, had been communicated from the prisons to the courts of justice, and had proved fatal to the magistrates and judges, and to multitudes of people who attended the trials, as well as to the families of discharged felons and debtors.

The second object was to remedy the cruel practice of detaining prisoners after acquittal for fees, and other oppressive demands of that nature. To effect this, he applied to the justices to assign to the jailer and others certain salaries in lieu of fees; but as no precedent for this could be produced, they did not think themselves authorized for such a step.

But the third and grand object was, to introduce an entire reform of morals in our prisons, where he had found the most flagrant vices to prevail in such a degree that they were actually become seminaries of the most atrocious wickedness and villany, and the most formidable nuisance to the community, in consequence of the promiscuous intercourse of prisoners of both sexes, and of all ages and descriptions, whereby the young and less experienced were initiated by old and hardened sinners into all the arts and mysteries of iniquity; so that, instead of being reformed by their confinement-which should be the chief end of punishment-those who were discharged became tenfold more injurious to society than before.

Upon this subject he was examined before the House of Commons, in 1774, when he had the honour of their thanks for his labours. This encouraged him to proceed in his design; in pursuance of which he re-visited all the prisons in the kingdom, together with the principal houses of correction. He also, in 1775, enlarged his circuit, by going into Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, where he found the same need of reformation.

In order to the attainment of the great objects which were before him, Mr. Howard spared no pains or experice, and cheerfully exposed himself to much inconvenience and hazard, particularly from that malignant distemper of which he saw inany dying in the most loathsome dungeons, into which, none, who were not obliged, besides himself, would venture. The only precautions, which he used to preserve himself from infection were never to enter an hospital or prison before breakfast, and in an offensive room never to draw his breath deeply, to smell to vinegar while he was in those places, and to change his apparel