1 There was scarcely any thing left to the moderns to fay a s to faylas new refpecting the return of comets, their nature, and their orbits. The Chaldeans, Egyptians, Pythagoras, Democritus, Hippocrates of Chios, Artemidorus, and Seneca, had already fettled the theory of them: tho' the moderns, it is true,' monitrated more clearly fome parts of it afterwards. Stobaus" thus explains the fentiments of the Pythagoreans: "They imagined, fays he, the comets to be wandering planets, which appear only at certain times during their courfe *." But Seneca, more than any other, in his feventh book of Natural Questions, has difcuffed this fubject like a true philofopher. The moon is an object which gave the ancients an opportunity of displaying their penetration. They early difcovered, that" it had no light of its own, but fhone with that which it reflected from the fun." This, after Thales, was the fenti. ment of Anaxagoras, and that of Empedocles †, who thence accounted, not only for the mildness of its splendor, but the imperceptibility of its heat, which our experiments but confirm. Proclus, in his commentary upon Timæus, presents us with three verfes of Orpheus, wherein he pofitively afferts, that the moon was another earth, having in it mountains, vallies, &c." It was the opinion of Democritus, that the spots which we obferve upon its difk, were no other than "fhades, formed by the exceffive height of the lunar mountains §," which intercept the light from the lower parts of that planet, where the vallies form themselves into what appear to us as fhades and fpots. Plutarch fays, that those deep and extenfive fhades which appear upon that planet, muft be occafioned by "the vaft feas" it contains, which are incapable of reflecting fo vivid a light as the more folid and opake parts, or by caverns extremely wide and deep, wherein the rays of the fun are abforbed;" whence those shades, and that obscurity, which we call the spots of the moon ||. The moderns understand by ether, a very rare fluid, or fpecies of matter beyond the atmosphere, and penetrating it, infinitely more fubtile than the air we refpire, of an immense * * Eclog. Phyf. 1. 1. + Plutarch de Facie in orbe Lunæ, † Μέσατο δ' άλλην γαιαν, &c. Struxit autem aliam terram immenfam, quam felenem Immortales vocant: bomines autem, lunam, Quæ multos montes habet, multas urbes, multas domos. Plut, de Facie, &c. extent, extent, filling all the fpaces where the celestial bodies roll, yet making no fenfible, refiftance to their motions. Thefe notions derive their origin from the doctrines of antiquity. Plato, in his Timæus, fpeaking of air, diftinguishes it into two kinds, the one grofs and filled with vapours, which is what we breathe; the e other more refined, called ether, in which the celeftial bodies are immerged, and where they roll Ariftotle knew theat weight of the airt; Seneca its weight, fpring, and elasticity; i for he defcribes the conftant effort it makes to expand itself, when it is compreffed t." 1 Leucippus, Chryfippus, Democritus, Ariftotle, Ariftophanes, Seneca, &c. accounted for thunder and earthquakes. The firft of these philofophers tells us, that thunder proceeds from a fiery exhalation, which inclosed in a cloud, bursts it afunder, and forces its way through." The laft, fpeaking of earthquakes, fuppofes, that "the earth hides in its bofom many fubterraneous fires, which uniting their flames, necessari- & ly put into fervid motion the congregated vapours of its cells, which finding no immediate out-let, exert their utmost powers, til at laft they force a way through whatever oppofes them." He says alfo, that if the vapours be too weak to burft the barriers which retain them, all their efforts end in weak shocks and hollow murmurs, without any fatal confequence §. Pytheas, and Seleucus of Erythrea preceded Defcartes, in explaining the cause of the ebbing and flowing of the fea; and Pliny, before Sir Ifaac Newton, has made mention, in that case, of the combined forces of fun and moon ||. The virtues of the loadftone were known to Plato, who called the magnet the ftone of Hercules, because it fubdued iron, which conquers every thing. Lucretius and Plutarch endeavoured to account for its wonderful properties ¶. Plato in Timæo, et Phædone. + Arift. de Calo, 1.41 C. fiictor Modo fpiffat fe, modo expandit, &c. Quæft. Nat. 1. 5. C. 5. Seneca, I. 6. c. 11. and 12.-The Newtonians attribute fubterraneous fires, earthquakes, thunder, and lightning, to the fermentation of vapours impregnated with fulphur and nitre. The notions of the ancients are feldom truly philofophical. V. Another * V. Another Traveller, or curfory Remarks and tritical Obfervations made upon a Journey through Part of the Netherlands, in the latter End of the Year 1765. By Coriat Junior. In 2 Vols. Pr. 6. THE character of Coriat Junior, tho' of the fame caft with that of Triftram Shandy, is not an abfolute imitation of it; for it contains much originality. Coriat is very intelligible, and knows how to apply his lathen sword better than Triftram did, when he is inclined to make a fudden transition. His journey from London to Dover, and his voyage from Dover to Ostend; his adventures in the laft mentioned places; his conferences, obfervations, rambles, &c. &c. blend many useful truths and arch. obfervations with much laughability-(if our reader will pardon the word). His reflections upon nuns and nunneries are affecting, and we follow him with pleasure and improvement 'by water from Oftend to Bruges. We fhall present the reader with his fourteenth chapter, to specify one of his manners." • My intention is not to make a great book, but to write a little one. I could easily collect a huge volume of excellent materials (with far lefs trouble than I take in spinning out my own cobwebs) fince many of the ablest pens have been employed upon the hiftory of the Netherlands; and endeavour to palm them upon the public for my own-but wherefore fhould I plunder the dead, to punish the living? Or with more candour than wit, more labour than fancy, and lefs judgment than reading, I might entertain my customers for a month together, with long-winded quotations from Guicciardini, Bentivoglio, Strada, Grotius, Sanderus, and many more-steal fentences from fome, and plans and prospects from others but fince thofe men have merited fo well of the republic of letters, why should I attempt to enervate them, and hath their venerable remains according to my conceit let each ftand fingle and independent upon his own bottom-may he ftill be read, ftill inform, and ftill have our tribute of praise -and so may every author who deferves it. The ingenious compiler of the Grand Tour, in common with feveral of his brethren, informs us that Bruges comes from Bridges (and of courfe Bridges from Bruges) of which they fay there are above two hundred in this city. It may be fo, for, upon my honour, I never counted them, no more than I did the streets, which, it feems, amount to two hundred and fixty. They tell you moreover that there are about feventy parochial and conventual churches-I can gafily believe it from the aftonishing number of ecclefiaftics, fecular and regular, which 2 ,, are are feen in the streets, and who abound full as much here as in any city in the Netherlands.—I tell you very fairly that my time was so short that I faw but little of that once flourishing city, arriving there only in the evening, and leaving it by nine o'clock the next morning; fo that it was with the utmost difficulty in fo large a place, that I made fhift to run up one ftreet and down another to pop my head first into one church, then into anotherif any of the courteous inhabitants did me the honour of a falute en passant, as is very customary; to present them with my beft bows in return-to ftep into one shop, and ask for fnuff; and into another, to buy a memorandum-book, with the better grace to inform myself of the name of fuch a place, or fuch an edifice-to thank them for their information, and to forget both by the time I had turned the corner of the next ftreet; with many more impertinencies of the fame kind, in the true spirit of modern travelling. Yet what little I faw, I liked; and what I liked, I needs must commend. But before I enter upon any further particulars respecting the city, let me, like a faithful guide, difembark my readers, and convey them in the moft agreeable manner from the barge without the Oftende port, to Myn Heer Vanderbergh's at the Corn-Bloom (Fleur de Bled) the house of our destination. At our near approach to the landing-place, I was ftruck with the appearance of about half a dozen fine equipages, that were waiting, as I concluded, for fome of the paffengers, gentlemen and ladies to whom they belonged, and whofe quality I began to take into further confideration. 2 As I am confident that at least one half of my readers would have been of the fame opinion, so I shall not be ashamed to acknowledge that I was under a very great mistake; and that those fame equipages, fine as they were, with all their carvingand gilding, their plate glaffes before and behind and on either fide, their velvet linings, fringes and taffels, turned out to be only a stand of hackney coaches, one of which was immediately fecured for our company. Before you can be admitted within the gates of any city in the Auftrian Netherlands, it is neceffary to answer a few lawful queftions; fuch as, Who you are? whence you came? your business? and, in particular, if you have any uncustomed goods-Nor are thofe queftions put to firangers only, but even the natives of the country, as often as they travel, must give account of themselves.- -However difagreeable fuch interruptions may be to people who have been used to do as they lift, and to come and go as they pleafe; yet as we don't find that this authority is ever abufed, no inconveniency can poffibly arife to quiet fubjects and harmless travellers-on the contrary, contrary, the fecurity of both depends upon the rigour of the ftate; and to the vigilance and uprightnefs of the magiftracy, and the exemplary lives of the clergy, it is owing that their popu lace are far more civilized than ours; that prophane fwearing, drunkenness, and other licentious abominations are discountenanced, and knavery crufhed in the bud; and that numberlefs crimes which are the growth of free cities are very rare among the Flemings. D Hallood ads As Bruges afforded no novelty to any of our party, who had been often there before, fave to my fellow-traveller and myself, we chofe rather to walk to the inn, than to be fhut up in one of their fine hacks-It is impoffible for a stranger not to be ftruck with the approaches to the city, the folemnity of the ports, the neatness of the streets, the capacioufnefs of the markets, the venerable afpects of the churches, monafteries, and public edifices, the ftatelinefs of fome houfes, and the elegancy of others; add to thefe, the univerfal tranquility among the inhabitants that fucceeded their jubilee, which ended but three days before, and you have a faint idea of what Bruges is. What it was, you may partly gather from the general face of antiquity which appears throughout its buildings; the thinness of its inhabitants, compared with its circumference: from its immenfe weighing engines, now fallen to decay from many of its canals overgrown with grafs, leading to fpacious ware houses which were once the chief repofitories in Europe! and from other circumftances which fufficiently fhew the nothingnefs of human grandeur, and the viciffitude of human things. ༢、 Yet fuch is the will of heaven, that every fublunary ftate fhould fuffer change; and that as wife and virtuous men for the most part have been the founders and improvers of cities; fo weak and wicked princes, or their minifters, have been deemed fit instruments for their ruin and overthrow. But if commerce is fallen among them, religion ftill lifts her head; and if the number who wait upon the altar can be. admitted in teftimony of the piety of its inhabitants; this fure ly may be accounted an holy city-priests and prophets in abundance but not one Jeremiah to be found to lament over her!-the truth is, that they of all people have the leaft caufe for lamentation. ST But 'tis time to take a little notice of the fituation of our inn, left we fhould ftroll too far and forget the way back. Upon my word, a very good houfe! methinks I could with it ftood a little more airy-I have no other objection—O, comes our landlord here Your fervant, gentlemen!-welcome to Bruges !—Your company's up ftairs!-fhew the room, Peter!-The ladies are juft |