er, that we mifrepresent this neological philofopher, for really Je diffeminent, et fe tamifent, are the terms which he employs. And you are hence to learn, or may learn, if you please, how the folar rays (or vibrations) are diffeminated and fifted through the atmospherical air, in order to form that day-light, or that eclat of white rays, by which we perceive objects: for this atmospherical or day-light is compofed of clear and obfcure rays, which, fifting themselves anew upon folid bodies, are abforbed in them, by inflexions, if thefe bodies are opaque, or pafs through them in right lines, if they be tranfparent. Again-if you are defirous of accounting for all the phenomena of catoptrics and dioptrics, you have only to confider this light, as fifted on glaffes and mirrours, and you have the clue of the labyrinth. And then-as to prifmatic colours, do not be so childifh as to confider them as the effect of the decompofition of light; for our Author proves to all, who are capable of underfanding his demonstration, that they are the effect of the lightforming (lucefiques fays the French) vibrations of the univerfal fluid, which pafs through the different ftrata or regions of the atmosphere, undergo various modifications by the ofcillation of the atoms that compose these different ftrata, and, when diffeminated on the prifm, exhibit themselves under all these modifications to the eye of the fpectator.

The theory of founds is likewife derived from the centrifugal force of rotation as its mechanical cause, and the Author explains the manner in which the fonorific vibration is executed in the ambient air, and in what it differs from the lucific or lightforming vibration. There is a very confiderable portion of jargon in this explication; and yet it has fuch an appearance of fcientific reafoning, that we are not at all furprised that it has dazzled fuperficial readers, and those who have an intemperate defire of novelty. There is fomething lefs obfcure and more plaufible in his difquifition concerning the production of odours and the phyfical caufe of their propagation. The mechanical caufe here is fill the rotation of the earth, or its centrifugal force, from whence, according to our Author, all evaporation and exhalation refult, and from which also arife the general atmosphere of the globe, and the particular atmospheres of bodies; which laft are the phyfical caufes of odours, being compofed of the fame principles with the bodies to which they belong, and odours being no more than a mere dilatation of these atmofpheres, and not an emanation or wafte of the substance of the bodies themfelves. The novelties which follow these are ftill more remote from the received opinions: those that regard the theory of the mineral kingdom are audaciously hypothetical; the theory of vegetation is equally ingenious and romantic, but the theory of the animal kingdom, of the formation of living

beings is, indeed, fuch an extravagant extenfion of the liberty of inventing, as is an infult upon the patience of the philofophical reader. Such pompous phrafes, fuch brilliant nonsense, we do not remember to have ever met with. We have no conception that fuch phrafes and notions could be permitted to pass through the pen of such an intelligent and ingenious man as M. CARRA, unless he defigned to amufe the Public, at the expence of the refined fyftem-builders of modern times, by exhibiting a Bayes in philofophy, to hold forth their fimilitude with all its ridiculoufnefs.

II. Vie d' André Doria, Prince de Melfi, &c. i. e. The Life of ANDREW DORIA, Prince of Amalfi, General of the Naval Armies of Francis I. and afterwards of thofe of the Emperor Charles V. By M. RICHER. 12mo. 256 pages, with the portrait of Doria. Paris. 1783. Paris. 1783. Pr. 30 fous.-M. RICHER, whofe pen has been long exercised in hiftorical compofition, has lately formed the defign of publishing the lives of the most eminent fea-commanders. John Bart, Barbaroffa, and Tourville, have already appeared. De Ruyter and Duquesne, we are told, are in the prefs. Inferior to none in valour, virtue, modefty, and generofity, was the illuftrious hero, whofe life we here announce, and few lives are more interefting than that of Andrew Doria. He was born at Onelia, in the territory of Genoa, in the year 1468, commanded the fleet of Francis I. who was fo imprudent as to force him, by ill-treatment, to quit his service, and enter into that of his rival Charles V. who derived fignal benefit from his talents and genius. DORIA was not only famous for his military exploits: he acquired a ftill fuperior renown, from his being the deliverer of Genoa, to which he gave the republican form of government, which still fubfifts. He was offered the fovereignty, deserved it, and refused it. His highcft gratification was the consciousness of having deserved it, and this he enjoyed to the age of 93. He was humane, generous, and magnificent. He was the refuge and friend of the unfortunate. He never spoke of himself, and was conftantly applauding the exploits of others. Thefe are only a few lines of the illuftrious life and character, which the Reader will find well delineated in the work before us.

12mo.

* II. La Vie du Pape Benoit XIV. &c. i. e. The Life of Profper Lambertini, Pope of Rome, under the Name of Benedict XIV. -with inftructive Notes, and a Portrait of the Pontiff. 326 pages. Paris. 1783. Price 30 fous. The name and the virtues, the wit and learning, the humane heart, liberality of fentiment, and gentle manners of this excellent Pontiff are yet fresh in the memory of those who contemplate with pleasure eminent and worthy characters, But the Public is indebted, pevertheless, to M. CARRACCIOLI for the care he has taken to

7

make

make this great man ftill more fully and more univerfally known, and for many anecdotes concerning his life and character, which deferve to be redeemed from oblivion.

IV. Oeuvres complettes de Lyfias, &c. i. e. The whole Works of Lyfias, tranflated into French. By the Abbé AUGER, Vicar General of the Diocese of Lefcar, and Member of the Royal Academy of Infcriptions and Belles Lettres, To which is prefixed a Preliminary Difcourfe, and a Critical Differtation concerning the Neceffity and the true Method of correcting and restoring the ancient Texts. 8vo. 551 pages. Paris. 1783.. 551 pages. Paris. 1783.The Abbé AUGER, whofe learned labours we have had often occafion to mention, is far raifed above the clafs of common tranflators. He is a fcholar, a critic, and a man of tafte,-three characters too rarely united in tranflators and commentators! The Abbé's defign in tranflating Lvfias is to exhibit a model of that noble fimplicity which is effential to true eloquence, in opposition, fays he, to that affected, studied, artificial eloquence which prevails too much among the French orators, both at the bar and in the pulpit. The characters that form the eloquence of Lyfias, according to our Author's ample account of this orator, are purity of ftyle, precifion and propriety in the ufe of terms, perfpicuity without diffufion, fine moral painting, a nice feeling of the decent and the fitting, eafe and fimplicity without negligence; and, above all, that invincible charm, that fweet and powerful attraction, called grace, which the most ignorant often feel, which the most knowing can never define, and in which Lyfias. had neither fuperior nor equal. Our Abbé confiders the merit of Lyfias in the different kinds of eloquence, compares him with Ifocrates and Demofthenes, and fhews where he furpaffes, and where he is furpaffed by these illuftrious rivals. The Critical Dissertation, in which he points out the obligations and qualities that bind and characterize an editor of ancient authors, is fenfible and judicious; and the reftrictions he annexes to the liberty of correcting the text, and reftoring words that have been corrupted or omitted, are fuch as we think every wife critic must adopt.

V. In the Year 1772, the celebrated naturalift M. ROME DE L'ISLE,, published his Chryftallography, or, a Defcription of the Forms peculiar to all Mineral Bodies in their Combination with Saline, Stoney, and Metallic Substances; and though this work was only an Effay, in which the Author confined his obfervations to polyedrical forms with plain facets, and confequently to a fmall number of the bodies that form the mineral kingdom, it met with the most favourable reception, and was highly applauded by Linnæus. The fame work, greatly augmented, and fwelled to four volumes octavo, has been lately published under the following title, Chryftallographie, &c. i. e. Chryftallography, ar a Defcription of the Farms peculiar to all the Bodies of the Mine

ral

ral Kingdom, in their State of Saline, Stoney, or Metallic Combindtion-together with Figures, and Synoptical Tables of all known Cryftals. Paris. 1783.-This fecond edition exhibits a much more extenfive and complete work than the first; for the Author takes in the whole mineral kingdom, by confidering the faline, ftoney, and metallic fubstances, of which it is compofed, under the three afpects of determinate, indeterminate, and confused cryfiallization. He even takes a curfory view of those bodies which, without being cryftallized, appear under a polygonal form, more or lefs diftinct, which is derived from the feparation or the approximation of their undiffolved integrant molecules, as our Author expreffes himself. Thus his work is not only as complete a Chryftallography as the prefent ftate of our knowledge in phyfics will admit, but also a body of Lithology, which, in concert with Mineralogy, opens general and important views relative to the theory of the earth.

VI. The publishers of the General and Particular Hiftory of ancient Greece, which we mentioned about the time of its first appearance, have given a new and magnificent edition of this celebrated work in thirteen volumes 8vo, with 73 plates, engraved by the most eminent artists. Only two hundred copies of the work, and of the plates, are printed, that the purchafers may be affured of having the beft impreffions of the latter. Among the plates are 11 maps, 13 picturesque views of the ruins of Greece and of feveral of its monuments, reftored according to the principles of antient architecture; and 26 prints, reprefenting the mafter-pieces of sculpture that diftinguished the moft fhining period of the arts in Greece, ufually called the age of Alexander, fuch as the Groupe of Laocoon, the Farnefe Bull, the Venus de Medicis, the Apollo of Belvidere, the Wrestlers, the Hermaphrodite, the Antinous, &c. The work will coft 5 livres each volume-the plates 30 livres; but this price was to be increased after the month of September 1783 to 120 livres.

GERMANY and the NORT H.

VII. Thefaurus, &c. i. e. The Swedish Collection, containing Works, either compofed by Swedish Writers, or relative to the Kingdom of Sweden, felected and published by M. CHARLES CHRISTOPHER GJORWELL, Librarian to his Swedish Majefty. Vol. I. in 8vo. Stockholm. 1782.-This collection is to confift of Academical Memoirs, of Differtations published in the Universities of Sweden, of the Difcourfes, Poems, Letters or Lives of illuftrious men; all in Latin.-Each volume is to contain four numbers, and it is only the 1ft number of the first volume that we have now before us. This contains the fix following articles:-1. Gustavologia, or, a Poem on the Coronation of GUSTAVUS III. King of Sweden.-2. A Memoir concerning the

Laws

Laws and Jurifprudence of Sweden: by Profeffor OLAUS RABENIUS, of Upfal.-3. A Differtation concerning the Plants of Surinam, publifhed in 1775, at the Univerfity of Upfal, by the late Chevalier LINNEUS.-4. A Fragment of Livy, lately difcovered at Rome, publifhed and enriched with critical Notes, by M. JOHN IHRE, Profeffor of Eloquence at Upfal, Knight of the Polar Star, and Member of feveral Literary Societies.-5. 1 Differtation on the State of Literature in Sweden, during the Union of Calmar; published in the Univerfity of Lunden, by M. LAGERBRING, Profeffor of Hiftory.-6. A Differtation concerning the unnatural Senfibility of the Bones, publifhed in the Year 1780, in the University of Upfal, by ADOLPHUS MURRAY, M. D. Royal Profeffor of Anatomy and Chirurgery. All these pieces have been publifhed feparately; but it is thus that many valuable Differtations have only a tranfitory existence, and fink too foon into oblivion. The republic of letters is, therefore, indebted to the learned editor of this Mifcellany, for the zeal and care he has employed in giving this collection a form, that will perpetuate its valuable contents.

VIII. PROSPECTUS d'une Geographie de l'Inde, &c. i. e. PROPOSALS for the Publication of an accurate and complete Geography of India, compofed in the Country and Places defcribed. This work is accompanied with every circumftance which can recommend a work yet unpublished, and attract the attention and confidence of the curious. It is the fruit of travels and ob fervations, carried on during the space of twenty years without interruption. Its author is a learned Miffionary, who has refided in Indoftan near 40 years *, and who compofed it in Latin; and its editor is M. JOHN BERNOULLI, Member of the Royal Academy of Sciences at Berlin, who has tranflated and defigns to publish it in French. The celebrated M. Anquetil du Perron, fome years ago, mentioned F. Tieffenthaler with the higheft encomiums, as the author of three remarkable Indian maps, and of a Defcription of Hindostan which had been fent into Denmarkt. It is this very Defcription that M. BERNOULLI propofes to publifh: M. Anquetil's account of its exiftence excited his curiofity and defire to fee, and, if poffible, to poffefs it, and he, after much inquiry, found it in the hands of M. Kratzenftein, Profeffor at Copenhagen, from whom he purchafed it with the knowledge and confent of the Author. M. BERNOULLI purchafed, at the fame time, 60 drawings, made, each, upon the. spot, and reprefenting particular districts in Indoftan, plans and

*F. JOSEPH TIEFFENTHALER, a native of Trent, and a learned Ex-Jefuit and Millionary.

+ See the Journal des Savans of Paris for December 1776 (or, ac-` cording to the Dutch Edition, January 1777).

REV. O&. 1783.

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