16 PSALM CXXXIX-ITS SOLEMN IMPORT. "My thoughts, before they are my own, On every side I find thy hand : "If, mounted on a morning ray, "The veil of night is no disguise, APPLICATION. "O may these thoughts possess my breast, Nor let my weaker passions dare Such thoughts can never be misplaced anywhere, but their best abiding place is our heart-the altar where we may partake of holy communion with God. "Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my strength and my Redeemer."-Psa. xix. But since the Jerusalem area affects us, in what way do we return the action? One example from among HIGH PRESSURE-ITS REMOTE EFFECTS. 17 a multitude of instances must suffice-presuming that like causes produce similar effects, in a degree, from time to time. In the quarto" Meteorological Observations "--from the Observatory, Greenwich, under the direction of the Astronomer Royal, we find, 1840, December 1st, 2nd, 3rd, the Barometer to be 30.34; calm, or very light air N. N.W.; the days were fine and very tranquil and in a state of repose. But this high pressure of the barometer with us was productive of a dreadful hurricane on the coasts of Syria and Circassia. The high pressure of our atmosphere rushed down like an impetuous torrent to the S.E. area, where the barometer was low. The evening of the 1st of December was fine, but fresh; the wind quickened up in the night to a gale. At 5 A.M. of the 2nd of December it was very violent, with thunder and lightning. By 9 A.M. it blew a hurricane. Our ships at anchor off Beyrout threw their guns overboard, the anchors came home in an awful squall, and at sunset there appeared no hopes of saving the ships. On the 3rd the wind moderated and shifted a little. Every vessel on the coast of Circassia was lost, and the extent of disasters from this dreadful storm can never be ascertained-many went down at their anchors, and the devoted town of Beyrout suffered more from this gale than from the storming by our fleet. The English ships did not escape, for the Zebra, a man-ofwar brig, was wrecked. The Pique frigate lost all her 18 GALES IN MEDITERRANEAN-REMOTE CAUSE OF. masts and became a sheer hulk-lost her four best anchors, rudder damaged, etc. The Bellerophon, seventy-four, much injured, etc. And the changes at the two places were simultaneous and as delicately sensitive as the ends of a balance reciprocating with each other. In the following month of January, 1841, on the 21st, the barometer was again at high pressure of 30-40 inches, sharp frost, 18°, fine, but cool and pleasant, and very tranquil, ponds bearing. The greater part of the Mediterranean was visited with very heavy and severe gales from the rushing down of our high pressure upon an area of low pressure like a vast cataract. At Toulon, and Algiers, and Phillipville, it was most terrific. Twenty-eight merchant vessels were driven ashore. Thus we have indisputable evidence that even the Persian Gulf and us may reciprocate; and that opposite states exist at one and the same time, at remote areas, being associated states and necessary results. As these facts cannot be controverted, so they cannot be casual, neither in respect to our thunder storms with the S.E. Sirocco, or their severe gales from the N.W. I have endeavoured to associate heat and electricity, as analagous in some properties, and I think I am warranted in extending it somewhat further by assigning a polarity to heat, by which is meant, according to the usual definition, "that quality of a body in virtue of which peculiar properties reside in certain points, usually as in electrified or magnetised bodies." The fact of a cold and a hot point co-existent, the POLARITY OF HEAT. 19 simultaneous concentration of heat in the focus of one area, and the concentration of cold in the focus of another area, and the conjoint effect or action being co-temporaneous, and limited to the same day, and probably to the same hour-all these confer upon heat the character of polarity, opposite states of equivalent quantities. It may seem a great anomaly to suppose that at any time we receive an accession of heat from the Polar regions; but such may be the case, although it is repugnant to our ideas. Degrees of heat are absolute quantities, temperature is a relative effect, and it is well known that the polar regions are remarkable for extreme fluctuations of temperature, the range of the thermometer in the winter months being sometimes as much as 60° or 70°. If it is true, as we have endeavoured to show, that any given area of the atmosphere, losing 10° or 20° degrees of heat, and that those degrees are transferred to some other area, it is quite immaterial where those 10° or 20° of heat come from, whether from air 20° below zero, or from air 40° above zero. The heat can be transferred without the air. For if when the thermometer sinks to 20° below zero, and it subsequently requires 20° of heat to bring it back again, then those 20° which it lost must have raised the temperature of some other place. We have no knowledge of any such thing as a real zero, or 0, i.e., where there is no heat; the idea is a mere metaphysical abstraction; it may be a convenient point of reference, and the freezing point of water would seem to be the most rational. 20 CLIMATE OF ENGLAND-ITS ADVANTAGES. The subject we have been considering may not be without some practical value, in a mental or even moral point of view, as tending to rectify a general misapprehension that the climate of England is much more changeable and variable than any other, and this is apt to give rise to undue complaints and sometimes to reproach. Nothing can be more incorrect, for it is a positive law that our climate, or the weather, cannot change without an equal change in some other part, and that all are subjected to the same vicissitudes as ourselves in turn, within the temperate and frigid zones. Taken on the whole, the climate of England is favourable to health, longevity, and enjoyment-and that for our latitude we have the mildest winters of any place on the globe, and that the variations of temperature are within a moderate limit; but with this seeming disadvantage, that the variations are around and about the freezing point, say from 10° above to 10° below; hence, very great apparent changes, of one day frost and snow, and next mild, soft, and thawing. Whereas in the colder climates a variation of 10° or 15° does not raise the temperature to the thawing point; hence, the frost continues more permanent, although the change of temperature has been as great or greater than our own. This with our moist atmosphere and cloudy skies are our chief characteristics. But what an immense advantage have we in the exemption from severer and more continuous cold, which would freeze our harbours, and impede our |