crystallizations and configurations of saline particles. He was a Member of that Society, and of the Society of Antiquaries.

Besides his philosophical poem entitled "The UNIVERSE," ," he published two volumes on the construction and the employment of the Microscope. These works were found so worthy the attention of the curious that they passed through many editions in his life time:-and, indeed, so very useful are they in microscopical researches, that no one, possessed of a microscope, should be without them.

He also published a history of a small, but wonderful, aquatic animalcule, called the POLYPE; a creature which, in the ordinary mode of propagation, is produced from the side of its parent; first appearing as a small protuberance, from whence it gradually encreases to a perfect animalcule, and then drops from the side of its parent, to provide for itself, and to produce its own likeness. This

créature is multiplied by other extraordinary means; namely, by being cut into two or more parts, each of which parts will, in a few days, become a perfect animal, like the first.

Mr. BAKER terminated a creditable and useful life, in November, 1774, and was buried at St. Mary le Strand, in which church is a tablet to his memory.

THE

AUTHOR'S PREFACE.

IT has too long been a general, though absurd, opinion that all the WORKS OF Providence we see around us, were created only for the use of MAN. Ignorance and pride, which first began, have since continued this mistake; and, being imbibed in childhood, the early prejudice of education has given it such authority, that to doubt its truth, will, by many, be accounted high impiety; though quite the contrary, to any one who dares reflect, is so ex-' tremely plain, that little more is necessary than to look about us, in order to be convinced.

I am not for displacing MAN from his proper degree in the eternal scale of BEINGS. He is,

without dispute, the first upon this Globe: His Reason makes him Lord over every other creature here.— But this Globe itself is so inconsiderable, so near to nothing, compared with the GRAND UNIVERSE, that to be swelled with this small pre-eminence, and fancy himself therefore the Lord of the whole Creation, is no less ridiculous than it would be for a puny inhabitant of an ant-hill, to strut about, and boast that all the earth was made for him alone.

As self-love is the inborn principle of mankind, so is pride, its first-begotten, their general passion. No one lives without it: even the beggar in his rags imagines himself of consequence. Nor is this passion useless, or to be blamed, but when it over-stretches much beyond the bounds of reason: for it excites the mind to emulate and rise above its fellows, to gain and to deserve esteem. The love and the respect of others are the just, as well as the wished, reward of every good action: but, without this passion, they both would be disregarded, and we