Here we have in this author an instructive example: No person, in my
opinion, has made such enlightened or scientific experiments, or such
judicious observations with regard to the nature of siliceous substance,
as a compound thing; no person reasons more distinctly in general, or
sees more clearly the importance of his principles; yet, with regard to
mineral concretions, how often has he been drawn thus inadvertently
into improper generalization! I appeal to the analogy which, in this
treatise, he has formed, between the stalactical concretions upon
the surface of the earth, and the mineral concretions of siliceous
substance. As an example of the great lights, and penetrating genius, of
this assiduous studier of nature, I refer to the judicious observations
which he has made upon the subject of aluminous earth, in this
dissertation.
I am surprised to find this enlightened naturalist seeking, in the
origin of this globe of our earth, a general principle of fluidity or
solution in water, like the alkahest of the alchymists, by means of
which the different substances in the chemical constitution of precious
stones might have been united as well as crystallised.
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