He is here situated in regions not only peculiarly suited to his bodily constitution, but to the development of his moral and intellectual faculties. The variety of climate, alternating between moderate heat and mitigated cold, while it requires attention to the comforts of clothing and habitation in their adaptation to the changes of the seasons, and thus exercises his ingenuity, presses still more powerfully on the resources of his mind, by the cessation, during a considerable part of the year, of that supply of the necessaries of existence, which, at another season, is afforded in comparative abundance. Under the influence of these circumstances, man becomes, by a kind of moral and physical necessity, a storing animal; and habits of forethought, thus engendered, are strengthened and increased by exercise, till the mercantile spirit is produced.

The same tendency is encouraged by the diversified productions of different soils, of changing seasons, of various elevations from the mountain to the valley, of adjoining islands and continents, and even of more distant regions. Placed in the middle, between the two extremes of climate, the productions of the north and of the south are equally within reach of the inhabitants of the temperate zones; and experience soon teaches him the enjoyment and comfort of accumulating from both quarters. The neighbourhood of seas, lakes, and rivers, contributes much to the fostering of this spirit, by affording facilities of intercourse which could not otherwise be obtained; and, accordingly, we find that the early efforts of commercial enterprise have been chiefly confined to such localities, or, at least, have derived their origin or their stimulus from them. It is true, that the first traders of whom we read, were among the descendants of Ishmael, a wandering and active inland tribe; but it was to the maritime land of Egypt that they were directing their course for conducting their petty traffic. The rise of the mercantile spirit in Egypt is easily accounted for, on the principles to which we had adverted. Situated on the banks of the Nile, a navigable river, with the ea towards the south, and

the broad Mediterranean towards the north, it is no wonder that the Egyptians should have been among the earliest and most successful merchants of ancient times. A similar remark may apply to Tyre, Sidon, and Carthage, where the mercantile spirit also prevailed. And, indeed, it is impossible not to regard the subsequent civilization of European nations, surrounded as they are by facilities for navigation, and situated in a climate possessing all the properties we have described, as the natural, or rather providential, result of the same principles.

SECOND WEEK-FRIDAY.

PRACTICAL EFFECT OF THE COMMERCIAL SPIRIT PRODUCED BY A VARIETY OF CLIMATES.

Ir would be very interesting to trace the progress of a mercantile spirit, arising from the wants of one climate, and the superabundance of another; but this is a speculation which I cannot at present stop to pursue in its various bearings; and I must confine myself to a rapid view of the practical effects actually produced by it in European countries, and especially in our own.

The desire to possess, when once thoroughly awakened, becomes insatiable; and this, again, gives a proportionate stimulus to the spirit of enterprise, which induces the traveller to urge his discoveries, and the trader to compass sea and land in the transport of produce from country to country; while the artificer, the manufacturer, and the agriculturist, each in his own department, exert their industry, skill, and ingenuity, in turning to account the knowledge and the materials which thus flow in upon them. It is because neither the climate nor the soil of any one country is naturally suited to the production of all the luxuries and conveniences which man covets, and because, even where these objects of desire might

be produced by human industry, they are not naturally to be found, that the intercourse between distant countries takes place, on which so much of the civilization of the world depends. The ingenuity of man being thus stimulated, produces the most surprising changes, and promotes, in an astonishing degree, the means of human subsistence and enjoyment. It is not merely that the varied riches of other lands are imported, but that an essential alteration is effected in the actual produce of the soil.

It is a remarkable fact, noticed by Mr. Whewell, that where man is an active cultivator, he scarcely every bestows much of his care on those vegetables which the land would produce in a state of nature. He improves the soil, he even improves the climate, by his skilful labours, and he thus renders both fit for sustaining and nourishing plants of a higher quality. He, therefore, does not generally select the more valuable of the natural productions, and improve them by careful culture, but, for the most part, he expels the native possessors of the land, and introduces colonies of strangers. This remark he proceeds to exemplify in the condition of our own part of the globe.

'Scarcely one of the plants,' he says, 'which occupy our fields and gardens, is indigenous to the country.. The walnut and the peach come to us from Persia; the apricot from Armenia. From Asia Minor and Syria, we have the cherrytree, the fig, the pear, the pomegranate, the olive, the plum, and the mulberry. The vine which is now cultivated, is not a native of Europe; it is found wild on the shores of the Caspian, in Armenia, and Caramania. The most useful species of plants, the cereal vegetables, are certainly strangers, though their birth-place seems to be an impenetrable secret. Some have fancied that barley is found wild on the banks of the Semara, in Tartary; rye in Crete; wheat at Baschkiros, in Asia; but this is held by the best botanists to be very doubtful. The potato, which has been so widely diffused over the world, in modern times, and has added so much to

the resources of life in many countries, has been found equally difficult to trace back to its wild condition."

'In our own country,' Mr. Whewell goes on to observe, a higher state of the arts of life is marked by a more ready and extensive adoption of foreign productions. Our fields are covered with herbs from Holland, and roots from Germany; with Flemish farming, and Swedish turnips; our hills with forests of the firs of Norway. The chesnut and the poplar of the south of Europe adorn our lawns, and below them flourish shrubs and flowers, from every clime, in profusion. In the meantime, Arabia improves our horses, China our pigs, North America our poultry, Spain our sheep, and almost every country sends its dog. The products which are ingredients in our luxuries, and which we cannot naturalize at home, we raise in our colonies; the cotton, coffee, and sugar, of the East, are thus transplanted to the farthest West; and man lives in the middle of a rich and varied abundance, which depends on the facility with which plants and animals, and modes of culture can be transferred into lands far removed from those in which nature had placed them. And this plenty and variety of material comforts is the companion and the mark of advantages and improvements in social life, of progress in art and science, of activity of thought, of energy of purpose, and of ascendancy of character.'

This splendid display of the effects of commercial and agricultural intercourse, which might easily be enlarged, depending, as that intercourse mainly does, on the influence, direct and indirect, of varieties of climate on the surface of the earth, serves to show a wise and beneficent intention in so unequal a distribution of temperature, and brings us back to the conclusion, that whatever partial inconveniences may accompany such arrangement, these are vastly counterbalanced by the advantages of which it is productive. If it

* Whewell's Bridgewater Treatise, p. 71.-He observes in a note, that it appears now to be ascertained that the edible potato is found wild in the neighbourhood of Valparaiso.

be true, as it undoubtedly is, that much of the activity, ingenuity, and intelligence, which exist in the world, had their first development in the circumstances attending the differ ences in question; and if the very wants and privations of a less genial climate have eventually, not merely, improved the intellectual character of men, but bound them together by new and intimate ties, from the equator to the vicinity of the poles, how can we avoid the inference, that such extensive and important results were contemplated and provided for by the Divine Mind, in establishing the relations between the natural and moral worlds?

SECOND WEEK-SATURDAY.

ADAPTATION OF ORGANIZED EXISTENCES TO SEASONS AND

CLIMATES.

THE adaptation of plants and animals to the changes of the seasons, which, taken even in the broad and general view, is so clear an indication of an intelligent Designing Cause, is no where more conspicuous than in the season of winter. Were but a strong and continuous blast of the icy breath of winter to pass over our forests, fields, and gardens, in any of those months when vegetation is in its glory, and when animated nature luxuriates in universal plenty, the effect would be most disastrous. All organized existences would feel the fatal shock. Leaves, and fruits, and flowers, would shrink, wither, and decay; insects on the wing would fall lifeless to the earth; the various species of caterpillars would drop stiff and dying from the frozen vegetables on which they fed; even the larger animals would be stricken with the general blight; birds and beasts, if they did not instantly perish, would droop and shiver; and man himself, adapted as his constitution is to sustain the rigours of all climates, would find himself invaded by deadly diseases. Nor would the evil end here. Not only would individuals