ut at all increasing their temperature, as it does to raise
the temperature of water from the freezing point, one hundred and forty
degrees, or from thirty-two to one hundred and seventy-two degrees, as
indicated by the thermometer. This principle is of vast importance to
the world, and particularly to the inhabitants of cold countries, where
the ground is covered with snow and ice a part or the whole of the year.
The transition from the cold of winter to the heat of summer, in some of
the northern climates, takes place within a few days. In these climates,
also, there are vast accumulations of snow and ice, which, but for this
principle, would be converted into water as soon as the temperature of
the atmosphere becomes above thirty-two degrees, which would produce a
flood sufficient to inundate and destroy the whole country. But the
uniform action of this law renders the melting of snow gradual, and no
such accident ensues.

A similar law is observed in the conversion of _water_ into _vapor_,
which is of great use in enabling us to cool apartments by sprinkling
floors or hanging up moistened cloths. The heat of even a whole city is
in like manner greatly moderated by frequently sprinkling the streets.
It is on this account that gentle showers in hot weather are so cooling
and refreshing.

If water, like other fluids, continued to increase in density to the
freezing point, the cold air of winter would rob the water of our lakes
and rivers of its heat, until the whole was reduced to the temperature
of thirty-two degrees; when, but for the circumstance to which we have
just alluded, it would be immediately converted into a solid mass of ice
from top to bottom, causing instant death to every animal living in it.
The lower strata of such a mass of ice would never again become
liquefied.

This is a striking proof of the beneficence and design of the Creator in
forming water with such an exception to the ordinary laws of nature, and
a knowledge of it can hardly fail to exert a most salutary, elevating,
and ennobling influence on the mind of its possessor. The field of human
happiness, then, with the virtuous, seems to enlarge in proportion as a
knowledge of the works and laws of the beneficent Creator is extended.
There is little ground for doubt as to what is GOD'S WILL in relation to
the universal education of the family of man, when he has connected with
the exercise of mind in the