_unapt to cohere_, and so
_minute_ and _little_, that a very _small_ degree of agitation keeps them
always in the _state of fluidity_. Of this kind, I suppose, the _AEther_,
that is the _medium_ or _fluid_ body, in which all other bodies do as it
were swim and move; and particularly, the _Air_, which seems nothing else
but a kind of _tincture_ or _solution_ of terrestrial and aqueous particles
_dissolv'd_ into it, and agitated by it, just as the _tincture_ of
_Cocheneel_ is nothing but some finer _dissoluble_ parts of that Concrete
lick'd up or _dissolv'd_ by the _fluid_ water. And from this Notion of it,
we may easily give a more Intelligible reason how the Air becomes so
capable of _Rarefaction_ and _Condensation_. For, as in _tinctures_, one
grain of some _strongly tinging_ substance may _sensibly_ colour some
_hundred thousand_ grains of _appropriated_ Liquors, so as every _drop_ of
it has its proportionate share, and be sensibly ting'd, as I have try'd
both with _Logwood_ and _Cocheneel_: And as some few grains of _Salt_ is
able to infect as great a quantity, as may be found by _praecipitations_,
though not so easily by the _sight_ or _taste_; so the _Air_, which seems
to be but as 'twere a _tincture_ or _saline substance, dissolv'd and
agitated by the fluid and agil AEther_, may disperse and _expand_ it self
into a _vast space_, if it have room enough, and infect, as it were, every
part of that space. But, as on the other side, if there be but some _few
grains_ of the liquor, it may _extract all_ the colour of the tinging
substance, and may _dissolve_ all the Salt, and thereby become _much more
impregnated_ with those substances, so may _all_ the air that sufficed in a
_rarfy'd state_ to fill some _hundred thousand_ spaces of AEther, be
compris'd in only _one_, but in a position proportionable _dense_. And
though we have not yet found out such _strainers_ for Tinctures and Salts
as we have for the Air, being yet unable to _separate_ them from their
dissolving liquors by any kind of _filtre_, without _praecipitation_, as we
are able to _separate_ the Air from the AEther by _Glass_, and several
other bodies. And though we are yet unable and ignorant of the ways of
_praecipitating_ Air out of the AEther as we can Tinctures, and Salts out
of several _dissolvents_; yet neither of these seeming _impossible_ from
the nature of the things, nor so _improbable_ but that some happy future
industry may find out ways to effect t