HA a And foon by your answer I shall perceive then, 4. Have a care dabling qúerist, we kindly advife you, If caution's in season, and comes not too late, Let the loss of a nose be enough to surprise you, And know that the eyes often bear the same fate : For although you may now be consummate in eithere. Too foon you may find them both fuffrers together. On the Anniversary of her Majesty's coronation-day. [Ail glorious fou'reign, whose illustrious name Fills with extatick sounds the trump of fame: May this returning day produce new bliss, Transporting joys, and every day like this. Already round the globe your actions shine, Of late, impending clouds, with thunder charg'a, She spoken And like our God, behinda cloud: Q. How old was our Saviour, when he was crucified? A. Irenaus affirms, that he was either fifty, or between forty and fifty, But as he grounds his opinion upon particular, not universal tradition ;, as he enforces it from that inconclusive sentence, thou art Agt yet fifty years old.; as he can no ways réconcile it with a passage in St. Luke compar'd with St. John's account by Paftovers, so we fhall take no further nos tice of it. The chief difficulty of the question lies in fixing his age at his entrance upon his publick ministry, since it is granted, that he spent therein three years and an half. Some maintain, that he was then entred on his thirtieth year, which they gather from Luke iii. 23. και αυτG- ήν ώσει ετών τριάκοντα αρκόμεν@», which our translation renders, and Jefus himself began to be as. bout thirty years of age. But as this is contrary to the time appointed by the law, for the Levitès to be gin the service of the Sanctuary, which requires thirty years compleat ; others therefore more probably afa firm that ápxómsvą (which is render'd began) is an expletive or pleonasm (terms importing an useless or redundant word) or else refers not to our Saviour's age, but to his publick miniftry: And then the sense is this, Jesus himself was about thirty years of age, when he began his facerdotal office. Others again, who are very conversant in history and chronology, contend' that from several circum. stances in both those sciences it may be gather'd, that he was 33 years of age when he began to preach.. Neither does this any way derogate from the afore mention's paffage in St. Luke, fince the Evangelift's design seems not so much to acquaint us with the precise age of our blessed Lord, but to let us know, that he was arrived at that determin’d period, before which it was unlawful to officiate in holy things.. And this opinion is fomewhat favour'd by the partis cle wrsi about, or as it were. Q. I wou'd know, whether 'tis allowable by the friet laws of God for cousin germans to marry. For our laws allow us in many things, that the laws of God do not ? A. It may be too severe to pronounce it absolutely unlawful, fince not taken notice of in the catalogue of unlawful marriages prohibited in Levit. xviii. nor can by parity of reason be deduc'd from any prohibia tion there. H:6 Q. Why Q. Why is it common in our church to fit, when a chapter is read out of any of the Evangelists, and yet 10 fand, when the Gospel for the day is read ? A. It was the custom in the primitive Church to ftand, when any thing was read out of the Evangelifts : And therefore it is remark'd by an ecclesiastical historian as an unpresidented thing in an Alexandrian bishop, in that be us’d not to rise at the reading of the Gospels. But why we rise to the Gospel for the day and not to the second leffon, we presume to be, because the former is introduc'd with glory be to thee, O Lord! Which as being an hymn of praise, is pro. per to be repeated in a standing posture. Q. Your opinion, whether the flux and reflux of the sea may be attributed to the motion of the earth; or as fome think, proportioned to the moon? A. That the tides cannot derive their original from the motion of the earth round its own axis is apparent from some of those objections, which the opposers of the Copernican system alledge against such a motion. But as it is generally agreed, that they are chiefly owing to the moon, so not to its pressure occafion'd by its motion, as was once suppos’d, but to the mutual tendències naturally inberent in all bodies. But that the fun as well as moon has some influences on the tides is evident from hence, in that they are greater, when those two luminaries are in their conjunctions and oppositions, than when in their quadratures. Q. I fell a huse for sol. and get as much, per cent, as the horse cost me. Pray what does the borse cost ? I defire also to know whether this can be folved by arithmetick? A. To the first part of the question, we answer, that if from the root of 3 you subtract 1, and multiply the remainder by 50; you will have the price of the horse, that is nearly 361. 12 s, od. 2 f. To the second, that there is no numerical question but what may be answer'd by arithmetick, for arithme. tick teaches to add, subtract, multiply, divide and extract roots, now these are all the operations that are are necessary to solve any question ; 'tis true, the books of common arithmetick do not direct how these rules must be applied, except in some few easy cases ; therefore recourse must be had to Algebra, which shews how these rules must be combined, and without which a man can't call himself an aritbmetician. Q. There are three perfons, viz. J. P. W. R. and W. J. equally intituled to an estate of 61. per annum, novo J. P. has received it and enjoy'd the benefit of improvement for 30 years past, but desires to do all imaginable justice to the other two parties concern’d, W. R. and W. J. Query, what J. P. must give for each proportion, deducting only 12 years taxes at 4 s. per pound, per annum ? A. We suppose that the improvement 7. P. has made of his money has been at the rate of 6 l. per cent. per ann, and that the taxes have been paid the last 12 years, according to this 7. P. ought to give W. R. and to W. 7. each, 1511. 7s. 40. Perhaps this may at first view secm somewhat ftrange to those who consider 3. P. has received but 1801. in all, but if they please to consider the vast raising of money, when the interests and interests of interests, donc. are continually improved, they may cease to wonder. Q. Gentlemen, as I was walking t’other day, I obferu'd a kite in the air, to fwm several times round in a circle, without the least perceivable motion either of body or wings, and kept 'em all that time in a horizontal position, and get continued to move circular a considerable pace, and I have often observed that when kites fly the swiftest, their bodies seem to lye in a horizontal posture, and their wings move a feeming perpendicular, whilf at the fame time the birds move forwards with a great velocity. Now Gentlemen, I desire to know the manner how the fight of birds is perform'd, and to what mechanick powers they are reducible ? Your answer to this will oblige, Genflemen, your humble servant, Nicholas. Cason. A. The flight of birds is perform'd by the same mechanick powers, by which any other local notion in in other animals is perform’d, viz. by means of mufcular fibres swellid and contracted by the influx of animal fpirits from the brain ; but to give a particular explication of that mechanism in describing almost the whole fabrick of the body of birds, but chiefly the structure and composition of their wings, the disposition, bigness, strength and various insertion of those muscles by which they are moved, doc. Since it would take much more room and time than can well be spared, we are obligʻd to refer you for these and other curiosities relating to that matter, to the accurate treatise of the learned Alfonfus Borellus de Mot. Animal. Ch. 22. ist part. Where you will find that birds without the vibration of their wings may continue some time to Ay not only horizontally, but also oblique upwards. However, it is not to be fupposed that the circular motion of the kite you saw fhould continue so long without some agitation of his wings, tho it may be scarce perceivable at that distance it was from you, except we should imagine it was so carried away by some vortical motion of the air, Q. What is the cause of that disease call'd Chorea Sancti Viti, or St. Vitus's dance ? A. Chorea Saneti Viti, or St. Vitus's dance, seems to proceed from a disorder of the animal spirits, by an heterogeneous copula, which becoming fierce and unbridled, it is necessary they should be to exercised and fatigued, that they themselves might be tamed, and the offending matter dissipated. Q. Why, when people speak improperly, is it term’d a 4. It became a proverb from the repeated blunders of one Obadiah Bull, a lawyer of London, who liv'd in the reign of king Henry the VII. Q. Gentlemen, there is a wager laid upon the folloveing question, which depends upon your answer, Whether the moon in Ireland is Like the moon in England ? Tours; &c. Tho. Trump. a bull ? A. There |