For instance, I have a sovereign plant to fix the human mind, and which would give steadiness even to a Babylonian: but for these fifty years I have been diligently observing Babylon, and have not found one single moment, wherein the Inclinations, Customs, and Manners have been worth fixing. I have another plant, most excellent for checking the too lively sallies of the spirit of invention: but thou knowest how rare these sallies are now-a-days: never was invention at a lower ebb. One would think that every thing has been said, and that nothing more remained but to adapt things to the taste and mode of the age. I have a root which would never fail to allay that sourness of the Learned who censure one another: but I observe that without their abusing and railing at each other, no man would concern himself about their disputes. It is a sort of pleasure to see them bring themselves as well as Learning into contempt. I leave the malignity of the readers to divert themselves with the malignity of the Authors. Moreover, do not imagine that nature sleeps in any part of the earth; she strenuously labours even in those infinitely minute spaces where the eye cannot reach. At Giphantia, she disposes matter on extraordinary plans, and perpetually tends to produce something new: she every where incessantly repeats her labours, still endeavouring to carry her works to a degree of perfection which she never attains. These flowers which so agreeably strike the eye, she strives to render still more beautiful. These animals, which to you seem so dextrous, she endeavours to render still more so. In short, Man that to you appears so superior to the rest, she tries to render still more perfect; but in this her endeavours prove the most unsuccessful.