Wesley further says, the sun was situated at the most exact distance from the earth, so as to yield a sufficient quantity of heat, neither too little nor too much, to every part of it. Ho further intimates that there was at first no inclination of the earth's axis, and that the seasons and the degree of heat and cold were, in consequence, the same all the world over, and all the year round. All these statements seem erroneous in the extreme. The supply of heat to the different parts of the earth does not depend altogether on the distance of the sun from the earth, as Wesley intimates, but on the motions of the earth around the sun and upon its own axis. Wesley seems to imagine that if the axis of the earth were not inclined, or elevated at one end, the earth would receive from the sun the same quantity of heat through every part; whereas nothing could be farther from the truth. If, as Wesley expresses it, "This oblique globe had not been turned askance," some parts of the earth would have received from the sun scarcely any heat at all; they would have received neither light nor heat, except in such slight measures as to be altogether useless. The arctic regions and the antarctic regions must have been alike uninhabitable. That turning of the oblique globe askance, which Wesley represents as the cause of extreme heat and cold, was the very thing to _prevent_ those extremes, or to reduce them to the lowest possible point, and to secure to every part of the globe, as _far as possible_, an _equal_ amount of light and warmth. I say _as far as possible_; for to secure to every part of the earth exactly the same amount of light and heat from one sun, is impossible. Place a little globe in what position you will with respect to a neighboring candle, and fix the axis of that globe as you please, and move that globe; give the globe a motion upon its own axis, and another motion round the light near which it is placed, and you will find it impossible to secure to every part of that globe exactly the same amount of light and heat. By inclining the axis of the globe, or as Wesley expresses it, turning it askance, as the axis of the earth is inclined or turned askance, you may secure the _greatest possible equality_ of light and heat to every part; but still that greatest possible equality will be a considerable _inequality_. So far, therefore, from the polar regions being made colder or darker by the globe being turned askance, they are indebted to that very obliqueness of the earth's axis, and that apparent irregularity of its motions, for the chief portion of that light and heat which they receive. How Wesley came to speak so erroneously on this subject, I am at a loss to know, as he must, one would think, have understood the first elements of geography and astronomy. Yet his words are at variance with the first elements of those popular sciences.