There is a word, and it is a great word in this Book,[1] _ἐπι το αὐτο,_—_In id ipsum_, that is, to look to the thing itself, the very point, the principal matter of all; to have our eye on that, and not off it, upon _alia omnia_, any thing but it.—To go to the point, drive all to that, as also to go to the matter real, without declining from it this way or that, to the right hand or to the left. BP. ANDREWS. [Footnote 1: The New Testament which the Preacher had before him.] A certain William Osmer once wrote a dissertation upon the Horse, wherein he affirmeth, it is demonstrated by matters of fact, as well as from the principles of philosophy, that innate qualities do not exist, and that the excellence of this animal is altogether mechanical and not in the blood. In affirming this of the Horse the said William Osmer hath gone far toward demonstrating himself an Ass; for he might as well have averred that the blood hath nothing to do with the qualities of a black pudding.—When Hurdis said Give me the steed Whose noble efforts bore the prize away, I care not for his grandsire or his dam, it was well said but not wisely. The opinion which is as old as anything known concerning this animal, that the good qualities of a horse are likely to bear some resemblance to those of its sire or dam, Mr. Osmer endeavoured to invalidate by arguing that his strength and swiftness depend upon the exactness of his make, and that where this was defective these qualities would be deficient also,—a foolish argument, for the proposition rests upon just the same ground as that against which he was reasoning. But what better reasoning could be looked for from a man who affirmed that if horses were not shod they might travel upon the turnpike roads without injury to their feet, because, in his own language, “when time was young, when the earth was in a state of nature, and turnpike roads as yet were not, the Divine Artist had taken care to give their feet such defence as it pleased him.”