Most combustible bodies are capable of being inflamed by electricity, but more especially if it be made to strike against them in the form of a spark or shock obtained by an interrupted circuit, as by the interposition of a stratum of air. In this way may alcohol, ether, camphor, powdered resin, phosphorus, or gunpowder be set fire to. The inflammation of oil of turpentine will be promoted by strewing upon it fine particles of brass filings. If the spirit of wine be not highly rectified, it will generally be necessary previously to warm it, and the same precaution must be taken with other fluids, as oil and pitch; but it is not required with ether, which usually inflames very readily. But on the other hand, it is to be remarked that the temperature of the body which communicates the spark appears to have no sensible influence on the heat produced by it. Thus the sparks taken from a piece of ice are as capable of inflaming bodies as those from a piece of red-hot iron. Nor is the heating power of electricity in the smallest degree diminished by its being conducted through any number of freezing mixtures which are rapidly absorbing heat from surrounding bodies. * * * * * HEATING ROOMS. A new invention for heating rooms has met with much encouragement in Paris. A piece of quick-lime dipped into water, and shut hermetically into a box constructed for the purpose, is said to give almost a purgatory-heat, and prevent the necessity of fire during winter.--_Lit. Gaz_. * * * * * THE SELECTOR; AND LITERARY NOTICES OF _NEW WORKS_ * * * * * GOLDEN RULES. TO RENDER MEN HONEST, RESPECTABLE, AND HAPPY. _By Sir Richard Phillips_. All members of the human family should remember, that the human race is, as to time and nature, but as one totality; for, since every man and woman had two parents, each parent two parents, and so on in geometrical progression, hence every individual, high or low, must necessarily be descended from every individual of the whole population as it existed but a few hundred years before, whether they were high or low, virtuous or abandoned; while every procreative individual of the existing race must be the actual progenitor of the entire race which may exist at the same distance of future time. What motives for charity, for forbearing from injuries, for benevolence, for universal love. * * * * *