( 12 )
dy, except what is Mechanical, and what might be produc'd in it, supposing such a parcel of matter were artificially fram'd and constituted as the body is, though without any Substantial Form, or other such like internal Principle. So when a piece of Glass, or of clarify'd Rosin, is, by being beaten to powder, deprived of its Transparency, and made white, there appears no change to be made in the pulveriz'd body, but a comminution of it into a multitude of Corpuscles, that by their number and the various scituations of their surfaces are fitted copiously to reflect the sincere Light several ways, or give some peculiar Modification to its Rayes; and hinder that free passage of the beams of Light, that is requisite to Transparency.
Fourthly, as in the cases belonging to the foregoing number there appears not to intervene in the Patient or Subject of the change, any thing but a Mechanical alteration of the Mechanical Structure or Constitution; so in some other cases it appears not, that the Agent, whether natural or factitious, operates on the Patient otherwise than Mechanically, employing onely such a way of acting as may proceed from the Mechanisme of the matter, which it self consists of, and that of thebody
