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iv PREFACE. « fooliili fpeculations, and the individual fpecies are but indifferently afcertained, yet from this period the at tention of mineralogifts was more direCted to the exa-' mination of great.,rock maffes than had fjrmerly been the cafe. In this point of view the labours of thefe enquirers muff: be cohfidered as of importance. In 1736, Magnus Von Bromel, a fcholar of Iliserne and Boerhaave, publifhed a fyftem of mine ralogy. He divides minerals into eight claffes, 1. Earths, 2. Salts, 3. Sulphurs, 4. Stones. 5. Petri factions, 6. Calculi. 7. Semi-metals, and 8. Metals. In 1739, Cramer publifhed a fyftem of mineralogy, which contains feven daffes. 1. Metals, 2. Semi- inetals, 3. Salts, 4. Inflammable fubftances, 5'. Stones, 6. Earths. 7. Watersi In 1736, the illnftrious Linnaeus publifhed the firfb {ketch of his mineral fyftem. He divides minerals into three claffes, 1. Petra, 2. Mineralia, 3. Foflilia- Ihe firft clafs contains three orders, a. Vitrefcentes, b• Calcarise, c. Apyrae. 'lhe fecond three orders, a. Salia, b. Sulphuria, c. Mercurialia. The third clafs contains alfo three orders, 1. Concreta, 2. Pe- trifafta, 3. Terrae. This fyftem is in many refpeflts faulty, and its principal merit confifts in having firft drawn the at tention of mineralogifts to the ftudy of the cryftalline figures of minerals. Although Linnaeus cannot be , faid to have contributed much to the progrefs of mineralogy, yet indireCtly his labours in the other branches of natural hiftory laid the foundation of fhat reformation which was afterwards- effeded by Werner.