ON SPONTANEOUS GENERATION. 283 



ness in not being able to comprehend how cleanliness pre- 

 vents spontaneous generation from producing them. I may 

 safely appeal to the daily experience of hundreds, who, for 

 long periods of time, have used no other modes of preven- 

 tion than merely combing their hair with a common comb, 

 without ever being infested by Fed. capitis. What prevents 

 spontaneous generation from taking place in such cases ? 

 They are subject to the same influence as others; whatever 

 secretions are produced, there they remain, subject to their 

 power and influence, yet none are generated ; but if, by some 

 chance, they should come in sufficient contact with an in- 

 fested person, so that they might receive some from him, they 

 will then live and multiply as favourably as if the person 

 had been subject to them for years.' 



In respect to banishing the " uncouth idea of a Deus ex 

 machind^^ so much insisted on by Dr. W., I think the argu- 

 ments adduced by him are not very effective for that purpose; 

 the utmost they do is merely to remove it a step further. If 

 the vital principle is inseparably connected with matter, the 

 varied purposes, actions, and operations of that principle, in 

 all the varied forms of organic beings, must have been fore- 

 seen by the Almighty; and powers suitable to those purposes 

 have been implanted either in the different combinations of 

 matter, or have endowed this unknown dynamic power with 

 those peculiar powers, by the direct operation or command 

 of the Deity, which then brings him into as direct operation 

 in creating this complex unknown power, as a means of 

 working out his intentions with respect to the created world 

 and its inhabiting beings, as the common opinion does, which 

 is the more simplified manner of action ; his omniscience is 

 called into exercise equally as much, whichever opinion we 

 adopt ; he knows the forms best suited for each purpose or 

 locality, and whether he, by his direct word, called the types 

 of all organisms into existence, or created a power which 

 should perform the creations of those forms according as he 

 saw best and most fitting, his omnipotent or almighty power 

 is equally called forth. But to proceed (as I intend to return 

 to this part of the subject further on), if we consider life 

 solely by its effects, it is certainly a dynamic power, exhibit- 

 ing results accomplished by no other power whatever ; but 

 with regard to its operations upon matter alone, as exhibited 

 to our general view, we have nothing to do in our present 



' I have pursued this view of the subject much farther in the ' Entomo- 

 logical Magazine ' for April, 1837, in controverting the opinions of Bur- 

 raeister upon Phthiriasis, &c., as expressed in his ' Manual of Entomology,' 

 §§ 202, 203. 



Vol. IV.— No. 42. n. s. 2 m 



