Relations of Organized Beings. 361 



phant, endowed in one respect with an analogy to the Ox, 

 and in another respect to Man, yet having no immediate 

 affinity with either. 



As then Analogy consists in an agreement of function, and 

 only of form so far as it tends to discharge that function, it 

 follows that real and genuine Analogies may take place be- 

 tween the works of Nature and the works of Man, while no 

 such relation of Affinity can possibly exist. When, for in- 

 stance, the inventive powers of Man are called upon to imi- 

 tate any of the operations of Nature, the external matter to 

 be acted on being in both cases the same, a similar arrange- 

 ment of form is adopted by both. If the problem be to 

 make a floating body adapted for rapid motion through 

 water, Man either by practical experiment or mathematical 

 calculation produces the form of a boat, and thus uncon- 

 sciously imitates the structure of the Whale and Seal among 

 Mammals, the Penguin among Birds, the Ichthyosaurus and 

 Turtle among Reptiles, the Fish among Vertebrata, the Dy- 

 tiscus among Coleoptera, the Notonecta among Hemiptera, 

 Sepia among Mollusca, Physalia among Acalephae, &c. &c. 

 Nor is the analogy between a ship and a Fish confined to the 

 external form only ; the keel of the one represents the spine 

 of the other, the " ribs " of both agree in name as in nature, 

 the rudder coincides with the tail, the oars with the fins, the 

 masts with the spinous processes, the running rigging with 

 the tendons, the seamen with the muscles, the look-out man on 

 the forecastle with the eye, and the captain in the cabin with 

 the mental faculties in the Fishes' brain. Again, what can 

 be more striking than the analogy between a locomotive 

 steam-engine and a living Animal ? We see in both an ana- 

 logous respiratory and digestive system, the same necessity for 

 food and drink and oxygen to sustain that internal combus- 

 tion which is the source of the vital action, the same obedience 

 of the organs of motion to the impulse of the governing mind, 

 and the same wear and tear of the system, terminating in old 

 age and sudden or gradual death. Yet in all these cases there 

 is no set purpose on the part of Man to imitate the works of 

 Nature, he merely applies the faculties which God has given 

 him to elicit the properties which the same God has given to 

 matter ; and by this process alone he often arrives at the same 

 or similar results to those at which Creative Wisdom had ar- 

 rived before him. It appears to me therefore, that relations 

 of Analogy, that is to say, agreements in structure in conse- 

 quence solely of an agreement in the function to be performed, 

 may be as truly and as correctly asserted to exist between ar- 



Phil. Mag. S. 3. Vol. 28. No. 188. May 1846. 2 C 



