Joint Convention. 215 



least, when it teaches that the fundamental element or principle 

 of life is the same in the vegetable and animal, consisting of a 

 colorless pulpy substance without form or structure, yet capable 

 of motion, assimilation, absorption and organization; this sub- 

 stance is known as protoplasm. From this germ of life, matter 

 runs its course through all the changes and transformations in 

 the vegetable and animal kingdom, thus covering and peoj>ling 

 the earth, in all its variety and beauty. 



There is a theory in science, that three conditions are essejitial, 

 and absolutely necessary to this life, and that no life, either vege* 

 table or animal, is found without these three, to wit, conscious- 

 ness, force and matter. And in tliis substance known as 

 protoplasm, these elements are combined, working out through 

 their environment the highest forms with which we are familiar. 

 This view of the potency and power, locked within an element 

 of nature so simple as that represented by protoplasm, impresses 

 us with a feeling of awe and sacredness akin to that that once 

 attached to forms of beauty in the days of Pantheistic art; 

 more than that, it has the effect, as we contemplate the fact, to 

 make us more considerate of the tender bud and delicate blossom, 

 feeling that in some degree, at least, it may be conscious of our 

 tender care and of our needful ministrations. Thus in the 

 forms that matter assumes in the transformations familiar in 

 horticulture, do we see the beauty of its art. 



John Stuart Mill, however, a pessimist of wide reputation, 

 says there is no indication in nature of any act of beneficence; 

 the higher prey upon the lower without mercy; each exists 

 upon the other, until it may be said that the highest is at the 

 cost of the lowest; living by dying, seems the process from the 

 foundation up. In the vegetable world the same is true, as illus- 

 trated in the peculiar habits of the insectivorous plants, feeding 

 as they do upon the insects attracted by their seductive charms; 

 especially is this true of the Drosera rotundifolia. It is a sin- 

 gular fact that there is a wonderful correspondence between this 

 peculiar plant and the animal, in the provision made for diges- 

 tion of food; the gastric fluids, we are told, being the same in 

 each. Not only in these insectivorous plants is the pessimist's 



