AND VEGETABLES. 



familiar application of its fate to lluit of 

 human life and beauty is not more striking 

 to the imagination than pliiiosophically and 

 literally true. The sensitive plant is a more 

 astonishing example of the capability of 

 vegetables to be acted upon as living bodies. 

 Other instances of the same kind we shall 

 hereafter have occasion to mention. 



The spontaneous movements of plants are 

 almost as readily to be observed as their 

 living principle. The general direction of 

 their branches, and especially of the upper 

 surface of their leaves, though repeatedly 

 disturbed, to the light; the unfolding and 

 closing of their flowers at stated times, or 

 according to favourable or unfavourable cir- 

 cumstances, with some still more curious 

 particulars to be explained in the sequel of 

 this work, are actions undoubtedly depending 

 on their vital principle, and are performed 

 with the greater facility in proportion as that 

 principle is in its greatest vigour. Hence 

 arises a question whether Vegetables are 

 endowed with sensation. As they possess 

 hfe, irritability and motion, spontaneously 

 directing theii^ organs to what is natural and 



E 2 



