252 Dr. Spurgin on the Nature and Properties of the Blood. 



their new condition, are instrumental in developing the pur- 

 poses and designs of the living point or molecule still further ; 

 so that each distinct stage is a medium and instrument, bear- 

 ing the energy of the antecedent stage fully and perfectly to 

 the subsequent one ; each stage is thus passive to the influences 

 or designs and purposes of the antecedent one, and thence 

 active in influencing the stage subordinate or secondary to it. 

 Thus, and thus alone, are we enabled to see how the purposes 

 and designs of the primitively living molecule, or how its 

 living energies and forces, can flow determinately and de- 

 signedly through all the dependent stages, until the work in- 

 tended is accomplished, or at its end — the adult being ! ! from 

 whence as from a new beginning the work can proceed dc 

 novo, and a multiplication of the species emulous of an infinity 

 be effected, and by the multiplication, a succession thereof 

 emulous of an eternity. And herein we have another rule of 

 true philosophy confirmed in nature ; viz. " that the end rules 

 the cause, and the cause the effect ;" or, " the end is the all of 

 the cause, and the cause the all ot the effect." 



In declaring these principles we know that we are liable to 

 be misapprehended by reason of the defect of terms, or of our 

 defective application of the terms in common use : but if there 

 is any meaning in language, we do not employ any of its terms 

 to signily nothing ; and consequently in making mention of 

 life, -we only use the term to designate the relationship in which 

 one condition of organization or of animal matter, whether 

 fluid or solid, stands to another condition in the same being. 

 Thus, as we have stated above, the blood in relation to the 

 organ it permeates is as its life ; but in relation to the fluid 

 which causes it to be what it is, and which in the order of 

 formation was prior thereto, the blood is only vital in a se- 

 condari) or inferior sense! — Of all material fluids, the seminal 

 fluid is most vital ; but yet is not life, nor can it bear any pro- 

 portion to life, because its product is merely one limited thing, 

 differing from all other things and enjoying only limited ca- 

 pabilities: whereas what is unlimited, possessing all things in- 

 finitely, and thence enjoying infinite capabilities, being above 

 and beyond the nature of matter and all finite things, cannot 

 be re|)resented nor defined by natural language ; for language 

 is derived from the limited things of nature, and the definite 

 forms thereof. 



To make the application. — The operations, the changes, the 

 phaenomena which are said to result from a principle called 

 Life (from a principle that has never been defined), do all con- 

 vey to us, as intelligent beings, some idea of intelligence and 

 design : but we do not on that account confound the intelli- 

 gence 



