130 



almost all occasions, to designate the influence of spiritual pro 

 perties by the term "life," which includes them all; we should 

 therefore* describe, as nearly as we can conjecture, the process of 

 organization in the following way. 



32. The organic spirit in its several spheres has a relation 

 with its own elements in the blood by which it lives; and another 

 with the organic particles existing in the same fluid, by which 

 they are separated from the blood, and deposited in places agree- 

 ing with the continuous spheres of the spiritual properties, by 

 which they were decomposed from their alliances in the state of 

 blood. The particles, thus formed by life, afterwards become 

 inhabited by life, as is proved by their resisting the tendency to 

 putrefaction, which otherwise belongs to them. This leads to the 

 other result, which has been left for consideration, viz. 



33. 2. That life, having formed, continues to preserve the 

 structures. In order to preserve that which the spirit has pro- 

 duced, it is necessary that the spirit should reside in the organic 

 particles; it then maintains their coherence by a continued opera- 

 tion of that same affinity which ivas before competent to dissolve 

 former connections and assign them a separate place. The mode 

 therefore in which the structures are preserved during life, is one 

 which is simple and in strict harmony with the preceding acts. 



34. But this union between life and the organic particles is 

 not permanently maintained during the living state ; for the old 

 particles are perpetually passing as excrementitious into the cir- 

 culation. When, therefore, life ceases to preserve the place of a 

 particle which it has once assigned, it must arise from a change 

 which the particle has undergone, or else from another complex 

 relation, or antagonist process of the spirit, by which the former 

 relation between it and the organic particle is made to cease: then 

 life, in this minute sphere, being free or unengaged, if such is its 

 disposition (as it commonly is, except under disease), produces a 

 new particle, by which the old one is in effect replaced, the con- 

 tinuous spheres of the spirit compelling a corresponding continuity 

 of the particles composing the organized fabric. These latter 

 particulars will be hereafter more fully considered. 



35. Thus much for the present of the mode in which life is 

 maintained. Many other considerations belong to the same sub- 

 ject: but these, together with, I fear, some other unavoidable repe- 

 titious, will fall under more particular heads. 



