164 7()o('HFMir\l- PROCESSES, 



1/ichig to collect together mid combine into a connected whole 1 In- 

 scattered threads which constitute the materials for the study of 

 the metamorphoses of animal matter. 



In proceeding to a minute Investigation of the chemical pro- 

 cesses in the animal or vegetable organism, we usually be-in by 

 considering such questions as whether the masses acted upon by 

 different forces in vital phenomena differ essentially from those in 

 \\-hich we have studied mechanical or physical forces? whether 

 all those differences which force themselves upon our notice in no 

 small number and in a very decisive manner, on comparing 

 together organic with inorganic 1 , and organised with crystallised or 

 amorphous bodies, are owing to essentially different causes, or 

 arise simply from a multiplicity of intermerging forms, and only 

 correspond to the more prominently marked points of limitation 

 in the frequently intersecting series of qualities ? This is not a 

 question, however, which we purpose discussing at the present 

 time ; for, as we have already observed in our brief notice of it in 

 the introduction to the theory of the Animal Substrata, it has 

 been finally set at rest by pure chemistry. The belief which our 

 predecessors cherished of an actual principle of vitality has passed 

 away with them, and to attempt to attach even a semblance of 

 reality to this exploded notion of a bygone period would be at 

 once to condemn the most brilliant discoveries of the last few 

 years, and indeed the whole labours of half a century, as the mani- 

 festations of mere delusive chimeras. 



But whilst pure chemistry has shown us that the laws which 

 control the cohesion of different atoms in stones and rocks are 

 the same as those by which the persistence of the atomic com- 

 position of animal and vegetable substances is maintained, the 

 theory of the animal substrata, juices, and tissues, affords a proof 

 that the quality of the different particles of matter which serve as 

 points of application for the active forces which exist in the 

 animal body, invariably corresponds to the functions required for 

 the performance of the purposes of life. When we pass in review 

 the delicately linked series of chemical combinations taken by the 

 animal body from that laboratory of all organic bodies the 

 vegetable kingdom or generated anew within itself, the idea 

 involuntarily presents itself to us, that the chemical quality of a 

 substance for the most part corresponds to its physiological import- 

 ance ; thus we find that the more complex atoms, the chemical 

 particles of which have a less stable equilibrium, occur especially 

 wherever the higher functions of material life are manifested. 



