EMPIRICAL LAWS. 45 



heated or electrified), and the consequent (the production of 

 water), there must be an intermediate process which we do 

 not see. For if we take any portion whatever of the water, 

 and subject it to analysis, we find that it always contains 

 hydrogen and oxygen; nay, the very same proportions of 

 them, namely, two thirds, in volume, of hydrogen, and 

 one third oxygen. This is true of a single drop ; it is true 

 of the minutest portion which our instruments are capable of 

 appreciating. Since, then, the smallest perceptible portion 

 of the water contains both those substances, portions of 

 hydrogen and oxygen smaller than the smallest perceptible 

 must have come together in every such minute portion of 

 space ; must have come closer together than when the gases 

 were in a state of mechanical mixture, since (to mention no 

 other reasons) the water occupies far less space than the 

 gases. Now, as we cannot see this contact or close approach 

 of the minute particles, we cannot observe with what circum 

 stances it is attended, or according to what laws it produces 

 its effects. The production of water, that is, of the sensible 

 phenomena which characterize the compound, may be a very 

 remote effect of those laws. There may be innumerable 

 intervening links ; and we are sure that there must be some. 

 Having full proof that corpuscular action of some kind takes 

 place previous to any of the great transformations in the 

 sensible properties of substances, we can have no doubt that 

 the laws of chemical action, as at present known, are not 

 ultimate but derivative laws ; however ignorant we may be, 

 and even though we should for ever remain ignorant, of the 

 nature of the laws of corpuscular action from which they are 

 derived. 



In like manner, all the processes of vegetative life, whether 

 in the vegetable properly so called or in the animal body, are 

 corpuscular processes. Nutrition is the addition of particles 

 to one another, sometimes merely replacing other particles 

 separated and excreted, sometimes occasioning an increase of 

 bulk or weight, so gradual, that only after a long continuance 

 does it become perceptible. Various organs, by means of 

 peculiar vessels, secrete from the blood, fluids, the component 



