2 Principles of Vegetable Matter. [Book VITL 



the vegetable and animal kingdoms, remains to be 

 confidered. 



Unorganized bodies, we have feen, confift of 

 fimple combinations of many different elementary 

 principles. Organized bodies, on the contrary, confift 

 of few principles j but in the proportions, combina- 

 tions, and arrangement of thefe principles, they are' 

 infinitely, varied ; and their ftructure is as complex, as 

 their materials are fimple. Thus, in the mineral 

 creation we may enumerate not fewer than forty 

 diftinct elementary principl.-sj the vegetable creation 

 for the-moft part confrfts only of three ; and the utmoft 

 to which it can be extended, is about fix or feven di- 

 tincl: fpecies of matter, which occasionally enter into 

 the compofidon of thofe varied beauties, that fingu- 

 larity of flru6lure, that vaft aflemblage of organized 

 foodies, fo different in qualities and external appearance, 

 which the woods, the fields, and the gardens, prefent 

 to our view : fo numerous that they have hitherto 

 eluded the art of the moft fkilful botanilt to methodize 

 - and arrange. 



The condiment or elementary principles of vegeta- 

 bles, are hydrogen, oxygen, apd charcoal. Thefe, as 

 far as our obfervations have hitherto extended, are 

 common to all vegetables. There are fome other fub- 

 ftances, fuch as calcarious earth, iron, and azote, which 

 are occafionally found in vegetables; but as tfiey are 

 not common to all plants, they cannot be confidered 

 as eflential to the constitution of vegetable matter. 



But if the materials of which vegetables are Gom<- 

 pofed are fo few and fimple, their organization is cu- 

 rious beyond any thing which the mineral world prefents 

 to our view. The parts of vegetables, which natu- 

 palifts are accuftomed to confider as diftincl in their 

 stature and functions, are fix, the item or trunk, the 



root, 



