3$ PROPERTIES OP MATTERT 



trefaction and fermentation- Language itself 

 is insufficient to describe the difference which 

 exists between the laws, by which, animated 

 beings are governed, and those, to which mat- 

 ter, either dead or common, is amenable. 

 While the phenomena which common matter 

 displays are regular and definite, and uniformly 

 and invariably the same ; we behold, on the 

 contrary, the same kind of matter applied to 

 different living systems, as well as to the same 

 Systems at different times, changed into a na- 

 ture totally different : we behold, in the same 

 field, and in the same soil, a multitude of dif- 

 ferent vegetables fed and nourished by water 

 and by air, in quality precisely the same, and 

 yet assuming an organisation and form totally 

 different, 



It is well observed by Mr. MASON GOOD, 

 (whose learning and research I am happy to 

 acknowledge,) that the most burning sands of 

 hot climates, even the karo fields of the Cape 

 of Good Hope, (so sere and adust that no wa- 

 ter can be extracted from them,) are the media 

 in which the most succulent vegetables of 

 Which we have any knowledge flourish and 

 evolve ; so deleterious, indeed, is a wet season 

 to their growth, that they are destroyed by it. 

 There are also various tribes of vegetables that 

 are destitute of radicles, and which can only 

 be supported and nourished by the air, and by 



