EVOLUTION OF LIFE* 67 



quintillions, one hundred and twenty-three 

 thousand one hundred and thirty-six quadril- 

 lions ! 



Whatever the imagination of poets may have 

 conceived of the loves of plants, or whatever 

 may have been asserted by LINN^.US of the 

 SEXUAL SYSTEM, the truth of this system con- 

 tinues to be very questionable and uncertain. 

 The various modes, by which the species are 

 multiplied, and the destitute state of nervous 

 energy in the parts which are concerned in that 

 process, decidedly prove, that they are not only 

 insensible to any feeling, but altogether uncon- 

 scious of the actions which they perform. If 

 any nervous arrangement has an actual exist- 

 ence in them, it does not extend throughout the 

 whole of the system, but is confined to the 

 efflorescence alone, at the particular times, 

 when the corolla is unfolded, and when the 

 system is about to fultil the end of its existence, 

 in the production of fructification. How 

 debile and limited must this nervous power be 

 conceived, when we reflect on the immoveable 

 spot to which vegetables are fixed, and the 

 short life which the efflorescence is suffered to 

 enjoy. It is no sooner arrived at adolescence, 

 than its acme of perfection is attained, and the 

 period of caducity immediately ensues. The 

 system proceeds from germination to fructifica- 

 tion, from fructification to death, in a regu- 



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