PHYSIOLOGY OF ORGANIC LIFE. 143 



ultimate change, which it sus-tains, and which 

 alone virtually, and in fact, constitutes dissolu- 

 tionnot a suspension of organic action only, 

 but a total decomposition from its former state 

 of union. 



The flesh and blood of a horse, or of an 

 ass ; of a monkey, or of a man ; of a mate- 

 rialist, or of a philosopher, will yield the 

 same materials by decomposition. There may, 

 perhaps, be a greater quantity of ammonia in 

 the one, than in the other ; but as this differ- 

 ence is frequently found to exist in the analysis 

 of the flesh of different men, no inference from 

 thence can be drawn, that the animal matter of 

 which these different beings are composed, is es- 

 sentially different. Decomposition is, therefore, 

 the last change they sustain, in order to reduce 

 the different parts from a living to a dead state, 

 that they may be ultimately converted into a 

 common one. The chair on which I sit the 

 paper on which I write and the pen with 

 which I am writing, in common with the 

 organic remains of the animal and vegetable 

 kingdom as well as the exuvise of both, con- 

 stitute dead matter. 



After having stated what I conceive dead 

 matter actually to be ; to understand what it 

 is not, must be most obvious. Dead matter 

 forms no part whatever of the organs which 

 subserve to the functions of animals, or of ve- 



