FORMATION OF COMPOUND BODIES. 185 



ployed, it will answer every purpose, and re- 

 concile all contradictions; it will reconcile the 

 opposite, and contrary phenomena, of attrac- 

 tion and repulsion the centripetal, and centri- 

 fugal forces the motion of bodies downwards, 

 as well as the elevation of them up wards ; the 

 agg egation of a mass of mud, by the manual 

 labor of a gang of scavengers ; and the junction 

 of different bodies together, from chemical af- 

 finity ; and we shall be called upon, to admit 

 as true, the absolute solidity and impenetra- 

 bility of matter. So far, however, from soli- 

 dity, or impenetrability, being essential proper- 

 ties of matter, we possess facts abundant, and 

 universal, to show that the primary particles of 

 matter, are both permeable and penetrable. 

 When we see water and air, and the different ar- 

 ticles of food which animated beings receive for 

 their nourishment and support, converted by 

 the process of assimilation, or of animation, 

 from a common to a living state, from insen- 

 sibility to sensibility,---from non-sense to sense, 

 from passivity to power, from immobility to 

 motion, without the penetrability of matter, no 

 such change could be accomplished ; if the 

 particles of matter were penetrable in part, and 

 not altogether, animated beings would form a 

 ^ compound of life and of death,- of penetrable 

 matter, which had received the participation of 

 life ; and of matter impenetrable, which had 

 the power of resisting its influence. 



