406 LAWS OF MOTION. 



some parts of the animal kingdom are distin- 

 guished from the vegetable, and some species 

 of the vegetable from the animal, until its final 

 termination in the human species. Although 

 the relation and similitude which the various 

 individuals bear to the species, as well as the 

 different species to the same genus, are great 

 and striking; there, notwithstanding, subsists 

 shades of difference between every part; so 

 that when the extremes are compared, instead 

 of analogy, there is a total difference between 

 them. Vast and immense as the chasm actu- 

 ally is which separates both, it, notwithstand- 

 ing, is filled up by a regular procession of be* 

 ings, both animal and vegetable, until it finally 

 terminates again in inanimate and formless mat- 

 ter; all possessing different powers, faculties and 

 aptitudes, concatinating the two extremes : the 

 perfect with the imperfect, the rational with the 

 irrational, the active with the passive, the sim- 

 ple with the compound, the organised with the 

 disorganised ; until we arrive at, and are forced 

 to acknowledge, the existence of elementary 

 matter, of which the universe is composed and 

 filled, as manifested by the regular gradation in 

 the elements of light and air, of water, and of 

 earth.* 



* From what has been said, it will appear, that I do not 

 .consider air as an original element, but as a compound, which 



