26 NO ONE TEACHES THAT 



of a nature distinct from any form or mode of ordinary 

 force. Heat, light, electricity, &c., manifested in a living 

 organism are clearly of the same nature as heat, light, and 

 electricity manifested out of the body. We know and 

 admit that physical forces are at work in the living body, 

 but ask, is there not yet another internal force or power at 

 work in the living body which is not physical or chemical ? 

 To this many chemists and physicists would reply "No!" 

 while some of us feel compelled to answer emphatically 

 " Yes ! " and to say that there is evidence of such a power, 

 and that the actual phenomena have not been, and in the 

 present state of science cannot be explained by the action 

 of physical and chemical forces only. We doctors and 

 physiologists are ready and willing to learn, and most 

 desirous of being taught. We also freely confess our 

 ignorance of much that we ought to know and long to 

 know, but it is really quite unnecessary for chemists to 

 impress upon us the fact that life cannot create heat, light, 

 motion, and electricity. Can Dr. Odling point out a single 

 living physician, or physiologist, who teaches that life, or a 

 living thing ever generated external force ? As the chemists 

 are so emphatic about life not creating heat, light, &c., it 

 is curious, and not without significance, that they do not also 

 show that heat, light, &c., can be converted into life. 



But some scientific men do speak of these external forces 

 acting in living beings as if they were the real vital forces. 

 Dr. Odling himself says, " We might apply the phrase 

 vital force to the potential energy of so much fat or muscle 

 capable by oxidation of being manifested in the form of 

 external heat or motion." The word vital thus used is 

 obviously useless, has no definite meaning attached to it, 



