LAWS OF LIFE UNKNOWN. 343 



conception we may be led to form and regard as the most 

 reasonable that can be framed, as to the cause which 

 operating upon formless matter leads to the production of 

 definite form and structure. Since the formless matter 

 exhibits phenomena essentially different from those mani- 

 fested by any non-living matter it would be unreasonable to 

 expect that the cause of the vital changes would be dis^ 

 covered in the class of causes to which the very different 

 phenomena of non-living matter have been referred. Hence 

 we are led to suggest that the cause in question should be 

 included in a different category altogether. I consider that 

 it belongs lo a vital as distinct from a physical order of 

 causes. As already stated the laws which govern ihe opera- 

 tion of vital forces or powers are unknown, but it by no 

 means therefore follows that they are undiscoverable. It is 

 surely, as I have suggested, more reasonable to attribute the 

 special results to special agencies we know nothing about, 

 than to refer them to a mode of causation which, as far as has 

 yet been proved, is absolutely incompetent to bring about 

 phenomena in any way allied to those which characterise 

 the living matter of all living beings. Trie more we learn 

 concerning the details of physical actions the less reason- 

 able does it appear to regard physical causation as of 

 universal application, and to infer that vital phenomena will 

 at some future time be thus explained. And, on the other 

 hand, the more minutely we investigate the phenomena of 

 living matter the less likely does it appear that Ihe causes of 

 these will be discovered in the domain of physics, or that 

 any vital, as well as all non-vital, actions will be proved to 

 be in the grasp of physical law. 



Now he who accepts the idea of the existence of vital 



