116 FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



position by a power external to themselves. The same 

 hypothesis is open to you now. But if in the case of crys- 

 tals you have rejected this notion of an external architect, 

 I think you are bound to reject it now, and to conclude 

 that the molecules of the corn are self-posited by the forces 

 with which they act upon each other. It would be poor 

 philosophy to invoke an external agent in the one case and 

 to reject it in the other. 



Instead of cutting our grain of corn into slices and sub- 

 jecting it to the action of polarized light, let us place it in 

 the earth and subject it to a certain degree of warmth. In 

 other words, let the molecules, both of the corn and of the 

 surrounding earth, be kept in that state of agitation which 

 we call warmth. Under these circumstances, the grain and 

 the substances which surround it interact, and a definite 

 molecular architecture is the result. A bud is formed ; this 

 bud reaches the surface, where it is exposed to the sun's 

 rays, which are also to be regarded. as a kind of vibratory 

 motion. And as the motion of common heat with which 

 the grain and the substances surrounding it were first 

 endowed, enabled the grain and these substances to exer- 

 cise their attractions and repulsions, and thus to coalesce 

 in definite forms, so the specific motion of the sun's rays 

 now enables the green bud to feed upon the carbonic acid 

 and the aqueous vapor of the air. The bud appropriates 

 those constituents of both for which it has an elective 

 attraction, and permits the other constituent to resume its 

 place in the air. Thus the architecture is carried on. 

 Forces are active at the root, forces are active in the blade, 

 the matter of the earth and the matter of the atmosphere 

 are drawn toward the root and blade, and the plant aug- 

 ments in size. We have in succession the bud, the stalk, 

 the ear, the full corn in the ear; the cycle of molecular 

 action being completed by the production of grains similar 

 to that with which the process began. 



