54 FRAGMENTS OF SC TENCH. 



polarity. In fact, without this notion of polarity this 

 "drawing" and "driving" this attraction and repulsion, 

 we stand as stupidly dumb before the phenomena of crys- 

 tallization as a Bushman before the phenomena of thesolai 

 system. The genesis and growth of the notion I have en- 

 deavored to make clear in my third Lecture on Light, 

 and in the article on "Matter and Force " published in 

 this volume. 



Our further course is here foreshadowed. A Sunday or 

 two ago I stood under an oak planted by Sir John Moore, 

 the hero of Coruuna. On the ground near the tree little 

 oaklets were successfully fighting for life with the surround- 

 ing vegetation. The acorns had dropped into the friendly 

 soil, and this was the result of their interaction. What is 

 the acorn? what the earth? and what the sun, without 

 whose heat and light the tree could not become a tree, 

 however rich the soil, and however healthy the seed? I 

 answer for myself as before all " matter." And the 

 heat and light which here play so potent a part are 

 acknowledged to be motions of matter. By taking some- 

 thing much lower down in the vegetable kingdom than 

 the oak, we might approach much more nearly to the case 

 of crystallization already discussed; but this is not now 

 necessary. 



If, instead of conceding the sufficiency of matter here, 

 Mr. Martineau should fly to the hypothesis of a vegetative 

 soul, all the questions before asked in relation to the snow- 

 star become pertinent. I would invite him to go over them 

 one by. one, and consider what replies he will make to 

 them. He may retort by asking me, " Who infused the 

 principle of life into the tree?" I say, in answer, that our 

 present question is not this, but another not who made/ 

 the tree, but what is it? Is there anything besides matter 

 in the tree? If so, what, and where? Mr. Martineau 

 may have begun by this time to discern that it is not 

 "picturesqueness," but cold precision, that my Vorstel- 

 lungs-fahigkeit demands. How, I would ask, is this 

 vegetative soul to be presented to the mind? where did 

 it flourish before the tree grew? and what will become 

 of it when the tree is sawn into planks, or consumed in 

 fire? 



Possibly Mr. Martineau may consider the assumption of 

 this soul to be as untenable and as useless as I do. But 



