22 OF THE VITAL POWERS. 



The formative power must be most universal ; 

 without it indeed organisation cannot be conceived to 

 exist. 



Contractility likewise is common to each kingdom. 



Irritability and sensibility, in the sense above ex- 

 plained, are peculiar to animals. 



Lastly, the vita propria is variously observable in 

 some organs, particularly the generative, both of certain 

 animals and vegetables. 



46. It is scarcely necessary to remark, that most of 

 these modes of vital energy, though necessarily distin- 

 guished into orders, are intimately connected ; v. c. the 

 mucous web, forming the basis and seat of contractility 

 in so many organs, is interwoven also with the irritable 

 muscular fibres* and the sensible nerves. 



47. Whatever may have been the opinions of physi- 

 ologists respecting the difference or identity of the vital 

 powers, it is universally agreed that they exist in the 

 similar solid parts, as the ancients called them, of which 

 the organs or dissimilar parts are composed. But it 

 has been disputed, and particularly of late, whether 

 vitality is peculiar to the solids or common also to the 

 fluids ; and, the latter being granted, whether or no the 

 blood alone is so endowed. 



48. As to the first question, the whole natural history 

 of each organic kingdom, as far as it has hitherto been 

 cultivated, abundantly shows that those living parts, 

 however delicate, of all known animals and vegetables, 

 are solid ; — a circumstance necessarily implied in their 

 determinate figure destined for certain uses. For, not 



in der Reihe der vcrschiedenen Orgauisatiancn. 1793. 8vo. H. F. Link, VBer 

 die Leben»krilfte in rmturMttorucker RSckricht. Rostock. 1795. 8ro. 

 • See Abildgaard, Acta Reg. Soc. Med. HavnieM. T. i. 



