166 TRANSFORMATION OF ANIMALS. 



great a quantity of nutritious juices, which transforms the 

 stamina into petals ; and it not unfrequently happens, that, 

 when these double-flowering plants are committed to a poor 

 soil, they become drier, are reduced to their natural state, 

 and produce single flowers only. Plants which inhabit the 

 valleys, when transported to the tops of mountains, or other 

 elevated situations, not only become dwarfish, but undergo 

 such changes in their general structure and appearance, that 

 they are often thought to belong to a different species, though 

 they are, in reality, only varieties of the same. Similar 

 changes are produced when Alpine or mountain plants are 

 cultivated in the valleys. 



From culture and climate, likewise, plants undergo many 

 changes. But this subject is so generally known, that to en- 

 large upon it would be entirely superfluous. We shall only 

 remark, that the older botanists, when they perceived the 

 same species of plants growing in a different soil, or in a dif- 

 ferent climate, assume such different appearances, considered 

 and enumerated them as distinct species. But the modern 

 botanists, to prevent the unnecessary multiplication of separate 

 beings, have endeavored to reduce all those varieties, arising 

 from fortuitous circumstances, to their original species. 



From these facts, and many others which might be men- 

 tioned, it appears, that, in both the animal and vegetable king- 

 doms, forms are perpetually changing. The mineral kingdom 

 is not less subject to metamorphosis ; but this belongs not to 

 our present subject. Though forms continually change, the 

 quantity of matter is invariable. The same substances pass 

 successively into the three kingdoms, and constitute, in their 

 turn, a mineral, a plant, an insect, a reptile, a fish, a bird, a 

 quadruped, a man. In these transformations, organized bodies 

 are the principal agents. They change or decompose every 

 substance that either enters into them, or is exposed to the 

 action of their powers. Some they assimilate, by the process 

 of nutrition, into their own substance ; others they evacuate in 

 different forms ; and these evacuations make ingredients in 

 the compositions of other bodies, as those of insects, whose 

 multiplication is prodigious, and affords a very great quantity of 

 organized matter for the nourishment and support of almost 

 every animated being. Thus, from the apparently vilest and 

 most contemptible species of matter, the richest productions 

 derive their origin. The most beautiful flowers, the most ex- 

 quisite fruits, and the most useful grain, all proceed from the 

 bosom of corruption. The earth is continually bestowing 



