Z ANIMALS, COMPARED 



are confined to a single spot, such as many species of shell- 

 fish and the gall insects, are furnished with a covering 

 which protects them from external injury, and with the 

 ready means of receiving aliment agreeable to their taste. 

 In short, all animals, from the highest to the lowest rank, 

 are enabled by some natural means to escape or repel 

 danger, to find security, and investigate their proper food ; 

 but vegetables are totally unfurnished with the means of 

 active defence, and must submit to every attack and every 

 accident. An animal may be therefore defined an or- 

 ganised being, possessed of a certain portion of intellect 

 for its own preservation, combined with the vital principle 

 and power of motion : while a vegetable is fixed to one 

 place, and exposed to injuries without the means of eva- 

 ding or repelling them. 



Notwithstanding these distinctive characters, which may 

 be sufficient to discriminate the boundaries between an 

 animal and a plant, they both possess so many correspond- 

 ing qualities, that it appears difficult in some cases to 

 pronounce where animal life commences, and vegetable 

 terminates. The sensitive plant (mimosa pudica), which 

 shrinks from the slightest touch, seems to have as much 

 of perception and of the locomotive faculty, as the poly- 

 pus and sea-nettle. The moving plant (hedysarum gymns) 

 furnishes a still more extraordinary example of vegetable 

 motion : but both these, to manifest their innate powers, 

 require to be acted upon by some external objects ; while 

 every thing animated acts from a principle within itself. 



The resemblances, however, between animals and vege- 

 tables, are nevertheless very great ; and in many respects 

 their economy is the same. They have both their periods 

 of nascency and maturity, of improvement and decay. 

 They reproduce their kind ; seem to participate in sensa- 

 tion, or at least in irritability, to a certain degree ; and to 

 have their respective antipathies and propensities. The 

 ferocious animals create a desert round them ; and some 

 noxious plants resemble them in this respect. The strong 

 prey on the weak in both kingdoms of nature ; the lion 



