^Appendix. 81 



analysis and beyond the reach of any thing like positive and 

 certain science. The processes of the propagation and develop- 

 ment, growth and maintenance for years, of animals and trees, are 

 no less mysterious than their spontaneous generation. 



The physico-chemical forces, sometimes called dynamical 

 forces, produce spontaneously gases and water, crystals and salts, 

 earths and ores, rocks and stones ; but they never produce either 

 animal or vegetable organisms, without the co-operation of the 

 vital force ', which is an inherent property of a peculiar impon- 

 derable element of matter, unknown to the chemist. That un- 

 known element, called the vital element, constitutes of itself the 

 life of the blood of animals, the seed in the earth, spoken of ia 

 ist Genesis, nth and i2th verses the life and active principle 

 of the eggs, sperm, germs, seeds and buds, which develop int 

 animals and plants. 



11. "And God said, let the earth bring forth grass, the herb 

 yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after its kind 4 

 whose seed is in itself, upon the earth ; and it was so. 



12. "And the earth brought forth grass^' etc. 



The question arises, what was the seed spoken of in Gene- 

 sis; and from whence come the animalcules and the germs of 

 life, which the microscope reveals in the air, and in still water in 

 summer ? Some affirm that they all spring from living parents ; 

 and that all plants, grasses and weeds spring from seeds grown 

 upon the stalks of parent plants, of like character. Can that 

 be so? 



Grain and seeds kept dry will not freeze in any tempera- 

 ture ; but if saturated with water, they will freeze. Freezing and 

 thawing not only destroys the vitality of animal and vegetable 

 organisms, but soon destroys their texture, so that they decay 

 when the hot weather comes. How can the swarms of mosqui- 

 quitoes of Greenland, Lapland, and other high latitudes be 

 accounted for, unless they are produced spontaneously, by heat, 

 moisture, and a vital force, acting upon the decayed vegetable 

 and animal matter of previous years ? To suppose that frozen 



eggs will hatch and produce living animals, is to make a suppo- 

 6 



