90 FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE 



the molecules are set in definite positions, and in accord- 

 ance with their arrangement they act upon the light. 

 But what has built together the molecules of the corn? 

 Eegarding crystalline architecture, I have already said 

 that you may, if you please, consider the atoms and 

 molecules to be placed in position by a Power external 

 to themselves. The same hypothesis is open to you now. 

 But if in the case of crystals you have rejected this no- 

 tion of an external architect, I think you are bound to 

 reject it in the case of the grain, and to conclude that 

 the molecules of the corn, also, are posited by the forces 

 with which they act upon each other. It would be poor 

 philosophy to invoke an external agent in the one case, 

 and to reject it in the other. 



Instead of cutting our grain of corn into slices and 

 subjecting it to the action of polarized light, let us place 

 it in the earth, and subject it to a certain degree of 

 warmth. In other words, let the molecules, both of the 

 corn and of the surrounding earth, be kept in that state 

 of agitation which we call heat. Under these circum- 

 stances, the grain and the substances which surround it 

 interact, and a definite molecular architecture is the re- 

 sult. A bud is formed; this bud reaches the surface, 

 where it is exposed to the sun's rays, which are also to 

 be regarded as a kind of vibratory motion. And as the 

 motion of common heat, with which the grain and the 

 substances surrounding it were first endowed, enabled 

 the grain and these substances to exercise their mutual 

 attractions and repulsions, and thus to coalesce in defi- 

 nite forms, so the specific motion of the sun's rays now 

 enables the green bud to feed upon the carbonic acid and 

 the aqueous vapor of the air. The bud appropriates 



