ANIMAL LIFE IN GENERAL. 77 



The human body has its vegetal assimila- 

 tion of liquid nutrition in certain organs, 

 which can be used for preserving life when 

 the stomach is incapacitated. Already it has 

 been noted that man's organism has its Plant 

 character, present but subordinate, which it 

 is to transcend in order to be truly itself. The 

 question arises : Can the Animal lapse to the 

 Plant ? Whatever science may say to such a 

 metamorphosis, poetry has celebrated it re- 

 peatedly. Virgil introduces it in a striking 

 passage of the Aeneid, where the human Plant 

 is made to speak and also to bubble blood, 

 though fixed in earth. Dante picks up the 

 same incident and employs such a transfor- 

 mation as a punishment for the sin of suicide 

 in one of the circles of Inferno. The Euglena, 

 however, stands as the instance of a double- 

 bodied Plant-Animal in the order of Nature. 



It is difficult to draw a fixed line between 

 Plant and Animal in form or function, for 

 Nature has drawn no such line. Their differ- 

 ence is sometimes demanded when no differ- 

 entiation has yet taken place. That is, the 

 difference must first evolve, then it exists and 

 can be given. When Plant and Animal are 

 evolved into their typical forms, their dis- 

 tinction is just what has become manifested. 

 In like manner the definition of Life is re- 

 fractory till it defines itself or evolves itself 



