592 VIEWS OF CUVIER AND 



The celebrated Cuvier seems at one time to 

 have aimed at more enlarged views of the animal 

 economy ; for he observes that the vital energy 

 of animals, and the developement of their or- 

 ganization, are in proportion to the amount of 

 their respiration. But like his illustrious prede- 

 cessor John Hunter, he was so completely fettered 

 by the prevailing doctrine of the schools, that in 

 his introduction to the Regne Animal, he says that 

 " as the heart, stomach, and other involuntary 

 organs, are affected by the nervous system, it is 

 probably the source of their contractile power." 

 And again ; "as all the animal fluids are derived 

 from the blood by secretion, there cannot be a 

 doubt, that the nervous fluid is secreted by the 

 medullary matter, from which it is conveyed to 

 all parts of the body by the nerves." 



The fundamental error of regarding the brain 

 or any part of the nervous system, as the source 

 of vital energy, will appear evident from the fol- 

 lowing undeniable facts : 1. That life exists 

 throughout the vegetable world, and in many 

 species of the lower animals termed zoophytes, 

 polypi, entozoa, &c. in none of which has the 

 slightest trace of nervous matter ever been disco- 

 vered ; consequently, that all those physiologists 

 who have regarded nervous influence as the 

 source of vital energy, have vainly endeavoured 

 to explain a universal by a partial fact : 2. That 

 the germs of all the higher animals are developed 



