62 CEOONIAN LECTURES 



fully made out, there will be found to be no 

 difference between these actions and those 

 which can be made to take place where no 

 influence of life can be supposed to exist. 



Another vital fluid, or principle, has been 

 assumed to account for the phenomena dis- 

 played at the beginning of life in animal and 

 vegetable bodies. 



Dr. Prichard says : " This vital principle 

 assumes the character of a plastic or formative 

 power. It presides over, and sets in action, 

 the different processes by which growth and 

 organisation are effected ; and gives form and 

 modification to the component parts of the 

 animal and vegetable body, and contributes 

 afterwards by a preserving influence to the 

 maintenance of its existence for a definite 

 portion of time. This doctrine ascribes to a 

 thing which is supposed to be merely a species 

 of matter highly attenuated, properties and 

 agencies which belong to the highest power 

 and the highest intelligence." 



It appears, then, that, in the biological as in 

 the abiological sciences, ideas of the union of 

 matter and force have gone, or are going, 

 through two identical phases. 



