PREFACE. 13 



good, and so forth; which we say, not to derogate 

 from the value of Mr. Coleridge's application of the 

 doctrine, of which he has very ably availed himself ; 

 but merely to explain the term polarity, by referring it, 

 as a species, to a higher genus of intellectual concep- 

 tions. 



Reverting to the three powers before mentioned, it is 

 not to be understood, that on Mr, Coleridge's hypothesis 

 of Life, they ever act separately ; but in the different 

 modifications of Life, at one time the power of magnetism 

 predominates, at another that of electricity, and at 

 another that of chemistry. Magnetism is stated to act 

 as a line, electricity as a surface, and chemistry as a 

 solid; for all which Mr. Coleridge refers to certain 

 physical experiments. The predominance of magnetism 

 is characterised by reproduction, that of electricity by 

 irritability; and irritability, which first appears as 

 muscle, gradually rises into sensibility as nerve. The 

 limits of a mere introduction will not permit me to 

 examine Mr. Coleridge's first principles more in detail ; 

 and I can but briefly notice their application to the 

 successive stages of ascent, from the first rudiments of 

 individualised Life, in the lowest classes of the mineral, 

 vegetable, and animal creation, to its crown and con- 

 summation in the human body. Beginning with mag- 

 netism, by which, in its widest sense, he means what 

 he improperly calls the first and simplest differential 

 act of Nature (he should rather have said the first and 

 simplest conception that we can form of a differential 



