No. XVII.A.] APPENDIX. 269 



I would gladly have occupied your attention with a few remarks 

 upon the relations of electricity to organic or cell-life. By a modifi- 

 cation of the aggregation of cells, a plant produces leaves, stalks, flowers, 

 or roots, which every gardener knows is, to a certain extent, as much 

 under human control as digging, raking, or hoeing. During the pre- 

 valence of the potato malady, I subjected the plant to every form of 

 electricity, and in every possible manner, over long periods, without 

 obtaining any result. 



There is, however, one remarkable circumstance to be noticed with 

 regard to the relation of electricity to cell-life, for I have found that 

 electric currents stop the circulation of the blood, as suddenly as a stop 

 does a watch when put down ; and this entire stoppage of the circulation 

 extends not only to the blood-corpuscle, but also to the lymph-corpuscle 

 which creeps so slowly along the side of the vessel. 



If we take a review of the functions of animal life, we find that all 

 sensations, the registration of impressions, thought, action, and other 

 phenomena of animal life, are voltaic effects, and solely obedient to 

 physical laws : and to the idea of the performance of these functions we 

 assign the idea of vitality. Life, therefore, is one word used to signify a 

 number of changes. It is no independent reality apart from the matter 

 which exhibits these phenomena. Neither is it an imponderable attached 

 to matter ; nor is it an all-pervading ether, or anima mundi, as some 

 philosophers would have us suppose. Life, mind, memory, reason, thought, 

 come from organization, are purely physical phenomena, and cease at death. 



Man, however, is immortal. Man, at all times and in all regions, has 

 believed in his immortality. Now that which is mortal can have no 

 relation with that which gives to man his immortality. That which is 

 infinite must not be limited ; time must not be confounded with eternity, 

 matter with space, the body with the soul, nor material actions with God. 



Electro-biology, then, leads us no less to infer, than religion 

 commands us to believe, " that the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and 

 we shall be changed." 



No. XVII.A. 



PRINCIPLES OF THE HUMAN MIND DEDUCED FROM 

 PHYSICAL LAWS ; BEING A SEQUEL TO ELEMENTS OF ELECTRO- 

 BIOLOGY. By ALFRED SMEE, F.R.S. 



PREFACE. 



SOME years since, M. Roret, the distinguished French publisher, did 

 me the honour of causing to be made a translation into the French lan- 

 guage of my ' Elements of Electro-Metallurgy,' in which it met with as 

 signal a success as the original edition in this country. 



As soon as M. Roret received my work on Electro-Biology, he also 

 caused it to be immediately translated, and kindly wrote to me to know 

 whether J desired to make any additions to the English text. 



After a careful consideration, I determined to write a short epitome 

 of the Principles of the Human Mind, deduced from Electro-Biology, to 

 form an Appendix to that work. 



