366 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 



Here is no heart, or vessels, or brain, or nerves, 

 or any thing of an animal body. The question of 

 organization, then, is put quite aside. Neverthe- 

 less, Mr. Hunter conceived that the difference be- 

 tween the putrid and the sweet egg depended upon 

 the influence of life, which in the latter counter- 

 acted the chemical affinities, and prevented the 

 matter from falling into a putrescent state. If 

 then, said he, the matter of the egg has that pro- 

 perty of life to check and control the affinities 

 which all matter divested of life is subject to, has 

 it also the pov^er of resisting the changes of tem- 

 perature ? And now, upon comparing the putrid 

 and the living egg, he found that the latter resist- 

 ed freezing ; and he thus showed that the property 

 which resists putrefaction is allied to the property 

 of the animal body which preserves it in a uniform 

 heat, though exposed to the changes of tempera- 

 ture in surrounding bodies. We see by this that 

 a portion of matter in an eggy or in a seed, shall 

 be endowed with a principle, which, however ob- 

 scure, we perceive by its effects. 



Thus, living matter is under the influence of 

 laws totally distinct from those which govern dead 

 matter. What shall we call this peculiar proper- 

 ty ? We have acquired a notion of life by wit- 

 nessing the effects of many causes combined in the 

 whole animal. Motion is in general the result of 

 these ; and so we associate life and motion. Mr. 

 Hunter showed that each part of the body which 

 possessed life exhibited it by different phenomena. 



