OF NATURAL HISTORY. ' 53 



The life of animals is diveriified by a number of fucceflive 

 changes. Infancy, youth, manhood, old age, are charaeter- 

 ifed by imbecility, beauty, fertility, dotage. All thefe vicif- 

 litudes are confpicuous in the vegetable world. Weak and 

 tender in infancy, beautiful and vigorous in youth, robuft: 

 and fruitful in manhood, and, when old age approaches, the 

 head droops, the fprings of life dry up, and the tottering 

 vegetable, like the animal^ returns to that duft from which 

 it fprung. 



Upon the whole, by taking a retrofpe£live view of the ex- 

 treme difficulty of afcertaining the boundaries which diftin- 

 guifli the animal from the vegetable, and of the fimilarities 

 in their ftru6lure and organs, in their growth and nouriih- 

 ment, in their difTemination and decay, it is apparent, that 

 both thefe kingdoms conftitute the fame order of beings, and 

 that Nature, in the formation of them, has operated upon 

 one great and common model. 



