0V ORGANIZED BODIES. 23 



is called germ as long as it forms a portion of the body of the 

 parent. This latter general phenomenon is only a consequence 

 of the former. As long as the germ makes a part of the body 

 of the parent, it is nourished and grows as one of its organs; 

 its separation constitutes a kind of excretion. 



Most of the organized bodies also reproduce parts of which 

 they may be deprived; they likewise repair to a certain ex- 

 tent the lesions that they experience. 



The mass of individuals born of the same parents, and of 

 those which resemble them as much as they themselves are 

 like to each other, constitute a species. External circum- 

 stances, such as the atmosphere, food &c., as they are more or 

 less favourable, influence organization and its phenomena: 

 hence results a greater or smaller degree of perfection in the 

 development, and differences of similitude, generally, some- 

 what limited between the individuals of the same species; and 

 this constitutes the varieties. From this also results various 

 individual alterations in organized and living bodies: these al- 

 terations of organization and of its phenomena constitute 

 disease. 



This series of phenomena is common to all organized bo- 

 dies, and may be summed up in the following manner: The 

 origin is derived from a being similar to itself, the end ter- 

 minates by death, the maintenance of the individual is ob- 

 tained from nutrition, the continuance of the species by gene- 

 ration; in a word, it is the reception of an action of momentary 

 formation, exercised in a body which has received its princi- 

 ple from a parent, and transmits the same to its offspring, that 

 is called life. 



The two characteristic marks, which essentially distinguish 

 organized and living bodies, and which are common to all and 

 peculiar to them alone, are organization and life. 



7. The form and the action of organized and living bodies, 

 organization and life, are so closely connected, that whenever 

 we observe the one we may be certain of the existence of the 

 other; indeed the one always pre-supposes the other. We 

 never observe life but in organized bodies, and we never ob- 

 serve organization but in living bodies. In fact, in order that 

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