SUCCESSION AND CHANGE. 8.5 



tion. If we were to follow the processes through 

 which the salt, or any other substance whatever, 

 passes even in the longest series of changes or 

 events, we should invariably find each change to 

 be a motion of some kind or other ; and that any 

 particular motion always arose from some power 

 or source (beyond which we could not trace the 

 motion) overcoming another power which, had it 

 been the stronger, would have produced a totally 

 different result ; and given rise to quite a different 

 chain of appearances. Take, for instance, a bushel 

 of barley, and steep it in water, and it will drink 

 up some of the water, and swell and become sugary 

 to the taste, and begin to sprout ; and it will do 

 that whether it is steeped by the maltster, or sown 

 in the earth and steeped by the moisture of that. 

 Thus, a succession of events is begun, which in each 

 case we can trace no farther than the grain of 

 barley, unless we trace that through the plant on 

 which it grew, to the grain which produced that 

 plant ; and after we had known all the steps of 

 growth and ripening, between one grain and an- 

 other, we might repeat the same circle over and 

 over, but would never get any additional infor- 

 mation. But at every stage between the one per- 

 fect grain and the next in succession, the plant has 

 a different appearance, and is fitted to a different 

 use ; and the maltster knows that if the natural 

 progress of the plant be arrested, and its power of 

 again returning to that progress destroyed when 

 it is in the sugary state, it will become malt, and 

 the brewer will purchase it. So, as soon as the 

 maltster has steeped it to perfection, he tosses it 

 about, and breaks off the sprout, and dries it; 

 whereas, when it is left in the earth it roots 

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