18 DISTINCTIVE CHARACTERS OF ORGANIZED BODIES. 
Vegetable life, present themselves under a shape which ap- 
proaches more or less closely to the globular. From the 
highest to the lowest, each species has a certain characteristic 
form, by which it is distinguished ; this form, however, often 
presents marked diversities at different periods of life, and 
it is also liable to vary within certain limits among the 
individuals of which the species is composed. The size of 
Organized structures, like their form, is restrained within 
tolerably definite limits, which may nevertheless vary to a 
certain extent among the individuals of the same species. 
These limits are most obvious in the higher animals, whilst 
they seem almost to disappear among certain members 
both of the Animal and the Vegetable kingdoms, which tend 
to increase themselves almost indefinitely by a process of 
gemmation or budding, so as to produce aggregations of 
enormous size. Such aggregations, however, being formed 
by the repetition of similar parts, which can maintain their 
existence when detached from one another, may, in some 
sense, be regarded as clusters of distinct organisms, rather 
than as single individuals. Such is the case, for example, 
with the wide-spreading forest-tree, and with those enormous 
masses of coral of which reefs and islands are composed in 
the Polynesian Archipelago. For every separate leaf-bud of 
the tree, like every single polype of the coral, if detached 
from its stock, can, under favourable circumstances, perform 
all the functions of life, and can develop itself into a new 
fabric resembling that from which it was separated. ; 
2. The differences between Organized and Inorganic bodies, 
in regard to their structure, are much more important than 
those which relate to their external configuration., Every 
particle of a mineral substance, in which there has not been 
a mere mixture of components, exhibits the same properties 
as those possessed by the whole; the minutest atom of car. 
bonate of lime, for instance, has all the properties of a crystal 
of cale-spar, were it as large as a mountain. Hence it is the 
essential nature of an Inorganic body that each of its particles 
possesses a separate individuality, and has no relation but 
that of juxtaposition to the other particles associated with 
itself in one mass.—The Organized structure, on the other 
hand, receives its designation from being made up of a greatel 
or less number of dissimilar parts or oryans; each of thes 
