20 DISTINCTIONS BETWEEN 



Emily. Why really, I see no absolute necessity 

 which should prevent a living being from always pre- 

 serving its freshness and vigor, and living on to an indefi- 

 nite duration. 



Dr. B. True indeed, if you confine your views to a 

 single being isolated from all the rest of creation, but not 

 when you look at the general economy of nature. The 

 materials suitable for the nourishment of living beings, 

 must at some previous time have formed parts of other 

 living beings, so that the nourishment of one is obtained 

 at the expense of some other, and thus necessarily re- 

 quires its destruction. Contemplate at a general view, 

 the countless forms of being which crowd the vast do- 

 main of Nature. Do you not see the strong continually 

 preying upon the weak, and these in their turn yielding 

 to others still higher in the scale, and so on through the 

 whole series even from the spider that entangles its 

 victim in its treacherous web, up to man himself, the 

 greatest destroyer of all. Thus it is in Nature, that 

 renovation and decay destruction and creation death 

 and life, follow each other in constant and rapid succes- 

 sion, as necessary parts of the great system of the 

 universe. 



Emily. The characters you have mentioned are 

 common to both animals and plants, are there none 

 which distinguish these two classes of beings from one 

 another ? 



Dr. 13. There are several which serve as general 

 characteristics, but naturalists have hitherto found it very 

 difficult to find any character which should clearly dis- 

 tinguish them without any exception. 



. Emily. It appears as if I could very easily point out 

 a distinction ; for surely animals are endowed with the 

 power of voluntary motion, roaming about according as 

 their wants or pleasures prompt them ; while plants are 

 immutably fixed to one and the same spot, through their 

 whole period of origin, developement, and death or if, 

 as is the case in some instances, they float about unat- 



