238 GENERAL VIEW OF NATURE. 



of motion. They are supported by air and food, endowed with 

 life, and subject to death ; the active power or life which operates in 

 them we call the vital principle. This vital principle eludes the re- 

 searches of man; all that we know of it is in its effects, enabling the 

 organized body to resist putrefaction, and, to a certain degree, to 

 maintain a temperature different from surrounding bodies. Depriv- 

 ed of this vital principle, both animals and vegetables become sub- 

 ject to chemical decomposition; their solid parts are dissolved, and 

 they return to the earth from whence they were taken. 



If you dig up a stone, and remove it from one place to another, it 

 will suffer no alteration ; if you dig up a plant, it will wither and die. 

 If you break a mineral to pieces, every fragment will be a perfect 

 specimen of its kind ; it will only be altered in shape and size ; but if 

 you tear off a branch from a plant, or if a Umb be taken from an 

 animal, they will both immediately begin to decay; the vital princi- 

 ple being extinguished, putrefaction and dissolution follow. 



We should never have been able to predict, from the appearances 

 of the stone, the plant, and animal, that they were thus differently 

 constituted; by observations, we find that the productions and mode 

 of growth have been attended with different circumstances. We 

 find that the stone has grown by a gradual accumulation of parti- 

 cles, independent of each other, and can only be destroyed by chem- 

 ical or mechanical force ; the plant and animal have, on the contrary, 

 grown by nourishment, been possessed of parts mutually dependant, 

 and contributing to the existence of each other. 



So far, our observation teaches us the distinction between organ- 

 ized and inorganized beings ; though it does not teach us in what the 

 internal power of life consists. God permits us to know much, in or- 

 der to lead us to industry in the attainment of knowledge ; but he 

 places boundaries beyond which we may not pass, that we may be 

 humble. 



COMPARISON OF ORGANIC AND INORGANIC BODIES. 

 INORGANIC BODIES. ORGANIC BODIES. 



Their parts always analogous to, and 

 not depending on each other : thus a frag- 

 ment of stone is as much a stone as the 

 block or rock to which it belonged. 



Their parts are mutually dependant; 

 thus stem, leaf, flower, &c. do not con- 

 stitute a vegetable being, except as they 

 are united ; it is the same with the diffef- 

 ent parts of an animal. 



Origin. 



Molecular attraction, modified by time 

 and space, or by the art of man, (as in che- 

 mistry ;) they are made. 



Owe their existence to beings similar tu 

 themselves, produced either from eggs, or 

 brought into existence in a living state j 

 they are hatched or bom. 



Development. 



They grow by the addition of new par- 

 ticles ; they are hence said to increase by 

 juxtaposition or accretion. 



They develop by assimilating to their 

 nature, or converting to their sustenance, 

 foreign substances which they absorb, or 

 receive internally ; they increase by nour 

 ishment. 



Termination. 

 They are limited to no particular form, I They have a determinate form and dura- 

 (except in the case of crystals;) they have tion ; their existence terminates either by 

 no life, and are not subject to death ; they old age, or disease ; they die, 

 decompose. I 



Vital principle-^-Difference between a stone and a plant— Structure of inorganic 

 bodies — Of organic bodies— Orig-in. of inorganic bodies— Of organic bodies— DeceZop- 

 ment of inorganic bodies— Of organic bodies— Termination of inorganic bodies— Of 

 organic bodies. 



