44 LIFE IN NATURE. 



During this decay, therefore, the vital force that was 

 in the wood has passed forth from it. What has 

 become of it ? Part of it has been given out as heat ; 

 but part of it, evidently, has been, as it were, trans- 

 ferred to the fungus which has grown at its expense. 

 The wood was living, the fungus lives now ; the 

 wood has decayed, the fungus has grown ; the wood, 

 in its decay, has given out force ; the fungus, in its 

 growth, has taken up and embodied force, and is 

 ready in its decay to give it off again. The life of 

 the wood has, in short, been transferred to the fungus. 

 The force has changed its form, but it is the same 

 force in both. 



The fungus could not have grown if the wood had 

 not decayed, the force would have been wanting ; as 

 in the action of a balance, one scale cannot rise 

 unless the other falls. The living state is, in respect 

 to the force of chemical affinity, as the raised state is 

 in respect to the force of gravity. When one scale 

 of a balance falls, the raised state " is transferred 

 from it to the other scale ; so, when one organic body 

 decays and another grows upon it, the " living state " 

 is transferred from the decaying to the growing body. 



