54 LIFE IN NATURE. 



marvellous aspect of life, is the coexistence and 

 inseparable interlinking, in every part and process, 

 of these opposites. Building up and pulling down, 

 formation and destruction, results of chemical force 

 and results opposed to chemical force, are ever going 

 on together. Till the one class of operations is 

 seen to be a consequence of the other, an air of 

 impenetrable mystery rests over all. But if this 

 relation is recognized, the entire cycle of physical 

 life presents itself to us under a new aspect ; and 

 the problem of vitality, though peculiar in its 

 details, and of almost infinite complexity, is seen 

 to belong essentially to a class of problems already 

 solved. 



Water regaining its level, and rising, as in an 

 enclosed circuit it will do, by virtue of its fall, 

 presents to us in a simple form the very same rela- 

 tions of force. " You see," says Bishop Berkeley, 

 at the conclusion of his celebrated Dialogues on 

 Matter, "the water of yonder fountain, how it is 

 forced upwards in a round column to a certain 

 height, at which it breaks and falls back into the 

 basin from whence it rose; its ascent as well as 



