54 On the Vitalitij of Mailer. 



Art. VI. — On the Vitality of Matter. 



(Communicated for this Journal.) 



The mystery of life, or the cause of sensation and volunta- 

 ry motion, has been a subject of the deepest interest in all 

 ages of the world. The curious and the learned have insti- 

 tuted the most diligent inquiries to discover whether the hid- 

 den principle is an emanation from the divinity, or a super- 

 natural gift ; or whether it resides in the organized structure, 

 by some particular disposition and consent of parts ; or 

 whether each particle possesses inherent powers of life in its 

 separate state, and thus spontaneously arises from decaying 

 forms to engage in new scenes of activity. 



Within a few years, from some investigations with the mi- 

 croscope, a theory has arisen, which maintains that this mys- 

 terious principle is inherent in the elementary forms of mat- 

 ter, and that they assume new shapes, and revive in their 

 primitive activity, whenever death changes their aspects. 



These doctrines, adopted in their full extent, restore the 

 dogmas of the metempsychosis, and the chances ofDemoc- 

 ritus, and, by vulgar induction, end in atheism. Without 

 the dignity of that system of which Epicurus, Lucretius, 

 Pliny and Lucian were disciples, they fall into the materialism 

 of Leibnitz, who considers "each monad or atom possessed 

 of perception and appetite. This appetency produces an in- 

 ternal principle of alteration — hence the sympathies and af- 

 finities, the combinations and the forms of bodies." 



The Epicurean theory, although it deemed matter eternal 

 and insensate, and that its particles, by jostling forever, had 

 at length adhered in masses, ultimately forming the world 

 itself, inhabited by animals, and clothed with vegetation ; 

 yet, it taught that it was operated upon by an immaterial 

 divinity, and that life was imparted by a divine invisible pow- 

 er, who ruled over all. 



In later times. Sir Isaac Newton built a noble superstruc- 

 ture upon the principle asserted in the Mosaic account of the 

 creation — that all things were made by an omnipotent, im- 

 material, intelligent being ; that he established those immu- 

 table laws by which the universe is regulated and governed ; 

 and that he imparted animation to creatures by bestowing 

 upon them the breath of life. 



But Dr. II. M. Edwards, an English physician in Paris, and 

 Dumas, Dutrochct, Prevost and others, have ascertained to 



