LECTURE II. ' 79 



occasional ffiilure and considerable variation. 

 That such sympathetic actions are the 

 effect of unknown laws, he could never 

 have doubted ; but he thought he per- 

 ceived a spirit and design in these laws 

 very different from those which produce 

 results in dead matter. In the latter the 

 results are immediate and uniform, so that 

 they may be predicted ; whilst in the 

 former they sometimes do not take place, 

 and appear more like the effects of option 

 than necessity; they also are subject to 

 considerable varieties ; neither is their re- 

 sult in many instances immediate ; yet the 

 actions tend to produce some remote effect 

 or good to the individual in which they 

 occur. That such were Mr. Hunter's ideas 

 of the vital actions may be inferred from 

 his unphilosophical language, which im- 

 putes design to unintelligent agency. 



Mr. Hunter seems first clearly to have 

 perceived that we could not judge of the 

 vital actions from other subjects, and there- 

 fore that the zoonomia must be made a 

 separate study and pursuit by comparing 



