XXVI 
INTRODUCTION. 
fern hanging at the head of the pin with its roots down- 
wards. Some hours afterwards I looked at my little fern, 
and found it exhibited no symptoms of withering ; whereas 
the other seedlings, left carelessly on the ground beside the 
phial, were completely dead, and crumbled to powder be- 
tween the finger and thumb. I hung up the phial by a 
stiing to a nail in the garden wall, and here it was hanging 
twelve months afterwards. The cork was fastened exactly 
as I left it, but the phial was filled with something green, 
which, on taking it out, proved to he a plant of the com- 
mon chickweed, hut to my great joy the little fern still 
hung from the pin ; its roots were longer, it had made two 
fi’onds, and the original frond had withered, hut was still 
strong enough to support the fern. This instance is as 
good as a thousand. The exposure of the roots, which is 
no part of Mr. Ward’s plan, still adds a proof of its effi- 
cacy. The plant could not have lived one day so exposed 
in the open air ; in the phial it had lived a year, had re- 
newed its fronds, and looked healthy. How was this 
effect produced ? 
Who has regarded Nature without perceiving the word 
CHANGE legibly engraven on every object ? Throughout 
creation there is a perpetual decay, and a perpetual reno- 
vation. Death is the result of life, for life contains within 
itself the germ of death. This fact is so obvious, that it 
were idle to adduce proofs. There are many active agents 
in this change ; and it may he observed, that the office of 
every agent is to hurry forward the eternal round : the sun 
is equally the source of life and death : wind, rain, heat, 
