224 
will certainly be so much the more demonstrative of their 
worthlessness. It is utterly unreasonable to assume, as has 
been continually done, that the laws which govern vital actions 
are the very same laws as those which all non-living pheno- 
mena obey. There is not at this time a shadow of evidence in 
favour of such a contention. It rests only upon pure assump- 
tion, and is one of the most reckless and most unjustifiable of 
the many untenable assumptions to be met with in the histoiy 
of thought. It is opposed to facts of common experience and 
observation, as, for example, the growth upwards of a tree ; but 
this as well as other facts have been explained so as to fall in 
with the assumption. 
It may be freely admitted that if we attribute to vital power 
certain phenomena of the living world, which have not been, 
and cannot be, explained or accounted for by any physical 
laws yet discovered, we thereby assume an agency which we 
are unable to isolate or demonstrate, and the existence of which 
we cannot in any way prove. On the other hand, it is only fair 
to observe that, if we assume that phenomena peculiar to life 
will some day be explained by physics, we certainly act in a 
manner which is not sanctioned by science — we assume, we 
prophesy, and prophetic assumptions of every kind are contrary 
to the spirit of science. But, if we accept the dicta of many 
popular teachers, and assert that these vital phenomena are, 
indeed, physical, we assent to a proposition which has been 
actually proved untrue, and which has been shown over and over 
again to have no foundation, in fact, experiment, or observation. 
Nevertheless, it may be urged that it is no more incorrect or 
against the spirit of science to assume that a physical explana- 
tion will be discovered at a future time, than to assume that 
the phenomena are due to a force or power which we cannot 
isolate, and the nature of which cannot be demonstrated. 
But is it not in accordance with reason to assume the existence 
of a peculiar power to account for phenomena which are 
peculiar to living beings, which differ totally from any known 
physical phenomena, and which cannot be imitated — and is it 
not contrary to reason to prophesy that such phenomena will 
one day be explained by ordinary forces or powers ? Not- 
withstanding all the tremendous efforts which have been 
made by intellects the most robust to persuade themselves 
and others of the promise and potency of the molecular 
mechanisms of their imaginations, up to this very moment, 
nothing which in the least degree justifies their positive asser- 
tions has been discovered. Nothing like a vital phenomenon 
has been explained by physical science or imitated in the 
laboratory. 
