CREMATION. 
243 
If, then, heat is the instrument ordained for the reproduction of 
living from dead forms, by natural or artificial, combustion, advocates 
of the latter should doubtless be expected to prove its superiority to 
the former. It may be suggested that as Nature, when artificial aids 
are absent, is determined to burn the dead in her own silent mode of 
slow, so-called spontaneous combustion, why trouble ourselves about 
such work? Why not leave it to Nature? Certainly her patience 
is wonderful. She is still at work on the ancient mummies. The 
cunning of the embalmer only retards, it does not absolutely suspend 
disintegration. If our sense of smell did not inform us of the fact, the 
gradual loss of weight is clear proof. 
Sanitary science, the pages of which book we are constantly cutting, 
is teaching us, lesson by lesson, that the production of diseases, of the 
Zymotic class at any rate, is as dependent upon seeds of “ their kind ” 
as is the husbandman for his harvest upon seeds previously buried. 
Following the simile a little further, we know that if grain be sub¬ 
jected to but a moderately high temperature, its germinating power is 
permanently destroyed. 
We are but slowly realising or appreciating the fact that Nature 
has selected a code of laws, which, with a glorious impartiality, are 
as much in favour of one form of life as another. We are learning 
that the world was not made for us alone, or indeed more for us than 
other forms of life. That struggle for existence which is so universal 
seems most severe for man. However that may be. Nature does not 
hesitate to use and sacrifice its noblest and loveliest forms, as hot-beds 
for the production of life, in forms so minute, and, so far as we can at 
present perceive, so utterly valueless and superfluous to Natural 
Economy, as to excite our bewilderment, and wound our self-esteem. 
Self-preservation, the first law of nature, a constant incentive to 
animal and vegetable action, is exercised most by man. His superior 
intelligence best enables him to destroy or circumvent antagonistic 
forces. Slaying his fellow-men often calls forth his utmost energy, 
and secures his most anxious consideration. He fosters the lives of 
many animals only to destroy them for food. 
The advent of a little beetle from America has more than once 
sent a thrill of alarm through the country, involving considerable 
exercise of thought and means in order to secure its living absence. 
Whilst thus exercising our intelligence, we are fairly chargeable with 
being inconsistent to an extraordinary degree. The man who could 
be guilty of purposely introducing a plague of such insects would 
certainly deserve the worst possible fate ; and yet in a perfectly legal, 
and publicly approved method we are perpetuating forms infinitely 
more destructive to human life. 
Germatologists, if I may, so far as I know, coin a word whereby to 
distinguish the Tyndalls and Pasteurs of science, have clearly proved 
that those diseases which are classed as preventable are due to the 
presence in the body of the patient, of organic forms of extraordinary 
minuteness, and in numbers beyond computation. The death of the 
