e change or flux of all the parts), irritability and sensibility;
reproduction corresponding to magnetism, irritability to electricity, and
sensibility to constructive chemical affinity.

* * * * *

But before we proceed further, it behoves us to answer the objections
contained in the following passage, or withdraw ourselves in time from the
bitter contempt in which it would involve us. Acting under such a
necessity, we need not apologise for the length of the quotation.

1. "If," says Mr. Lawrence, "the properties of living matter are to be
explained in this way, why should not we adopt the same plan with physical
properties, and account for gravitation, or chemical affinity, by the
supposition of appropriate subtile fluids? Why does the irritability of a
muscle need such an explanation, if explanation it can be called, more
than the elective attraction of a salt?"

2. "To make the matter more intelligible, this vital principle is compared
to magnetism, to electricity, and to galvanism; or it is roundly stated to
be oxygen. 'Tis like a camel, or like a whale, or like what you please."

3. "You have only to grant that the phenomena of the sciences just alluded
to depend on extremely fine and invisible fluids, superadded to the
matters in which they are exhibited, and to allow further that Life, and
magnetic, galvanic, and electric phenomena correspond perfectly; the
existence of a subtile matter of Life will then be a very probable
inference."

4. "On this illustration you will naturally remark, that the existence of
the magnetic, electric, and galvanic fluids, which is offered as a proof
of the existence of a vital fluid, is as much a matter of doubt as that of
the vital fluid itself."

5. "It is singular, also, that the vital principle should be like both
magnetism and electricity, when these two are not like each other."

6. "It would have been interesting to have had this illustration
prosecuted a little further. We should have been pleased to learn whether
the human body is more like a loadstone, a voltaic pile, or an electrical
machine; whether the organs are to be regarded as Leyden jars, magnetic
needles, or batteries."

7. "The truth is, there is no resemblance, no analogy, between Electricity
and Life; the two orders of phenomena are completely distinct; they are
incommensurable. Electricity illustrates life no more than life
illustrates electricity."(13)

To avoid un