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Show 260 LIFE-THE RESTORER. which obey no laws but those which, to some extent or other, we regard as commOJ?- to all. matter. But there are also peculiar laws, whtch act m opp?sition to the common laws of matter, and wtth1n the sphere of their action overcome them, at least for a time. · 1 f These are the laws of that mystenous re a IOU which we call LIFE ; and which, ~bough we never can tell what it is in itself, or how It and the general ro erties of matter act and react upon each other, ~et pfurnishes by far the greater part of the usefulness and pleasure of nature befor~ us. Fanciful . men, who have ~ost stght of. facts, h~ve sometimes supposed and said th~t there ts a regu ar gradation through all the productiOns of nature., from the simplest substance up to man, an~ even htgher; and these have been called the gradatw~s of nature towards perfection, and bel~ up as especmlly worthy of our admiration. But, m truth, we observe no such gradation ; and we ought never to know any more about nature than we can . observe. There are differences, and very great dtfferenc~s of ~p-earance ; but still we are not. warranted m saymg fhat one production of nature IS more perfect than ther When we have any purpose of our own ~~~erv~ we may find that one thing more perfectly answers' our purpose than another does, and we may . but when we put our own purpose and use stoa yu sso o' ut of the considerati·O n, and co~e to, .s pe· ak of "use," and "purpose," and "per.fectH?n, m nature generally, we speak wor~s W:htch either have no meaning at all, or one which IS very pres~mptuous and impious, as well as very absurd.. fhat we always unde~stand ?ur own purpose IS very doubtful; and it 1s certain that we c.an never find out any purpose in nature. If w.e dtd, we should penetrate the secrets of the Almighty ; an~ as we cannot do that, it is a silly as well as an t~pwus vanitv to say that we can. The real fact 1s, that THE LIMIT OF KNOW.LE DGE. 261 we know what we have observed, and not a jot more ; and if we think that we do, we are in error. Now, when we carefully, attentively, and without any visionary theory-or notion formed previous to knowledge, and therefore groundless and delusivelook at nature around us, we find two great classes of natural productions. The one class perfectly passive to the operation of the laws of matter, having in themselves no principle of change, suffering no alteration though ever so long kept apart from other substances, and altering only when they are affected by something external of themselves. Those substances we can, in many instances, resolve into their elements, · or constituent parts ; and we also can, although :wt in so many instances, reproduce them back a gam out of the very elements into which they were previously resolved. If we cannot do that, .we always can account for all the parts, and say mto what other substances they have been compounded ; and s~att~r them as we may, through any number of combmatwns, not one of them is lost e.ither in i~s quantity o~ mat~er or in any of its qualities i. but m all cases m which we can bring the ingredients together under the proper circumstances _ an.d .these all observable circumstances, we get th~ ongmal com pound, unaltered and undiminished in any one of its qualities . These a~e the substances of whi~h, it has already ~een mentwned, no part., mechamcally considered, IS necessary to the existence and perfection of another. If we cut them with a sharp instrument break them ~y a blow, .or otherwise divide them by anr mechamcal operatiOn, all the parts are, size and weight excepted, just the very same substance that the larger mass was before the mechanical division. . , ~nd as we cannot make them smaller, except by ta~mg away a part, and the part and what is left still ~ak~ up the whole, so we cannot add to their ·-quantity m any other way than by adding matter of |
