This and similar facts, I may remark, convince me, that the earth has myriads of times been illumed by the highest attainments of intellect, and as often plunged into darkness. This single point of Indian philosophy was, in my opinion, but the mere shadow of the highest excellence in philosophy in general; and as the greatest cultivation of the human mind, and the greatest misapplication of its faculties, cannot well exist together, I am equally convinced, that the beautiful specimens of art, blended with heterogeneous absurdities, in the monuments of Upper Egypt, afford the most striking proof that, contrary to the common assertion, there _were_ periods in that country when tyrants held no despotic sway over the physical, nor the priests of a false religion over the moral structure of man. But to return to the subject.—True it is that the affinities of external agents with the molecules of organic bodies are precisely the same during life when their influence is resisted as after death when it operates with the greatest energy; but the power which during life organic bodies possess of resisting the influence of external agents, and even the extension of the sphere of their action beyond the mere bounds of the living body, is, in my opinion, very easily accounted for. All the particles of matter possess attraction and repulsion, and the largest homogeneous masses, _coeteris paribus_, evidence them most. Hence, organic bodies, while they possess homogeneity by the subsistence of intimate relations between their parts, evidence attraction and repulsion in the highest degree. While in infancy, these relations are merely forming, the powers of attraction and repulsion are weak; when, in the vigour of life, these relations are most intimate, these powers are greatest; when, in old age, these relations are interrupted, these powers are also diminished; and when, in death, these relations cease to exist between the molecules, or in other words, when the body is no longer organized, the power of combined resistance terminates. Thus, life is no forced state, but an intrinsic power arising merely from the intimate relation of these molecules, and the greater effects which, in such combinations, they are capable of producing, than when, in death, they have become independent of each other, and their powers disunited, are capable of much less effectual resistance. Thus, it is, that I would endeavour to shew a connexion between the phenomena of living bodies, and the general laws of nature. This general and common motion of all the parts, says even Cuvier, forms so peculiarly the essence of life, that the parts which are separated from a living body soon die, because they possess no motion of their own, and only participate in the general motion produced by their union. Thus, according to the beautiful expression of Kant, the mode of existence of each part of inanimate bodies belongs to itself; but, in living bodies, it resides in the whole.