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    organs ; when its whole life is in itself , and it enjoys independent existence . ' The organic life is born perfect ; the animal life becomes perfect only by servitude , and the aptitude which service gives . * The heart contracts as well ; . the arteries secrete as well ; the respiratory organs work as well , the first moment they begin to act as at any subsequent period . They require no teaching from experience ; they profit nothing from its lessons . 4

    But the functions of the brain and the actions of the voluntary muscles , feeble and uncertain at first , acquire , day by day , strength and precision ; and it is only by slow degrees , and not until the adult age , that they attain their ultimate perfection . » * * * * Could any man , after having attained the age of manhood , reverse the order of the course he has passed , —could he , with the power of observation , together with the experience , that belong to manhood ,

    retrace , with perfect exactness , every step of his sentient existence from the age , suppose of forty , to the moment when the air first came into contact with his body on his leaving his maternal dwelling , — among the truths that he would learn , the most interesting , if not the most surprising , would be those which relate to the manner in which he dealt with his earliest impressions ; with the mode in which he

    combined them , —recalled them , —laid them by for future use , —made his first general deduction , —observed what subsequent experience taught to be conformable , and what not conformable , to this general inference , —his emotions in detecting his first error , —his contrasted feelings on discovering those comprehensive truths , the certainty of which became confirmed by every subsequent impression . 4

    Thus , perfectly to live backwards , would be , in fact , to go through the complete analysis of the intellectual combinations , and consequently to obtain a perfect iDsight into the constitution of the mind . And among the curious results which would then become manifest , perhaps few would appear more surprising than the true action of the

    senses . 4 * * rp o se 6 j to hear ? to smell , to taste , to touch , are processes which appear to be performed instantaneously , and which really are performed with extraordinary rapidity , in a person who observes them in himself ; but they were not always performed thus rapidly ; they are processes acquired ; businesses learned ;—processes and businesses acquired and learned , not without the cost of many efforts and much labour .

    4 the same is true of the muscles of volition . How many efforts are made before the power of distinct articulation is acquired ! How many before the infant can stand ! How many before the child can walk !' The organic life may continue to exist after the animal life has perished , as in apoplexy , or has partially ceased to exist , as in catalepsy . Clearly and beautifully as these distinctions are marked , a still more interesting view follows : it is that of the progress of life ,

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    Functions of the Animal Economy . 57

• Citation
  • Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Jan. 2, 1833, page 57, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2606/page/57/