e deserving of attention, and for this reason it is we propose to
give to his arguments a brief examination.

The theory divides itself into two parts--the production of organic life
from the inorganic world; and the progressive development of the several
species from the first simple elementary forms of life.

Spontaneous, or, as our author calls it, aboriginal generation, is a
doctrine neither new, nor without its supporters. But unfortunately for
his purposes, the class of cases of spontaneous generation which appear to
be at all trustworthy, are those in which the animalcule, or other
creatures, have been produced either within living bodies, (entozoa,) or
from the putrefaction of vegetable or animal life, the decay and
dissolution of some previous organization. Here _life_ still produces
_life_, though _like_ does not produce _like_. It is well known that,
amongst some of the lower class of animals, as amongst certain of the
polypi, reproduction is nothing more than a species of growth; a _bud_
sprouts out of the body, which, separating itself, becomes a new animal.
With such an analogy before us, there appears nothing very improbable in
the supposition that _entozoa_, and other descriptions of living
creatures, should be produced from the tissues of the higher animals,
either on a separation of their component parts when they decay, or on a
partial separation when the animal is inflicted with disease. We make no
profession of faith on this subject; we content ourselves with observing,
that this class of cases, where the evidence is strongest, and approaches
nearest to conviction, lends no support whatever to our author's
hypothesis, and provides him with no commencement of vital phenomena. Of
cases where life has been produced by the operation of purely chemical
laws on inorganic matter, there are certainly none which will satisfy a
cautious enquirer.

If Mr Crosse or Mr Weekes produce a species of worm by the agency of
electricity, it is impossible to say that the germ of life was not
previously existing in the fluid through which the electricity passed.
When lime is thrown upon a field, and clover springs up, it is the far
more probable supposition that the seed was there, but owing to ungenial
circumstances had not germinated; for no one who has mentioned this fact
has ventured to say that the experiment would always succeed, and that
lime thrown upon a certain description of soil would in all parts of the
wo