hey result from the properties of the component elements
of the water. We do not assume that a something called "aquosity" entered
into and took possession of the oxide of hydrogen as soon as it was
formed, and then guided the aqueous particles to their places in the
facets of the crystal, or among the leaflets of the hoar-frost. On the
contrary, we live in the hope and in the faith that, by the advance of
molecular physics, we shall by-and-by be able to see our way as clearly
from the constituents of water to the properties of water, as we are now
able to deduce the operations of a watch from the form of its parts and
the manner in which they are put together.

Is the case in any way changed when carbonic acid, water, and ammonia
disappear, and in their place, under the influence of preexisting living
protoplasm, an equivalent weight of the matter of life makes its
appearance?

It is true that there is no sort of parity between the properties of the
components and the properties of the resultant; but neither was there in
the case of the water. It is also true that what I have spoken of as the
influence of preexisting living matter is something quite unintelligible;
but does anybody quite comprehend the _modus operandi_ of an electric
spark, which traverses a mixture of oxygen and hydrogen?

What justification is there, then, for the assumption of the existence in
the living matter of a something which has no representative, or
correlative, in the not-living matter which gave rise to it? What better
philosophical status has "vitality" than "aquosity"? And why should
"vitality" hope for a better fate than the other "itys" which have
disappeared since Martinus Scriblerus accounted for the operation of the
meat-jack by its inherent "meat-roasting quality," and scorned the
"materialism" of those who explained the turning of the spit by a certain
mechanism worked by the draught of the chimney?

If scientific language is to possess a definite and constant signification
whenever it is employed, it seems to me that we are logically bound to
apply to the protoplasm, or physical basis of life, the same conceptions
as those which are held to be legitimate elsewhere. If the phenomena
exhibited by water are its properties, so are those presented by
protoplasm, living or dead, its properties.

If the properties of water may be properly said to result from the nature
and disposition of its component molecules, I can find no intell