spasmodically at
certain seasons. The Life is _in_ every plant and tree, inside its own
substance and tissue, and continues there until it dies. This
localization of Life in the individual is precisely the point where
Vitality differs from the other forces of nature, such as magnetism and
electricity. Vitality has much in common with such forces as magnetism
and electricity, but there is one inviolable distinction between
them--that Life is permanently fixed and rooted in the organism. The
doctrines of conservation and transformation of energy, that is to say,
do not hold for Vitality. The electrician can demagnetize a bar of iron,
that is, he can transform its energy of magnetism into something
else--heat, or motion, or light--and then re-form these back into
magnetism. For magnetism has no root, no individuality, no fixed
indwelling. But the biologist cannot devitalize a plant or an animal and
revivify it again.[50] Life is not one of the homeless forces which
promiscuously inhabit space, or which can be gathered like electricity
from the clouds and dissipated back again into space. Life is definite
and resident; and Spiritual Life is not a visit from a force, but a
resident tenant in the soul.

This is, however, to formulate the statement of the third point, that
Spiritual Life is not an ordinary form of energy or force. The analogy
from Nature indorses this, but here Nature stops. It cannot say what
Spiritual Life is. Indeed what natural Life is remains unknown, and the
word Life still wanders through Science without a definition. Nature is
silent, therefore, and must be as to Spiritual Life. But in the absence
of natural light we fall back upon that complementary revelation which
always shines, when truth is necessary and where Nature fails. We ask
with Paul when this Life first visited him on the Damascus road, What is
this? "Who art Thou, Lord?" And we hear, "I am Jesus."[51]

We must expect to find this denied. Besides a proof from Revelation,
this is an argument from experience. And yet we shall still be told that
this Spiritual Life is a force. But let it be remembered what this means
in Science, it means the heresy of confounding Force with Vitality. We
must also expect to be told that this Spiritual Life is simply a
development of ordinary Life--just as Dr. Bastian tells us that natural
Life is formed according to the same laws which determine the more
simple chemical combinations. But remember what this m