Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1871-11-24
What Is Life Z

with organized beings possessing lie. That
the term llie indicates very special property
there can be no doubt, but as yet an impenc-
trablc veil seems to shroud its ultimate bro
ccsscs, believe, however, that the veil is
ut,the far end of the labyrinth in which we
are now wandering, and that patient obserya-
tion and guarded generalization may yet epa-
BILE US greatly to narrow the limits of the un-
known--to approach some steps nearer to tho
veil. must premise that, as L am now look
ing at the subject FROM purely physiological
point of view, regard life simply as condi
tion capable of producing certain pcrceptible
phenomena, and can take no cognizance what
ever of that mysterious union betwecu spirit
and matter which is broken in passing through
"thc valley Of the shadow of death" Mate
rial changes only arc subject to the material
instruments Of biological research. These
inner mysteries are now and must probably
ever remain, in our present condition of cxis-
tcnce, beyond the veil.
1t becomes daily more manifest, with the
advance Of knowledge, that the action of
known physical awa-such as chemical afin-
ity and capillarity as manifested by porous
media and by colloids-is most intimately in
tcrwoven with all organic processes, and it is
as yet impossible to say how far life may in-
huence, in the sense of modifying or direct
ing, the action of these laws. Life has been
called the vital force, and it has been sugges-
ted that it may be found to belong to the
same category as the convertible forces heat
and light. Life seems, however, to be more
property OF matter in certain state of com
bination than force. 1t does no work in
the ordinary sense. If a man lift weight
couple of feet off the ground, many Of the
80 called vital actions are called into play, but
yet every part of the work done can be ac-
counted for by the action of the ordinary phys
ical forces. The act Of the will, in legal
phrase the "mere notion" which induced the
lifting of the weight, can be referred, we can
scarcely doubt, to the mechanical action of
somc part Of largo and complicated appa-
ratus, the cerebral hemisphcres, and was ao-
companicd by q waste Of their substance
The telegaphic communication, to the
muscles involved, which harmonized their
several acts and signaled the contraction Of
their hbers, was conveyed through cord
whose molecules were set in vibration by q
force very probably convertible with the phys
lcal forces, generated by chemical change and
waste of tissue; and in the muscle, the organ
by which tho weight was actually raised, an
amount Of waste took place-that is to say.
".
gen precisely equivalent theoretically to the
quantity of coal which must have been burn
ed in perfectly constructed engine to do the
same work.
Chemical forces act in living beings under
very special circumstances For Series Of
years mass Of substances is held undergoing
constant change and throughout in the most
unstable state Of chemical combination The
instant the condition of life is removed. de.
commences, and the complex
constituents Of the body are resolved into
more simple and stable combinations. But
yet it may be fairly questioned whether the
chemical relations of the competent elements
of an organized body are in any way direotly
affected or controlled by life It has become
quite conceivable, especially through the re.
searches Of the late Master of the Mint, that
n constant adjustment and reimbursement of
and colloid diaphragms, in the
presence Of powerful catalytio agents NAV
possibly explain the maintenance of almost
any chemical conditions, however complicated.
The ono function Of living beings whose
explanation it seems at present impossible to
imagine except by regarding it as the mani.
festation of Especial property, is what has
been called tho "molding Of specific form:"
the building up of heterogeneous and com.
plicatcd organism, which shall repeat, not
rigidly but with certain degree of -aexibili-
ty, tho characters which have been transmit.
ted to it through germ from parent, ovory
moleoule Of every part having thus direct
relation IN form, in position, and in compost
ton, to every other molecule Of the body.
at present, regarding it from purely mate.
rial point of view, we are scarcely justified in
life as more than that condition Of
an organized being in which tho products of
chemical and physical changes taking place
within it are stamped with q specific organic
form. Prof WyviNc Thompson.
SsDr A Vermont girl who sued false rov.
or for breach Of promise laid the damages at
forty dollars. In court in answer to the in
quiry why that particular sum had been
named, she answered that counting the time
she had spent Sitting up" with him as worth
at the rate of nine shillings per week, she
had figured up the nine hours passed in his
company, and adding tho value of wood con.
sumed, she had found tnat the amount due.
There was no doubt in tho mind Of the Judge
that her claim was an honest one, and a YER.
dict was rendered accordingly.
Ey Congress, upon re-assembling in De-
combcr, will have before it seven hundred
and fifty.nine bills which were pending at
tho time Of adjournment. OF these, four
hundred and forty arc in tho House awaiting
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