to emanate from the Vital Principle, as anger or fear is produced by the heart being moved in this or that manner, and thinking may be some analogous or different kind of motion; but some of these phænomena are produced by the displacement of certain particles in motion, and others by change, the explanation of the quality and manner of which is foreign to the present inquiry.
Now to maintain that the Vital Principle is angry is very much like saying that it weaves or builds, and thus it would, perhaps, be better to say, not that Vital Principle pities, learns or thinks, but that the man, by his Vital Principle, is so affected or so engaged. It is not, however, hereby implied that motion is in the Vital Principle, but, on the contrary, that sometimes it proceeds to, and sometimes comes from it; as sentient impression is from external objects, and recollection comes from it to the movements or impressions abiding in the sentient organs. The mind seems to be a peculiar innate essence, and to be indestructible; were it destructible, however, it would, in an especial sense, be so by the dulness attendant upon age, when probably that happens to the mind which takes place in the sentient organs; for if an aged person could take an eye of a certain character, he would see as well as a young man. Thus, the infirmities of age are attributable, not to the Vital Principle having been in aught affected, but to its
