The physiologist cannot afford to lose this process from the category of chemico-vital, or biochemical manifestations.[[45]] The philosophy of the age has a tendency to make every thing chemical; it is true that the Divinity is as much seen in the laws which govern the elementary particles of matter, as in those laws which preside over the transmutation and sustentation of those elementary and inorganic particles, when compounded in the tissues which are engaged in the formation of living beings. The laws by which acids and alkalies neutralize each other, and the affinities single, double and elective, which the particles of matter exhibit, together with the influences of light, heat, and electricity upon almost every condition of matter, are as truly wonderful as the creative power. Man may, in many instances, imitate the processes of nature, he can render iron magnetic, and form alkaloids, but the
laws which govern the particles of matter are still the secret of the whole proceedings. We do but interpret the language of nature in discovery, the book is ever open before us, and every atom of the world is a word and a theme, capable of occupying the short span of sublunary existence allotted to man. We have read of "sermons in stones," but a book has been written on a "pebble."[[46]]
To return, as we every where in nature find a gradual transition in the forms, arrangements and properties of matter, so we may expect to find a link between the inorganic and vital chemistry of nature. The fungi, by which we contend this transition appears to be accomplished, are also a link in chemical composition, between the animal and vegetable kingdom, and not only in that, but in their subsisting upon matter which has been organized, they are deoxidizers and reducers, as the vegetable kingdom in its highest function is a compounder. To their functions and offices in the great scheme of creation, we may fairly apply ourselves with a sure and certain result of the most interesting discovery. Is it no hint that wherever decaying organic matter is found, there do we find fungi? is it no hint that they are found in all parts of the world? that even in snow the germs of fungi will grow and multiply to such an extent, according to Capt. Ross, that the protococcus was seen
by him, clothing the sides of the mountains at Baffin's Bay, rising, according to his report, to the height of several hundred feet, and extending to the distance of eight miles?
Even stones contain in their interior, or interspaces of their structure, the germs of fungi. A species of Tufa is found in the vicinity of Naples of a porous texture, which, when moistened and shaded, produces vast mushrooms, four or five inches high, and eight or ten inches broad.[[47]] This author further says: "In the Maremma, where the volcanic tufa is the basis of the soil the surface is intermixed with the animal remains of departed empires, and the ordure of cattle, is covered with grasses of old pasturages, and is wet with heavy dews. Everything, therefore, conspires there to a fungiferous end."
They are found growing in and upon both vegetables and animals. Nees von Esenbeck imagined, that minute forms multiplied themselves in the atmosphere; and really, when we consider the amount of effluvia composed of the atoms cast off from the bodies of living or decaying organic matters, which are incessantly passing into the atmosphere, the conjecture is not an unreasonable one. The minuteness of those, which we know are always found growing on decomposing bodies, does not preclude the possibility, nay, further favours
the probability, that others infinitely more minute,[[48]] may be destined to remove the more subtle and vaporous particles which escape into the air.
We can, therefore, I think, conclude, that the lower tribes of vegetation, may consistently be regarded as capable of existing in almost any condition, and almost under any circumstances, they may be made to grow in plants by inoculation, as shewn by De Candolle, and Dr. Hassall. If the stem of wheat also is inoculated with vibriones, they will make their appearance in the grain.[[49]] If the seed contain them and have not lost its germinating properties, these worms will be found again in the grain. If the grain containing them be dried for years, and moistened again with water, these animalcules, according to Bauer and Steinbach, will present all the phenomena of life. This experiment I have witnessed, and can confirm the statement. These animalcules in the diseased grain, have under the microscope the appearance of an immense
number of eels crowded together in a small space, and presenting a movement more, perhaps, vermicular than any other, and it is continued for a considerable time. Now if these animalcules, or their ova, can be proved to pass with the sap to the seed, there can be no difficulty in comprehending how germs, considerably more minute and of a vegetable nature, should be found subject to the same peculiar mode of obtaining an entrance into animals and vegetables for sustenance. "It is usually imagined," says Dr. Carpenter, "that the germs liberated by one plant are taken up by the roots of others, and being carried along the current of the sap, are deposited and developed, where vegetation is most active."
The chemical theory of disease would be better sustained by a comparison of "the artificial formation of alkaloids," and the phenomena of transformation of blood into the tissues of animals, and their degeneration into effete matters, and of sap into the tissues of plants and their degenerations.