

THE PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS. 



^siV 



SPECULATIONS WITH REGARD TO THE SIMPLEST 

 FORMS OF LIFE AND THEIR ORIGIN ON THE EARTH. 



By Prof. E. A. Minchin, M.A., F.R.S. 



{Delivered February 2lt1i, 1912.) 



Gentlemen, 



It is with no slight feeling of diffidence that I venture 

 to discuss the subject which I have chosen for my address to- 

 night, since there is perhaps no problem in the whole range of 

 the natural sciences which appears to be so far beyond the 

 possibility of final and definite solution as that of the origin of 

 life. We must,' indeed, " with no middle flight intend to soar " 

 when we attempt to unveil so profound a mystery ; we must fit 

 our imagination with wings that can carry it across the pro- 

 foundest abysses of space or the most immense periods of time. 

 Scientific men are not agreed as to the probable length of time 

 during which living beings have existed on this terrestrial globe 

 of ours ; but the lowest estimate is about a hundred million years, 

 the highest about a thousand million. What can the human 

 intellect pretend to know with any approach to certainty about 

 events from which we are separated by so vast an interval of 

 time ? All that we can attempt is to discuss the conditions and 

 limitations of the problem with the object of ascertaining what 

 are its possible or probable solutions. I think I need not 

 apologise for bringing the subject of the origin of life before this 

 Club, since the progress, slight though it may be, that has been 

 made towards a solution of the problem would have been 

 impossible without the aid of the microscope. 



Before I can approach the main problem, that of the origin of 

 life, it is necessary to discuss first the nature of "the living 

 substance, and to gain, if possible, some notion of its simplest or 

 most primitive form. For this purpose I shall be obliged to 

 trouble you with a certain number of hard facts, some of them 

 difficult and abstruse, others perhaps tedious from their 



JouRN. Q. M. C, Series II. No. 70. 23 



