HEREDITY HAS NO POWER, ETC. 99 



atozoon, nor the ovum can live alone. But when 

 united and fused together, under proper conditions, 

 this combination takes on the manifestations of life; 

 and these manifestations continue until death. 



Any good chemist can analyze a fertilized ovum 

 and learn, exactly, the chemical elements of which it 

 is composed, and the proportions in which they are 

 combined. He could then make a new combination of 

 carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen and oxygen in the same 

 proportions, in which these substances were combined 

 in the fertilized ovum ; and if life were a property of 

 that combination of atoms, this new chemical com- 

 pound, ought to become a living creature. But no 

 such thing could ever happen. 



As already remarked, neither the spermatozoon 

 nor the ovum can live alone. But when fused together, 

 the combination becomes a living creature. The 

 atoms in the combination are identically the same 

 that were in the spermatozoon and ovum before the 

 fusion occurred. Why should the combination live 

 when the two component parts of it could not ? 



It is clear that no man can, voluntarily 

 nor involuntarily endow a spermatozoon with 

 the power to develop, alone, into a human 

 being; for every one of them dies in a day, or 

 within a few days, after it matures ; unless it be so 

 fortunate as to unite and fu^e with an ovum. It is 

 equally clear that no woman can endow an o \iirn with 

 the power to become a human being. Kvri'y ovum 

 soon dies, unless it unite and fuse with a spermatozoon 

 under conditions favorable to growth. Haeckel says: 

 " there are calculated to be 72,000 [ova] in the sex- 



