THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. 63 



beings are now presumed by almost all physiologists 

 to be dependent upon the agency of transformed 

 physical forces? And, if this be the case, we may 

 well ask (seeing that they are all members of a cor- 

 related series) why a special force should be needed 

 to effect the transformation of physical forces into 

 those modes of energy which are active in the 

 manifestations of living beings, whilst no peculiar 

 force is deemed necessary to effect the transforma- 

 tion of one mode of physical force into any other 

 mode of physical force? The mere advancement 

 of such a supposition would seem to show that the 

 promulgators of it had not seized the very essence of 

 the doctrine of the Persistence of Force. Matter and 

 force, it says, are inseparable ; the latter manifests 

 itself as the attributes or qualities of the former, and 

 necessarily, if, under the influence of communicated 

 Motion or Force, the particles of matter assume dif- 

 ferent relationships to one another, this matter will be 

 changed in its qualities, and will display the same to 

 us under the guise of different attributes or force-mani- 

 festations 1 . When mechanical energy is converted into 



1 ' Redistributions of matter,' Mr. Spencer says, ' imply concomitant 

 redistributions of motion. That which under one of its aspects we con- 

 template as an alteration of arrangement among the parts of a body is, 

 under a correlative aspect, an alteration of arrangement among certain 

 momenta whereby these parts are impelled to their new positions. . . . 

 Inseparably connected as they are, these two orders of phenomena are 

 liable to be confounded together.' (' Principles of Biology,' vol. i. p. 43.) 

 And again, he points out that the ' transformation of ethereal undulations 



