4:42 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.— SUPPLEMENT. 



" special kinds of living matter do duty for all 

 kinds," I should not have lacked the countenance 

 of high authority for the assumption that the 

 fundamental properties of all living matter are 

 similar. I may perhaps be permitted to call his 

 attention to what Prof. Huxley 1 has eloquent- 

 ly said on this subject: "Beast and fowl, reptile 

 and fish, mollusk, worm, and polyp, are all com- 

 posed of structural units of the same charac- 

 ter—namely, masses of protoplasm with a nu- 

 cleus. . . . What has been said of the animal 

 world is no less true of plants. . . . Protoplasm, 

 simple or nucleated, is the formal basis of all 

 life. . . . Thus it becomes clear that all livin<* 

 powers are cognate, and all living forms are fun- 

 damentally of one character." 



On the all-important subject of the death- 

 point of living matter, therefore, and on the de- 

 gree to which a power of resisting prolonged and 

 higher temperatures is conferred upon bacteria 

 or their germs by virtue of their previous desic- 

 cation, I am quite unable to accept Prof. Tyn- 

 dall's assumptions. I go no further than to say 

 that in the present state of the evidence bear- 

 ing upon the subject I regard the hypothesis of 

 spontaneous generation as the most logical and 

 consistent interpretation of the facts which are 

 at present known. I am far from asserting that 

 further experiments may not shift the balance of 

 evidence in the opposite direction, but in order 

 that this may be brought about something more 

 than assumption must be forthcoming. 



When legitimate evidence is adduced, I hope 

 I shall not be unamenable to its influence. I 

 shall, however, continue quite obdurate in face 

 of the " reasoning " in which Prof. Tyndall in- 

 dulges on this subject. In 'the early part of his 

 recent communication he referred to the mental 

 bias which had influenced the late M. Pouchet; 

 but he has himself shown an even more obvious 

 bias in the contrary direction. Thus he has in- 

 formed me through the columns of the Times, in 

 one of those replies with which he has favored 

 we from time to time, that only one interpreta- 

 tion of the fermentation of superheated fluids is 

 possible. The notion of the survival of germs 

 alone finds favor with him, and he roundly dis- 

 misses the interpretation that the phenomena 

 may have been caused by a new birth of living 

 particles as no interpretation at all. Thus, in a 

 letter which appeared on the 18th of June, 1877, 

 he said : 



" Dr. Bastian says that two interpretations of 

 my facts are equally admissible. He is again wrong ; 



1 " Lay Sermons," pp. 126-129. 



there is but one interpretation possible. An inter- 

 pretation which violates all antecedent knowledge 

 is no interpretation at all. . . . The inference that 

 a particle which when sown produces a thistle is 

 the seed of a thistle is not surer than the inference 

 that the particles described in the Times as rising 

 in clouds from shaken hay are the seeds of bac- 

 teria." 



Having thus set his seal upon Nature's possi- 

 bilities, a corresponding interpretation of his ex- 

 periments and those of other workers is freed 

 from all difficulty. Whenever fermentation oc- 

 curs in guarded and previously superheated flu- 

 ids, the interpretation is, to Prof. Tyndall, always 

 plain and simple. He says : " I have had several 

 cases of survival after four and five hours' boiling, 

 some survivals after six, and one survival after 

 eight hours' boiling. Thus far has experiment 

 actually reached, but there is no valid warrant for 

 fixing upon even eight hours as the extreme limit 

 of vital resistance." He holds out the hope that 

 further researches " might reveal germs more ob- 

 stinate still." Now, one's comment upon all this 

 is, that with Prof. Tyndall it is not a question of 

 revelation at all, but rather one of mere assump- 

 tion. What could be clearer than his reasoning ? 

 He argues from a one-sided analogy that bacteria 

 must spring from seeds, and then uses this must 

 as the ready interpretation of all his experi- 

 ments, shutting his eyes apparently to all other 

 considerations, even though this interpretation 

 "violates all antecedent knowledge," as it cer- 

 tainly does. What present warrant is there for 

 supposing that a naked, or almost naked, speck of 

 protoplasm can withstand four, six, or eight hours' 

 boiling ? To which I can only answer, none. 



Let Prof. Tyndall's statements in regard to the 

 existence of invisible bacteria-germs and their 

 properties be contrasted with those which other 

 more sober believers in the same germ-theory, 

 who are similarly indisposed to admit spontaneous 

 generation, feel entitled to make. 



The medical profession has recently been told, 

 through the Pathological Society, by Prof. Lis- 

 ter, 1 that he thinks it highly improbable that 

 bacteria have any germs at all, and that, wheth- 

 er they have or not, he has never met with any 

 whose reproductive elements (in whatsoever stage 

 or condition they may exist) could survive an im- 

 mersion for half an hour to a temperature 2° be- 

 low the boiling-point of water (212° Fahr.). He 

 says: 



" I am aware that there are two instances, the 



1 See British Medical Journal, December 22, 1877, 

 pp. 905 and 902. 



