98 A SCIENTIFIC APPROACH 



chance, juxtapositions of particles which had the structure 

 of the simplest organisms. Dauvillier adduced the crystallisa- 

 tion of glycerine as an example of such configurations arising 

 by chance. Although glycerine had been known since the 

 eighteenth century, for a long time it had only existed in 

 liquid form. The first crystals of glycerine were found in a 

 barrel which was sent from Vienna to London. This sudden 

 crystallisation was due to an unusual combination of move- 

 ments which occurred, purely by chance, in the barrel. Since 

 that time the spontaneous crystallisation of glycerine has only 

 been observed two or three times in all. It is, however, easy 

 to obtain crystals of glycerine by seeding liquid glycerine 

 with a pre-existing crystal. Dauvillier pointed out that pure 

 chance thus seems to be the most important creative factor. 

 " Here ", he wrote, " we see once more the handiwork of a 

 strange creator who is dependent on nothing but time ". 



According to Dauvillier the first configuration of living 

 material, which arose by chance, must have had the pro- 

 perties of filterable viruses, that is, it must have had the 

 power to reproduce its own structure. As time went on these 

 centres of chemical activity gave rise to the development of 

 mitochondria and then to the formation of bacilli. 



The author himself admits that the formation of such a 

 ' living configuration ' endowed with the powers of metabol- 

 ism and self-reproduction, as a result of the chance com- 

 bination of organic molecules, seems a highly improbable 

 event. He considered that it could only have happened once 

 in the whole time the Earth has existed. After this there 

 occurred only the constant multiplication of this substance 

 which had arisen once and for all and was eternal and un- 

 changing. 



G. W. Beadle" subscribed to the same ' molecular ' theory 

 when he wrote in 1 949 : 



Somehow, out of this age-long trial and error process there 

 presumably arose molecules with the property of duplicating 

 themselves, that is, capable of catalyzing the process by which 

 they were formed. If such molecules were at the same time 

 sufficiendy large and appropriately built to permit chemical 

 modification without loss of the power to multiply their kind 



