THE LIFE OK MATTPJK. HU*.) 



natioiLs a (•(M'taiii foi'iiiaf iiuliyidiiality, f()ll()\vin<4" the type of that pos- 

 sessed })V each of their eonstituetil iiieiuhei's. M. Izolet consulers 

 society as iui organism, which he calls a " liyperzoarv."" Herhei't 

 Spencer lias developed the comparison of the collective or<>anism with 

 the individual oroanism, insisting- on its resendjlances and ditt'erences, 

 Th. Ribot has dwelt especially on the resemblances. 



The postulate that we have clearly stated here is understood as an 

 axiom by many minds. But it is not an axiom. In saying that ther(>. 

 is nothinu' in the complex that can not be foinid in the pai'ts they think 

 they are expressing a self-evident trutir. they are, in fact, merely stat- 

 ing an hypothesis. That arrangement, aggregation, and (•om])licated 

 and skillful grouping of elements can produce nothing really new in 

 the order of phenomena is an assertion that needs to be \-eritied ineach 

 particular case. 



The pruiriph' of (-(till i n ll'lilj^ (I Clj)iSrqilrilCr (if fill Jlfiri (/I IK/.- \A'i US 



a})ply this principle to organized beings. All beings in nature are 

 actually ari'angements, aggregates, or groupings of the same unixcrsal 

 matter: that is to say, of the same simple cliemical bodies. It results 

 from the preceding postulate that their activities can ditfer only in 

 degree and form, and not fundamentally. Ilien^ is no essential ditl'er- 

 ence of nature between the activities of various categories of beings, 

 no heterogeneity, nf) discontinuity. ^Ve may pass from one to another, 

 encountering no hiatus or impassable gulf. The law of continuity 

 thus appears as a simple conseciuence of the fundamental postulate; 

 and so is the law of evolution, for exolution is merely continuity in 

 action. 



Such are the origins of the philosophical docti'ine which uiii\crs:ili/.es 

 life and extends it to all bodies in nature. 



It may be remarked that this doctrine is not confined to any partic- 

 ular school or .sect. Leil)nitz was not at all a materialist, and endowed 

 his nuindane elements, his monads, not (ndy with a sort of life, but 

 even with a sort of soul. Father Boscowich. though he was a Jesuit 

 and a professor in the Colh^ge of Kome, did not deny to his indivisible 

 points a species of inferior vitality. St. Thomas, too. the angelical 

 doctor, according to M. (Jardair. accorded to inanimate sul)stances 

 a certain kind of activity, native inclinations, and a real appetition 

 toward certain acts. 



TI. 

 oiiKiix oi" lutUT]': matti:h in ijvin(; .mattkk. 



There should be two ways of proving the doctrine of the essential 

 identity of brute matter and livmg matter — one slowei- and more 

 laborious, the other moi'c rapid and decisive. 



Identification (f th<' tiro iiiatteri^, hri'te (iiid li'imig. — The laborious 

 method, that whic->h we shall l)e obliged to follow, consists in examin- 

 ing attentively the various activities by which life is manifested and 



