8 Evolution and Distribution of Fishes 



the group, alike in their morphological aspects and as 

 yielding confirmatory and detailed verification of the prin- 

 ciples already laid down In the earlier volume by the author. 



In the remainder of this chapter we may now consider 

 the fundamental evolutionary causes which effected the de- 

 velopment of fishes from simpler types; the mode of opera- 

 tion of these causes; and the relative Importance of each 

 causal agent alongside others that operated. 



As more fully set forth In the work already referred 

 to, the writer would regard It as a great and fundamental 

 law that all organisms have evolved — not through the 

 agency of matter or chemical atoms as ordinarily under- 

 stood — but from the continuous activity and increasing 

 condensation of energy. This universally present energy, 

 activating and building up atoms Into organic molecules, 

 shows successive condensation phases that we designate, 

 according to their wave-length and other physical proper- 

 ties, the thermic, lumic, chemic and electric states of energy- 

 motion. These in the order named, and when acting on 

 simple chemical atoms, gradually build up or link together 

 those inorganic compounds that pass from bivalent to tri- 

 valent and thence to quartivalent compounds. The matter 

 or chemical atoms thus acted on are in themselves inert, 

 passive, dead; but according to the condensation quality 

 and phase of the energy applied they assume those con- 

 ditions of atomic linkage and those physical characters that 

 determine the different types of molecules. 



But in passing from the Inorganic to the organic, the 

 writer has suggested (7:73-96)* the further condensation 

 of electric energy into that state of energy-action which 

 he has named the duplo-electric, and which he considers to 

 be specially concerned In elaboration of those colloid mole- 

 cules that form the necessary basis of all organic existence. 

 The colloid states of many Inorganic bodies are now well 

 known, since the first description of them by Graham, 

 now little more than a half century since. The colloid 

 states of silicon, sulphur. Iron, platinum, silver, gold and 

 others, are now well recognized. In all of these, as in 



*In all references to literature, the first and italicized number indicates the author 

 and work in question as given in "References to Literature" on pp. 534-542, the second 

 number indicates the page. 



