The Presichnea Address. By L. S. Bede, F.B.S. 211 



made artificially by the chemist, and if this can only be achieved 

 there will then remain but the discovery of the " conditions " under 

 which this artificial protoplasm will manifest its vital properties, 

 and the " living thing " made by man will be ready for examination 

 in our Microscopes. 



The President of the British Association, in his address last 

 August, gives his cordial support to Huxley's assumptions con- 

 cerning protoplasm, the " physical basis of life," and remarks that 

 '* wherever there is life there is protoplasm ; wherever there is 

 protoplasm, there too is life," forgetting that he himself in more 

 than one place speaks of lifeless matter as protoplasm, and nowhere 

 distinguishes between the living substance and the lifeless matter 

 which remains after its death, — forgetting, too, that roast and 

 boiled muscle and many other forms of non-living matter have been 

 called protoplasm by Huxley and others. Further, we are told 

 that protoplasm is to the biologist what the ether is to the physicist, 

 " onhj " one is a " tangible reality," and the other is a " hypo- 

 thetical conception." Possibly some scientific men may have of 

 late years dealt too freely in hypothetical conceptions, but the 

 analogy between the latter and tangible realities remains to be 

 discovered. 



Bathyhius. 



I am sure many here will be interested to learn anything that 

 can be added to oiu: knowledge concerning Bathyhius which may 

 help them to decide whether it is a tangible reality like protoplasm 

 or a hypothetical conception like the ether. Dr. Allman decides for 

 Bathtjbius, and remarks " that further arguments against its reality 

 will be needed before a doctrine founded on observations so carefully 

 conducted shall be relegated to the region of confuted hypotheses." 

 Professor Huxley spoke on this matter, but his words were not 

 reassuring. He expressed his sorrow that " his young friend, 

 Bathyhius, had not verified the promise of his youth (laughter)," 

 and his only confidence in August, 1879, in his " young friend," 

 originally evolved in 1807, appeared to be expressed in suggestions 

 concerning the pos.sibility of his being a '" blunder " and the pro- 

 bability of its exposure. Professor Huxley seems to forget the 

 effects which this possible blunder produced upon D. F. Strauss and 

 many more who seriously believed in Bathyhius, and have since 

 been infiuenccd by Strauss' teachings, founded upon the existence 

 of B(ithy})ins. Prol'essor Huxley asserts Batltyhius has not been 

 proved to be a " blunder," but he does not say what iu his oj»inion 

 Bathyhius has been proved to be, or whether anything at all has 

 been proved concerning his Bathyhius. Dr. Allman, however, 

 solcnnily asserts Bathyhius, and, paying tlu^ highest com])limcnts 

 to Huxley and Uacckel for their " very elaborate investigations," 



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