The Presklenfs Address. By L. S. Beale, F.R.S. 219 



different chemical changes at or near the same temperature ? Many- 

 things are asserted ahout compounds and molecules which possess 

 diverse properties, but which are destitute of the " property " of life, 

 of the nature of which we desire to learn something, but this life 

 " property " is gone before the investigation is commenced. It is 

 the old story. People ask to be informed concerning their nature, 

 as they are living, and they are told all sorts of things about dead 

 bodies, as if man and man's body were identical. Did not Socrates 

 point out that his dead body was not and could not be Socrates ? 

 We want to know about living matter, and a number of dogmas 

 are authoritatively laid down for our instruction about matter 

 which has ceased to live. Dr. Allman does not hint at the pos- 

 sibility of a difference between the albuminoid bodies obtained by 

 the analysis of protoplasm and the protoplasm itself in the living 

 state. 



The craving after molecular structure which is invisible, and the 

 anxious longing to discover material properties to account for phe- 

 nomena which are totally different from any physical phenomena of 

 which we have any cognizance, have been now observable for many 

 years, and indicate a strong desire upon the part of restless advocates 

 to gain a cause which has appeared to many well qualified to judge 

 to be a perfectly hopeless one from the first. In order to make the 

 speculations and assertions which have been offered apjDcar plausible, 

 all sorts of suggestions have to be made as to what may be possible, 

 or what may be discernible by the imaginations of gifted individuals. 

 Speculation is added to speculation, and error is piled upon error, 

 until it becomes almost impossible to present the pith of the matter 

 for consideration in moderate compass. Is the modern philosopher 

 who proceeds to smash, and dissolve, and analyze living matter, with 

 the object of discovering the mechanism which works, and the forces 

 which act, control, and guide, very much in advance, as regards the 

 reasonableness of the proceeding, of the savage who pounds up a 

 watch in order to see what is inside? Nay, the watch, by the 

 pounding to which it has been subjected, will have actually undergone 

 less change than the living matter, which shall have been sub- 

 mitted only to the preliminary steps of chemical analysis. 



The " Cell Soul." — Consciousness. — Identity. 



Probably every one here is aware that those who te-ach that tbere 

 is a close relationship between the living and the non-living, dilfcr 

 from one another in some points which are of fundamental import- 

 ance. 1. Some hold that all the actions of animals, vegetables, and 

 non-living matter belong to the same category, and are in their 

 essential nature the same. 2. Some think that while the pheno- 

 mena of living matter generally belong to the same class as the 

 phenomena of the non-living, mental phenomena and consciousness 



