Relations and Transformations of Energy 31 



Now the last of these, chlorophyll, can readily be separated 

 from the first and second, but still exhibit all its properties, 

 except that isolated from them it ceases food formation accord- 

 ing to most, it still may continue its action according to Priest- 

 ley and a few other observers. The second constituent seems 

 to be by no means single or simple, but evidently consists 

 of a series of colloid bodies held in equilibrium, but each capable 

 of performing a certain metabolic or digestive action on food 

 compounds. These are the zymogens and enzymes or ferments, 

 and each of them can, as experiment has shown, perform its 

 work as perfectly in a test tube as in a living cell. The first 

 constituent — the most complex evidently in composition — is 

 a colloid or more probably a set of colloids of great molecular 

 complexity, and which, if we may judge by the highly complex 

 bodies which it readily builds up, is traversed by and results 

 from currents of energy of enormous power, condensation, and 

 yet perfect quality. It is well also to note that the above 

 three constituents act cooperatively in building up or changing 

 the numerous and varied substances encountered in their 

 tissues. 



. The important question then is — and for many decades has 

 been: can we trace or construct fragments of a bridge that 

 once connected the inorganic crystalloid and specially colloid 

 bodies that we have postulated for the mid-archsean epoch, 

 mth those highly complex compounds of the lower plants 

 indicated above .^ Or to express it more directly, as has often 

 been done before: is there a possibly continuous and graded 

 passage, from dead or inorganic to living or organic matter.'^ 



Leduc in his most suggestive work (23: 147) well says: 

 "Considering the impossibility of defining the exact line of 

 demarcation between animate and inanimate matter, it is 

 astonishing to find so much stress laid on the supposed funda- 

 mental difference between vital and non-vital phenomena. 

 There is in fact no sharp division, no precise limit where inan- 

 imate nature ends and life begins; the transition is gradual 

 and insensible, for, just as a living organism is made of the 

 same substances as the mineral world, so life is a composite 



