Energies of the Organic World 75 



nary, quinary, and higher compounds that are everywhere 

 met w'ith in the organic world; (f) the existence of energy- 

 transformers in the tissues of many animals, possibly too in the 

 chlorophyll of plants, for the conversion of muscular or other 

 energy — whatever that may mean — into electricity (electric 

 eel, torpedo, etc.), or light (firefly, glow-worm), or cheniic 

 energy (animals generally), or heat (very frequent), strongly 

 suggests that an energy or energies higher than they can be 

 rapidly and economically let down into them; (g) the extremely 

 varied, complicated, and delicate reactions to environal stimuli 

 that most plants and animals may show simultaneously find 

 very remote resemblance in inorganic bodies; (h) in all changes 

 proceeding in living bodies, kinds of energy are needed that 

 can stimulate to the building up and breaking down of food 

 products, give out sufficient body heat but yet distribute the 

 latter gradually, enable the organism to respond to diverse 

 extrinsic stimuli, and start reactions that will place the organ- 

 isms most favorably in relation to such stimuli. 



Elaborate classifications have been devised in works on 

 plant and animal physiology, setting forth the relations of 

 energy in organisms, but in most cases such treat merely of 

 stores of food, and take little account of the primary question 

 as to how and by what kinetic energy the complex molecules 

 have been reared, that give to organic bodies their specific 

 and outstanding qualities. 



Unless we admit and demonstrate the existence and activity 

 of one or more organic energies, even while accepting the con- 

 tinuity of inorganic and organic processes, we are constantly 

 led into inconsistencies. Thus Leduc (S3: 147) says: "Con- 

 sidering the impossibility of defining the exact line of demar- 

 cation between animate and inanimate matter, it is astonisliing 

 to find so much stress laid on the supposed fundamental 

 difference between vital and non- vital phenomena. There is in 

 fact no sharp division, no precise limit where inanimate 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 of the same physical 



