36 THE NATURE AND ORIGIN OF LIVING MATTER. 



ignorance, the negation of knowledge ? I cannot see that it is. 

 Even if we call it vital force I cannot see that we gain any- 

 thing. For force is some form of movement, of molecular or 

 atomic vibration. It is conceivable that molecular vibrations 

 may occur in protoplasm which have no analogies elsewhere, but 

 if so we know nothing of them. Further, they are derived if 

 present from forms of vibration, chemical or heat vibrations, 

 which exist without the living cell, and are speedily resolved into 

 these again. Once more I think we gain nothing by the 

 assumption. I may be pardoned for using an illustration which 

 has done good service in much abler hands than mine. In this 

 glass you have the familiar substance water, of well known and 

 comparatively simple chemical constitution. You might not 

 suspect it of being the seat of molecular forces of most intricate 

 and mysterious complexity. Yet, if guided by scientific know- 

 ledge, you follow it with the imagination, you will see that it is 

 so endowed. Let this glass stand on the table sufficiently long 

 and its contents will disappear ; they have become converted 

 into aqueous vapour diffused in the atmosphere. Let the air 

 containing this vapour be transported by a favourable atmos- 

 pheric disturbance to the Alps of New Zealand. The gaseous 

 particles will become transformed into solid crystals of snow, 

 and on microscopical examination the constituent molecules of 

 our humble fluid will be seen to have arranged themselves in 

 wonderful and intricate patterns of geometrical regularity, 

 which for marvellous beauty cannot be surpassed even by the 

 organic world. Do we render this mysterious power of water to 

 assume intricate geometrical forms any easier to understand by 

 attributing it to a hypothetical something called aqiiositrf. You 

 will reply doubtless that to do so is merely to invent a word, not 

 to explain a phenomenon. And granting that the phenomena 

 of life are much more complex than those of crystallisation, 

 does this invalidate our applying the same reasoning to the word 



vitality. 



To this reasoning it may be objected that our protoplasm, a 

 mere speck of structureless jelly, exhibits none of the machinery 

 which might be reasonably expected in a substance capable of 

 such complex evolutions as I have endeavoured to briefly 

 indicate in the early part of this discourse. But this objection 

 can be hardly pressed, unless we are prepared to limit the 

 possibilities of organisation by what we can actually see. 



