114 president's address — SECTION D. 



properties of a novel character, such as giving a heavy white 

 precipitate with baric chloride which was not baric sulphate, and a 

 peculiar precipitate wdth argentic chloride. The weak point in 

 the study of this meteorite was that its so termed organic 

 constituent was not, prior to chemical treatment, subjected to 

 microscopical examination for the detection of structure, but the 

 fact that it yielded a resin to alcohol points strongly towards the 

 reality of its organic origin. This case, indeed, seems to have 

 advanced us a step beyond the state of vague suspicion aroused by 

 certain famous American meteorites in which the presence of 

 diamonds is said to have been demonstrated. By a pretty general 

 consensus of opinion diamonds are of organic origin. It has, 

 however, lately been announced that they have appeared among 

 the by-products of a furnace, and, if so, the antecedent difficulties 

 of accounting for the presence of organic matter in a meteoric 

 body and for its passage through the atmosphere undestroyed are 

 diminished. At any rate, if, as there seems no reason to doubt, 

 life products have been found in meteorites, it will be difficult to 

 escape the conclusion that life is not confined to this earth. It is 

 therefore quite possible that in the first instance it may have been 

 transmitted to us fi'om without ; but. as frequently remarked, this, 

 though it prove to be a fact, cannot affect any conclusion we may 

 reach as to the mode of the origin of life. It will merely compel 

 us to decide that life is not peculiarly an attribiite of the earth, 

 but that it had a birth- time and place in the infinities of the 

 cosmos. 



It is only natural that the mind which is apt to claim a monopoly 

 of reasoning power should tend to speculate on the nature of that 

 which underlies all reason, that, too, vvhich is certainly the most 

 energetic factor in the superficial economy of this globe, and very 

 possibly in that of many others. A present mystery life is 

 undoubtedly. A pei-petual inscrutable mystery it is said to be with 

 the surest confidence, and they who say so must be wise, for who 

 can say so but he whose mind is a true measure of the utmost 

 reach of human intellect in all time to come. Modesty, however, 

 suggests that in the light of the revelations of the last tenth part 

 of the Christian era it may be as presumptuous to pronounce any 

 object of natural inquii-y to be out of the range of the intellect 

 of the future as to assert the contrary ; nor does it well become 

 those w^hose stimulus to labor is the hope of solving or of helping 

 to solve the most intricate problems of nature to hug to their 

 breasts that darling of inane contentment — inscrutable mystery. 

 Excluding all but purely physiological views of the question — 

 What is life ? let us endeavor to formvilate a conception of the 

 meaning of the term " life " in its most comprehensive and, there- 

 fore, truest sense. For this it is necessary to clear the way by 

 dismissing to oblivion the long dominant opinion that the life we 

 speak of is a being capable of existing apart from body, resident 



