216 



THE AMERICAN MONTHLY 



[November, 



a universal force of gravity, so, from 

 the slightest hint, the biologist may- 

 yet be able to formulate a theory of 

 life. For this reason, the article on 

 page 191 on life and death in the 

 animal world, although it is purely 

 philosophical and speculative, at the 

 present time possesses an interest 

 for even the most realistic student. 

 It may be said, and truly, that such 

 articles only tend to reveal to us the 

 limitations of our knowledge of this 

 problem. At the most they are but 

 ingenious hypotheses, or futile at- 

 tempts, to explain what still remains 

 as much a mystery as ever. Yet how 

 often it has happened in the ex- 

 perience of the past, that the most 

 brilliant and far-reaching discoveries 

 have suddely sprung forth out of an 

 ignorance as dense as this! 



When we think of the advance in 

 knowledge since the days of science 

 in its infancy, or even since the be- 

 gining of the present century, is any 

 one so bold as to attempt to define 

 the bounds of finite knowledge ? 

 Dare we declare that even the 

 mystery of life is beyond and above 

 human comprehension ? 



If not, then there is a legitimate 

 field for speculation opened by such 

 contributions as those of Butschli 

 and Cholodkowsky, which the student 

 should not despise. 



Already chemists have studied this 

 subject, and many of the complex 

 compounds produced in the animal 

 body have been synthetically formed 

 in the laboratory. Such investiga- 

 tions indeed, do not throw light 

 upon the processes of cell-nutrition 

 and metastasis, but, by revealing the 

 molecular structure of the com- 

 pounds, and indicating the dif- 

 ferent possible ways in which the par- 

 ticular groupings of its constituent 

 atoms can be brought about, they 

 have opened a path toward a more 

 intimate knowledge of the processes 

 within the cells. 



After many years, the old idea of 

 a specific vital force antagonistic to 

 the ordinary chemistry has been 



eliminated from science. We now 

 study the chemistry of living things 

 unhampered by false ideas of life. 

 We no longer believe in a special 

 chemistry of life, but rather we 

 regard life as sustained by, if not a 

 direct result of, chemic forces — by 

 which we mean the interaction of 

 ultimate atoms. 



Nevertheless, the artificial synthesis 

 of organic compounds by no means 

 justifies the assumption that the pro- 

 cesses of life can be produced, or even 

 imitated, in the laboratory. They 

 only lead, as we have said, to a know- 

 ledge of the processes in the chemi- 

 cal laboratories of animals and plants 

 — which are the cells. But that we 

 shall ever succeed in balancing the 

 opposing atomic forces of the universe 

 so that, by their continuous and mu- 

 tual intraction, chemical changes will 

 go on indefinately as in the living 

 cell, is not to be even dreamed of. 



Artificial Cells. — In connection 

 with the preceding article we should 

 not omit a reference to experiments 

 which have attracted notice from 

 time to time, in regard to the artifi- 

 cial production of cells, not, indeed 

 of living cells, but of cells so nearly 

 like those which live as to be indis- 

 tinguishable from them in appearance 

 and visible structure. They are pro- 

 duced by the slow chemical action of 

 two salts which, when they react to- 

 gether, form an insoluble compound. 

 It is said that the artificial cells thus 

 produced are enclosed by a true 

 membrane, which allows of free pas- 

 sage to liquids, and their inte- 

 rior granulations are arranged in a 

 regular order, as in living cells. So 

 striking is the resemblance between 

 them and living structures that it has 

 even been suggested that they may 

 have been produced accidentally in 

 the history of the world, and their 

 forms been preserved in the rocks, 

 and are now described as fossil re- 

 mains of past life. 



What seems of most importance in 

 regard to these inorganic forms is 



