CHAPTER II. 



ORIGIN OF BRUTE MATTER IN LIVING MATTER. 



Spontaneous generation : an episode in the history of the 

 globe — Verification of the identity between brute and 

 living matter — Slow identification — Rapid identification 

 — Contrary opinion — Hypothesis of cosmozoa ; cosmic 

 panspermia — Hypothesis of pyrozoa. 



There should be two ways of testing the doctrine of 

 the essential identity of brute and living matter — 

 one slow and more laborious, the other more rapid 

 and decisive. 



Identification of the Two Matters, Brute and 

 Living. — The laborious method, which we will be 

 obliged to .follow, consists in the attentive examina- 

 tion of the various activities by which life is 

 manifested, and in finding more or less crude 

 equivalents for them in all brute beings, or in certain 

 of them. 



Rapid Verification. Spontaneous Generation. — The 

 rapid and decisive method, which, unhappily, is 

 beyond our resources, would consist in showing un- 

 questionable, clearly marked life, the superior life, 

 arising from the kind of inferior life that is attributed 

 to matter in general. It would be necessary com- 

 pletely to construct in all its parts, by a suitable 

 combination of inorganic materials, a single living 

 being, even the humblest plant or the most rudi- 



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