THE GENESIS OF LIFE. 171 



whilst declaring for biogenesis in the present, and whilst 

 assuming that in the present life invariably proceeds from 

 pre-existing life, assent to the statement that in the beginning 

 life arose from non-living matter; although, indeed, the 

 advocates of spontaneous generation do not hesitate to- 

 charge such persons with scientific and logical inconsistency, 

 in that they admit the possibility of life-development oc- 

 curring de novo in the far-back past, but deny the operation 

 of any such action in the present. 



It is obvious that the point at issue centres around the 

 old question whether at present life may or may not be 

 produced spontaneously. Could this question be defmitely 

 answered in the affirmative, then the idea that a natural 

 process may have operated in the past becomes not only 

 of feasible but of highly probable nature, and exemplifies 

 an a posteriori argument of likely kind. The issues of the 

 question have thus become broadened out to include, as it 

 may be shown, even the subject of man's origin and de- 

 velopment ; and in view of the more than passing interest 

 which must therefore attach to the modern phases of this 

 inquiry, we may shortly inquire into the present aspects 

 under which the theories of biogenesis and abiogenesis re- 

 spectively stand related to each other. 



Within recent years various series of experiments, the 

 results of which are cited in support of abiogenesis, have 

 been performed, amongst other investigators, by Dr. H. C. 

 Bastian, of London ; this investigator appearing as the 

 foremost advocate, in this country at least, of spontaneous 

 generation. The gist of Bastian's early experiments con- 

 sisted in the fact that, when certain fluids were employed in 

 experimentation, living beings were produced, notwith- 

 standing the presence of conditions which were ordinarily 

 supposed to be unfavourable or entirely opposed to the 

 development of life. The two great conditions aimed at in 

 experiments on spontaneous generation are, firstly, the 

 complete exclusion of all atmospheric or external influences 

 from the experimental fluid ; and, secondly, the thorough 



