LIFE IN ITS LOWER AND HIGHER FORMS 29 



legitimate conception of law, the materialistic position 

 that there is nothing in the world but matter, force, 

 and necessity, is as utterly void of justification as the 

 most baseless theological dogmas. l Yet, let us not 

 fail to mark that life is material, and that its simpler 

 processes depend on chemical combinations and 

 structural adaptations. Hence we naturally speak 

 of living material and of organic forms. Whatever 

 we have to say, or to leave unsaid, as to the mode in 

 which we may account for the appearance of life on 

 the earth, unorganised matter is lifted into vitalised 

 organic form. So obviously is this one of the seven 

 world riddles, 2 to use the phrase of Emil du Bois- 

 Remond, that we cannot contemplate the new appear 

 ance, without astonishment at the movement pulsating 

 with steady regularity. The spectacle afforded by 

 the wonderful energies prisoned within the compass 

 of the microscopic hair of a plant, which we commonly 

 regard as a merely passive organism, is not easily 

 forgotten by one who has watched its display con 

 tinued hour after hour without pause or sign of 

 weakening. 3 These energies simply illustrate the 

 activity constantly going on within the cells, whence 

 all life-forms are developed. It appears to be a 

 matter of no great moment what animal or what 

 plant I lay under contribution for protoplasm, and 

 the fact speaks volumes for the general identity of 

 that substance in all living beings. I share this 

 catholicity of assimilation with other animals, all of 

 which, so far as we know, could thrive equally well on 



Huxley s Lay Sermons, p. 158. 

 Die Sieben Weltraihsel, 1880. 

 3 Huxley s Lay Sermons, p. 137. 



