SPONTANEOUS GENERATION. 303 



mass the ^primitive transformation of the rudimentary 

 atoms into organic form, we must admit that the 

 "highly organized plant or animal is but an aggregation 

 of cells; their arrangement being dependent upon 

 pertain properties peculiar to them, and the exercise of 

 forces such as we have been studying, all of which 

 appear to act externally to the plant or animal itself. 



Experiments have been brought "forward, in which 

 it appeared that, after all organization -which could by 

 any possibility have existed, had been destroyed by the 

 action of fire, solutions of flint and metallic salts, 

 have, under the influence of electric currents, exhibited 

 .signs of .organic formations, and that, indeed, insects 

 a species of acari have been developed in them. The 

 experiments were said to 'have been made with care, and 

 many precautions taken to shut out all chances of any 

 error, but not .all the precautions required in a matter -of 

 such exceeding delicacy; and we are bound not to 

 receive the evidence afforded as the true expression of a 

 fact without much further investigation. All experience, 

 'setting aside the experiment named, is against the 

 supposition that pounded or -dissolved flint could by any 

 artificial means be awakened into life. 'Ova may 

 have -been conveyed into the vessels which contained 

 the solutions under experiment; and in due time, 

 although possibly quickened by electric -excitation, 

 the animals the most common of insects came into 

 existence.* 



Tlie rapid growth of conferva -upon water has 'dften 

 been brought forward as evidence of a spontaneous 

 generation, or the conversion of inorganic elements into 

 organic forms ; but it has been most satisfactorily proved 

 that .the germ must be present, otherwise no evidence of 



* "Mr. Crosse's Experiments in the Journal of the London 

 Electrical Society, and Mr. Weekes in the Electrical "Magazine, 

 and a communication appended to Explanations : a Sequel to the 

 Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation. 



