LIFE AND LIVING BEINGS 13 



maintenance of life is the contact of a living cell with a 

 current of liquid. The elementary physical phenomenon of 

 life is the contact of two different liquids. This is the 

 necessary condition which renders possible the chemical ex- 

 changes and the transformations of energy which constitute 

 life. It is in the study of the phenomena of liquid contact 

 and diffusion that we may best hope to pierce the scents 

 of life. The physics of vital action are the physics of the 

 phenomena which occur in liquids, and the study of the 

 physics of a liquid must be the preface and the basis of all 

 inquiry into the nature and origin of life. 



