44 THE LIVING WORLD. 



pounds, more or less similar to protoplasm, though 

 not capable of self-perpetuation, would serve the 

 first protoplasm as food. There would thus be no 

 lack of organic material for the subsistence of life of 

 the first protoplasm, even though this first organism 

 were incapable of feeding upon the inorganic world 

 directly. Doubtless, too, the conditions which pro- 

 duced the first living protoplasm existed fcw-srlong 

 time, and thus living matter would for a long time 

 be brought into existence by processes other than 

 those of reproduction. Indeed, there was no defi- 

 nite beginning of life. Here, as elsewhere, nature 

 made no jump, but produced life as she produces 

 everything else, by slow stages. Chemical processes 

 of early times resulted in the production of many 

 compounds which, acting upon each other, and acted 

 upon by the changing conditions, became modified 

 in an infinite variety of ways. Their complexity 

 and instability became very great. Finally, some of 

 the most unstable of all began to effect changes in 

 others which resulted in assimilation, and thus slowly 

 the properties became more marked. Simpler and 

 simpler substances were made use of as food. So 

 long as the original conditions lasted there would of 

 course be no need that living matter should possess 

 the properties of chlorophyll. Nor was this at all 

 necessary while circumstances were such as to make 

 possible the natural development of high carbon 

 compounds. Eventually the power to live upon the 

 simpler inorganic foods must have been acquired. 

 But it is only necessary to assume that this power 

 became fully developed by the time that the con- 



