THOUGHTS ON NATURAL PHILOSOPHY. 6l 



All the protoplasmic life and work is carried on, and 

 depends upon the subtle movements of the granules, 

 corpuscles, atoms, and molecules, of the protoplasm 

 and ether; and, as there is no barrier in the proto- 

 plasm between vegetable and animal life, we arrive 

 at the inevitable conclusion that all natural pheno- 

 mena, organic or inorganic, living or dead, owe 

 existence to material motion, and are the result of 

 the speed of material portions, moving, grouping, 

 re-grouping, and ever changing under the rule of 

 material motion, in a succession of dancing and 

 resting pictures and problems of exquisite intricacy, 

 variety, and beauty. 



Some may ask: If that be so, why is it that 

 material motion does not now originate life on the 

 earth ? It is not absolutely certain that it does 

 not ; but if it no longer does so, the reply is, 

 that circumstances are not now favourable; the 

 * earth has cooled the material movements of 

 its particles, atoms, etc., are slower. At one time, 

 when it was hotter, and the movements were 

 more rapid, this earth must have been a vast hot-bed 

 for the production of vegetable and animal life. 



" One fundamental fact in plant physiology prac- 

 tically contradicts the assumption that life has never 

 originated from inorganic substances namely, at 

 the present time living substance is being continually 

 formed in the plant cell from simple inorganic com- 

 pounds, carbonic acid, water, sulphates, nitrates, etc. 

 Between the small seed put into the earth in the 

 spring and the huge plant that grows from it during 



* The sun has also cooled. 



