AND ITS SELF-CONSERVATION. 259 



as phases of .one and the same process the process of 

 life itself. 



It is evident, then, that the same activity of the one 

 all-comprising World-Energy, according to the degree of 

 complexity of that activity, gives rise alike to " atoms," 

 to "molecules," to crystalline forms, and to the "won," 

 or object possessing life. If "matter" means "sub- 

 stance," and if substance in turn means the divine World- 

 Energy, then matter does indeed contain the "promise 

 and potency " of all life, terrestrial or other. Similarly, 

 the question whether the true theory of the origin of life 

 is that of " Biogenesis," or that of " Abiogenesis," is evi- 

 dently based upon a complete misconception of the nature 

 of the case. Life can assuredly come only from the 

 living. But the " living " is primarily the World-Energy 

 itself as absolute Vitality. Thus following next upon 

 centrality and affinity, the elementary forms of life are 

 found to constitute but the next grade in advance of 

 the simplest developments of the characteristic of inter- 

 nality or spontaneity, as that characteristic is ever un- 

 folding in the forms of the world in space. Evidently, 

 therefore, they belong to the (logically) first stages of 

 the return movement from externality to internality in 

 the total process of creative activity, which the World- 

 Energy forever constitutes. For the external itself 

 the whole of space-filling reality as we must con- 

 stantly remind ourselves, is nothing else than the internal 

 self-externalized the spontaneous continually expanding 

 itself into the inert, only to gather itself once more 

 through endlessly varying degrees into spontaneity again. 



Abiogenesis in the literal sense of the term is absurd, 

 seeing that aside from life and its manifestations there 



