DEATH AND RESURRECTION. 65 



obliged to extend our researches 

 through antiquity and primeval ages. 

 If then no gap was to be found in the 

 series and we perhaps finally traced 

 life back to the "moss-clad fragment" 

 from another world, we would again 

 face the question, how the beings on 

 that planet, once in time, had come 

 into existence? Perhaps there the ele- 

 ments and forces of nature were such 

 as to create life spontaneously. This 

 question, of course, could not be de- 

 cided except through continued obser- 

 vations, which would be obliged to ex- 

 tend to every point of an infinite uni- 

 verse and back to the dawn of time. 

 First, then, we should know that Har- 

 vey's hypothesis was a law, valid with- 

 out limitations in the past — but also 

 only in the past — and valid with one 

 single exception, namely, the very first 

 organism, of which we presently shall 

 speak. In regard to the law's validity 

 in the future, we should no doubt pos- 

 sess a knowledge that approached cer- 

 tainty, but it could not be called abso- 



