82 DEATH AND RESURRECTION. 



are unable to produce organic composi- 

 tions, that is, the peculiar grouping of 

 the elements into those ternary and 

 quaternary compounds which owe their 

 existence to an organic being, en- 

 dowed with life and life-force, and they 

 have added the amusing remark that 

 the chemists must produce living be- 

 ings in their retorts — make men — if 

 there be no life-force and if life be only 

 the result of chemical processes. The 

 chemists have not been at a loss for 

 an answer. They have made dextrose, 

 several organic acids and bases, and 

 recently they have also succeeded in 

 producing hydrates of carbon. Evolu- 

 tion has proceeded rapidly in this di- 

 rection, and today alcohol and precious 

 perfumes are made from coal, candles 

 from slate, Berlin blue, taurin and in- 

 numerable other bodies — formerly be- 

 lieved to be exclusively of animal or 

 plant origin — from the simple material 

 that inorganic nature offers us. 



The materialists have a custom of 

 not considering themselves under obli- 



