Vegetal Causes. 169 



theory," the nature of the first cell fixes the character 

 of the future organism. Hence, granting the spon- 

 taneous or automatic evolution of plant cells or germs, 

 as already described, it seems at least probable that 

 the majority of plants were evolved from original 

 cells fortuitously created. 



We thus infer that hundreds of thousands of living 

 germs or cells of plants sprang and still spring spon- 

 taneously and contemporaneously into being, when- 

 ever and wherever the organic conditions of the 

 planet are suitable for their automatic evolution. 

 That the organic springs from either the inorganic 

 or the organic as inconsequently as life follows death 

 or death follows life. For the only immortals are 

 the atoms and the only Gods the living. Each germ 

 again may have had only one centre of evolution, for 

 all genera could not have originated from one centre. 

 From the wide distribution of fungi, mosses, lichens, 

 sea-weeds, ferns, etc., we would be warranted in 

 according to such simply organised plants many 

 parent types automatically and contemporaneously 

 evolved all over the earth's surface, provided the 

 necessary conditions for generation and growth were 

 present. Conditions conceivable everywhere, for the 

 vegetal constituents — carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, hydro- 

 gen, etc. — are universal ; and as the elements are 

 bound by the inexorable law of their magnetic destiny 

 to assimilate in some form, there is nothing in such 

 simple forms as fungi to prevent them from assimi- 

 lating repeatedly in the same form, especially when 



