68 "Scientific Levity? 



Ergo, " a chemico-electric operation " was " the 

 first step in the creation of life ! " 



But had not Prevost and Dumas previously 

 announced that " globules could be produced in 

 albumen by electricity " ? Quite true : but the 

 support which the author's " supposition " was 

 supposed to receive from that announcement 

 fails at once before the remark that, " if his theory 

 had been that the first step in the process of 

 creation was the formation of vesicles by the 

 wind passing over the ocean, then the fact of 

 boys blowing bubbles in soap and water with a 

 tobacco pipe, and the fable of Venus being 

 born of the froth of the sea would have been as 

 much to his purpose." 



From the author of the " Vestiges " we turn 

 to his eulogist, Professor Tyndall : 



" If you ask me whether there exists the least evidence 

 to prove that any form of life can be developed out of 

 matter, without demonstrable antecedent life, my reply is 

 that evidence considered perfectly conclusive by many 

 has been adduced ; and that were some of us who have 

 pondered this question to follow a very common example, 

 and accept testimony because it falls in with our belief, 

 we also should eagerly close with the evidence referred 

 to. But there is in the true man of science a wish 

 stronger than the wish to have his beliefs upheld ; 

 namely, the wish to have them true. And this stronger 

 wish causes him to reject the most plausible support if he 

 has reason to suspect that it is vitiated by error. Those 



