From Inorganic Matter to Life. 161 



balance between aggregates and their units actions 

 and reactions of the two, in which the unit tended ever 

 to establish the typical form produced by actions and 

 reactions in all antecedent generations, while the aggre- 

 gate, if changed in form by change of surrounding 

 conditions, tended ever to impress on the units a corres- 

 ponding change of polarity, causing them in the next 

 generation to reproduce the changed form their new 

 form of equilibrium." * 



These quotations fairly represent Mr. Spencer's 

 hypothesis of the evolution of organic matter, the 

 evolution out of that matter of living things, and 

 finally, the evolution of living things differentiated 

 into special kinds of organisms. 



On the entire exposition of the change from inor- 

 ganic matter to living bodies differenced into kinds, 

 we would first of all observe, that there is not one 

 step in the process of which it is possible to furnish 

 any proof. The whole is an effort a very brilliant 

 effort the reader will readily admit of the scientific 

 imagination. It is as truly an imaginative creation 

 as the "Midsummer Night's Dream." The scientific 

 mind may say it is very like what might have hap- 

 pened, but we have no evidence that it is the actual 

 course of nature. It is a guess after truth, and guesses 

 as to matters of fact are more likely to be wrong than 

 right. He who shoots into a mist-cloud is not likely 



* Biology, Vol. 1., Appendix, pp. 486-7. 



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