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ter. How is it there is such a thing as matter ? Lastly, 

 so far, no conceivable brooding, or even gyrating, of a 

 single matter in time and space could account for the 

 specification of matter carbon, gold, iodine, etc. as 

 we see and know it. Time, space, matter, and the 

 whole inorganic world, thus remain impassive to the ac- 

 tion even of infinite time ; all these differences remain 

 incapable of being accounted for so. 



But suppose no curiosity had ever been felt in this 

 reference, which, though scientifically indefensible, is 

 quite possible, how about the transition of the inorganic 

 into the organic ? Mr. Huxley tells us that, for food, 

 the plant needs nothing but its bath of smelling-salts. 

 Suppose this bath now a pool of a solution of carbon- 

 ate of ammonia ; can any action- of sun, or air, or elec- 

 tricity, be conceived to develop a cell or even so much 

 lump-protoplasm in this solution ? The production of 

 an initial cell in any such manner will not allow itself to 

 be realized to thought. Then we have just to think for 

 a moment of the vast differences into which, for the 

 production of the present organized world, this cell 

 must be distributed, to shake our heads and say we can- 

 not well refuse anything to an infinite time, but still we 

 must pronounce a problem of this reach hopeless. 



It is precisely in conditions, however, that Mr. Dar- 

 win claims a solution of this problem. Conditions con- 

 cern all that relates to air, heat, light, land, water, and 

 whatever they imply. Our second objection, conse- 

 quently, is, that conditions are quite inadequate to ac- 

 count for present organized differences, from a single 

 cell. Geological time, for example, falls short, after all, 

 of infinite time ; or, in known geological eras, let us 

 calculate them as liberally as we may, there is not time 



