312 MODERN SCIENCE READER 



that I know very little about it. In fact, it is a substance, 

 or a mixture of substances, with which the chemist can do 

 very little. Great interest has been taken in all that per- 

 tains to protoplasm, because it is so directly connected with 

 life. The simplest organisms are the amoebce. These may 

 be regarded as representing life reduced to its lowest form. 

 Now an amoebce "is wholly or almost wholly protoplasm." 

 ' ' It lives, moves, eats, grows, and, after a time, dies, having 

 been, during its whole life, hardly anything more than a 

 minute lump of protoplasm" (Foster). Regarded as a 

 chemical substance, it contains the elements oxygen, hydro- 

 gen, nitrogen, carbon, and sulphur in fairly constant pro- 

 portions. It would be a great day for chemistry if a 

 chemist should succeed in putting together, and causing 

 to unite, the above-named elements in the proportions in 

 which they are present in protoplasm, and he should find 

 that he had made protoplasm artificially. If this artificial 

 protoplasm should move and eat and grow, he would 

 deserve to be ranked with Pygmalion of old. What are 

 the prospects? 



In the first place, protoplasm does not appear to be a 

 single substance, but a mixture of substances. It contains 

 something that is derived from a proteid, something else 

 derived from a fat, and still a third something derived from 

 a carbohydrate. Perhaps these three things are chemically 

 united with one another, and not simply mixed. The prob- 

 lem presented to the chemist is one of the greatest difficulty. 

 It would be necessary for him to determine exactly what 

 proteid, what fat, and what carbohydrate are essential to 

 the existence of protoplasm; then to bring these together, 

 and show that the substance thus obtained is identical with 

 protoplasm. This might be accomplished, and yet the 

 protoplasm obtained not be a living thing ; for there is dead, 

 as well as living protoplasm. There is no evidence that 

 any chemist is engaged in attempts to make protoplasm in 

 the laboratory. Possibly sone are dreaming of this prob- 

 lem, but dreams are generally harmless, and sometimes they 



