PROBLEMS OF MODERN SCIENCE 



laboratory, have done much to encourage the 

 new suggestion, which certainly seems far more 

 rational and consistent than any other so far 

 presented to us. It is true that we are thrown 

 back in a certain sense upon the discredited theory 

 of spontaneous generation, but it is a spontaneous 

 generation of quite a respectable character. We 

 are not asked to believe in the sudden conversion 

 of lifeless matter into living organisms, however 

 simple these may be, but in the gradual evolution 

 of the organic from the inorganic ; as the simplest 

 protoplasmic stage was reached we may suppose 

 that the organic matter gradually entered into 

 new relations, or energy-exchanges, with its en- 

 vironment, and that these actions and reactions 

 constituted the life of the organism. At this stage 

 it is for the metaphysician to carry on, though 

 perhaps even the humble biologist may be allowed 

 to interpret the living organism not only as an 

 elaborate machine, nor merely as the outcome of 

 a long process of evolution, but as a being which 

 stands on a higher plane and has a deeper meaning 

 for the structure of the universe than its inanimate 

 surroundings. 



Although my original intention was to speak 

 only of Pure Biology, I feel that I can hardly take 

 leave of my subject without saying a few words on 

 the practical applications thereof. How far applied 

 science should form part of a university curriculum 

 144 



