The Development of Life 47 



" I think that this pyknotic theory of substance 

 will prove more acceptable to every biologist who 

 is convinced of the unity of nature than the 

 kinetic theory which prevails in physics to-day" 



( P . 78). 



In other words, he appeals to a presumed 

 sentiment of biologists against the knowledge 

 of the physicist in his own sphere a strange 

 attitude for a man of science. After this 

 it is less surprising to find him ignoring the 

 elementary axiom that " action and reaction 

 are equal and opposite," i.e. that internal 

 forces can have no motive power on a body 

 as a whole, and making the grotesque 

 assertion that matter is moved, not by 

 external forces, but by internal likes and 

 desires : 



" 1 must lay down the following theses, which 

 are involved in Vogt's pyknotic theory, as in- 

 dispensable for a truly monistic view of substance, 

 and one that covers the whole field of organic and 

 inorganic nature : 



" 1. The two fundamental forms of substance, 

 ponderable matter and ether, are not dead and 

 only moved by extrinsic force, but they are 

 endowed with sensation and will (though, naturally, 

 of the lowest grade) ; they experience an inclina- 



