COSMIC PHILOSOPHY 



clearly than ever that between the various pro- 

 vinces of natural phenomena there are no sharp 

 demarcations. As the geologic development of 

 the earth is but a specialized portion of the whole 

 development of the solar system, — a portion 

 which we separate from the rest and assign to a 

 special science, solely for convenience of study; 

 so the development of living matter is but a 

 specialized portion of the whole development 

 of the earth, and it is only for reasons of con- 

 venience that the formation of primeval proto- 

 plasm is assigned to a different science from 

 that which deals with the formation of limestone 

 or silica. Though as we advance from a lower 

 grade of heterogeneity to a higher grade we 

 encounter differences of property or of func- 

 tional manifestation which we may broadly clas- 

 sify as differences of kind, the conclusion is 

 nevertheless forced upon us that such differences 

 of kind are ultimately reducible to differences 

 of degree, and that at bottom there is no break 

 whatever in the continuity of the process of 

 Evolution. 



It is not pretended, however, that these con- 

 siderations fulfil all the requirements of a scien- 

 tific explanation of the genesis of life. Essen- 

 tially sound as I believe them to be, they do but 

 point out the direction in which an explanation 

 is to be sought. A complete explanation of the 

 origin of life must include not only a statement 

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