FACTS 249 



the Transformist theory, accepted as it is without dispute 

 by men of science, goes back, not to that assuredly marvellous 

 phenomenon which was the appearance of man on the earth's 

 surface, but to the infinitely simpler phenomenon of the 

 appearance of a living protoplasm reduced to the minimum 

 sum total of hereditary characters. 



Archimedes said, in a symbolic proposition which taken 

 literally is absurd : " Give me a support for a lever and I 

 will move the world." Just so the Transformist of to-day 

 has the right to say : " Give me a living protoplasm and I 

 will re-make the whole animal and vegetable kingdoms." 



Of course, this is only a manner of speaking, for the re- 

 making of animals and plants as they exist now would require 

 not only the initial protoplasm, but also all the changes of 

 circumstances which have so enriched it with varied and 

 multiple heredity, that is, the evolution of the world itself 

 ever since the appearance of life. For the evolution of life 

 is bound up indissolubly with the evolution of the whole 

 world. 



The philosophic interest attaching to the question of 

 the appearance of life on the earth's surface is easily under- 

 stood. Moreover, the conditions of heat required for the 

 existence of life prove that life did appear, for there was a 

 time when temperature was too high for life to exist on the 

 earth's surface. Lord Kelvin has made the supposition that 

 a living cell may have been transported hither by a meteorite, 

 but this only displaces the problem. All astronomic bodies 

 have had an evolution analogous to that of the earth and 

 life had always to make a first appearance. Consequently, 

 it is simpler to accept the fact that it appeared on the earth's 

 surface under circumstances which men of science are en- 

 deavouring to reproduce in their laboratories. 



It is often said that Pasteur demonstrated the uselessness 



