CHEMICAL STATE OF PROTOPLASM. 53 



On the Chemical State of Protoplasm. On this point, 

 the similarity, or, indeed, identity, of the views of 

 Beale with those of Fletcher (see p. 6), is surprising. 

 A few quotations will show this : 



" Of the chemical composition, and of the actual state, speak- 

 ing in a physical sense, of the living matter, we as yet know 

 nothing. Nor have we even been able to hit upon any method 

 of investigation which offers a fair chance of enabling us to 

 ascertain the knowledge we so much desire to gain. If we 

 attempt to analyze living matter it becomes changed. We exa- 

 mine not the actual living, growing matter itself, but the sub- 

 stances which result from its death. The facts of the case do 

 not permit us to conclude that the materials we discover 

 actually existed during life. On the contrary, the evidence is 

 conclusive that the substances we test, and examine, and 

 handle, did not exist in the condition or state known to us 

 until the matter of which they consisted had ceased to live " 

 (" Protoplasm^" third edition, p. 32). Again, " It seems probable 

 that during this temporary living state the elements do not exist 

 in a state of ordinary chemical combination at all. These ordi- 

 nary attractions, or affinities, seem to be suspended for the 

 time." And again, " To assert that living matter is ' protein,' or 

 ' albumen,' is to assert that which never has been, and never 

 can be, proved, and all arguments based upon such assertions 

 must be discarded." 



The essential complexity of the state of aggregation of the 

 living matter is here recognized. 



" There can be no doubt that the smallest particle of living 

 matter is complex. It is impossible to conceive the existence 

 of a living particle, consisting of a simple substance only, as 

 iron, oxygen, nitrogen, etc. ; for living involves changes in which 

 different elements take part. It appears to me that the term 

 living atom cannot with propriety be employed, because living 

 matter is of complex composition, while the idea of an atom 

 seems to involve simplicity of constitution, if not indivisibility" 

 ("Protoplasm," third edition, p. 281). 



