ON THE NATURE OF LIFE. 



ments. And yet strong reasons are not wanting for 

 the belief that these elements are made up of certain- 

 ultimate component atoms, held together by a strength 

 we cannot yet overcome. In contradistinction to 

 those simplest compounds, over which chemistry has 

 no power of analysis, it is not unreasonable we should 

 suppose compounds of the opposite extreme of com- 

 plexity, over which we have no power of synthesis 

 and no power at all chemically except for destruction. 

 The range of what may be properly called chemical 

 action must be held to extend from the elements up 

 to the protoplasm (not inclusive), thus comprising 

 what is now called organic as well as inorganic che- 

 mistry, while it has no place in the vital, or metabolic, 

 or protoplasmic state. The molecular actions of the 

 protoplasm constitute, in fact, physiology. 



To all arguments against the vital or metabolic state 

 being a mere material combination, without any new 

 vital power or principle added to it, on the ground 

 that we cannot set it together by any chemical pro- 

 cess, we point to another truly material combination, 

 viz., the elements, which we have just as little power ta 

 unmake. Besides there are many chemical compounds-,, 

 such as the diamond, and other precious stones, and,, 

 as yet the vast majority of organic chemical com- 

 pounds, which we can destroy but cannot yet con- 

 struct, although nobody thinks of attributing their 

 properties to any spiritual principle. But between 

 the chemical and the metabolic states we are justified 

 in believing there is a greater gulf fixed than between 

 transmutation of the elements on the one hand, and 

 ordinary chemical reactions on the other. 



