LECTURES AND ESS A YS 



caused Lucretius thus to swerve from 

 his own principles ? Diminishing gradu- 

 ally the number of progenitors, Mr. 

 Darwin comes at length to one " primor- 

 dial form "; but he does not say, so far 

 as I remember, how he supposes this 

 form to have been introduced. He 

 quotes with satisfaction the words of a 

 celebrated author and divine who had 

 "gradually learnt to see that it was just 

 as noble a conception of the Deity to \ 

 believe He created a few original forms, j 

 capable of self-development into other 

 and needful forms, as to believe He 

 required a fresh act of creation to supply 

 the voids caused by the action of His 

 laws." What Mr. Darwin thinks of this 

 view of the introduction of life I do 

 not know. But the anthropomorphism, 

 which it seemed his object to set aside, 

 is as firmly associated with the creation j 

 of a few forms as with the creation of a ! 

 multitude. We need clearness and | 

 thoroughness here. Two courses, and 

 two only, are possible. Either let us 

 open our doors freely to the conception 

 of creative acts, or, abandoning them, let 

 us radically change our notions of matter. 

 If we look at matter as pictured by 

 Democritus, and as defined for genera- 

 tions in our scientific text-books, the 

 notion of conscious life coming out of it 

 cannot be formed by the mind. The 

 argument placed in the mouth of Bishop 

 Butler suffices, in my opinion, to crush 

 all such materialism as this. Those, 

 however, who framed these definitions of 

 matter were but partial students. They 

 were not biologists, but mathematicians, 

 .whose labours referred only to such 

 accidents and properties of matter as 

 could be expressed in their formulae. 

 Their science was mechanical science, 

 not the science of life. With matter in 

 -jts wholeness they never dealt ; and, 

 .denuded by their imperfect definitions, 

 " the gentle mother of all " became the 

 object of her children's dread. Let us 

 reverently, but honestly, look the ques- 

 tion in the face. Divorced from matter, 

 ' where is life ? Whatever our faith may 

 say, our knowledge shows them to be 



indissolubly joined. Every meal we eat, 

 every cup we drink, illustrates the 

 mysterious control of mind by matter. 



On tracing the line of life backwards, 

 we see it approaching more and more to 

 what we call the purely physical con- 

 dition. We come at length to those 

 organisms which I have compared to 

 drops of oil suspended in a mixture of 

 alcohol and water. We reach the pro- 

 togenes of Haeckel, in which we have " a 

 type distinguishable from a fragment of 

 albumen only by its finely granular 

 character." Can we pause here? We 

 break a magnet, and find two poles in 

 each of its fragments. We continue the 

 process of breaking ; but, however small 

 the parts, each carries with it, though 

 enfeebled, the polarity of the whole. 

 And when we can break no longer, we 

 prolong the intellectual vision to the 

 polar molecules. Are we not urged to 

 do something similar in the case of life ? 

 Is there not a temptation to close to 

 some extent with Lucretius, when he 

 affirms that "Nature is seen to do all 

 things spontaneously of herself without 

 the meddling of the gods "? or with 

 Bruno, when he declares that matter is 

 not " that mere empty capacity which 

 philosophers have pictured her to be, 

 but the universal mother who brings 

 forth all things as the fruit of her own 

 wornb "? Believing, as I do, in the con- 

 tinuity of nature, I cannot stop abruptly 

 where our microscopes cease 'to be of 

 use. Here the vision of the mind 

 authoritatively supplements the vision of 

 the eye. By a necessity engendered and 

 justified by science I cross the boundary 

 of the experimental evidence, and dis- 

 cern in that matter which we, in our 

 ignorance of its latent powers, and not- 

 withstanding our professed reverence for 

 its Creator, have hitherto covered with 

 opprobrium, the promise and potency of 

 all terrestrial life. 



If you ask me whether there exists the 

 least evidence to prove that any form of 

 life can be developed out of matter, 

 without demonstrable antecedent life, 

 my reply is that evidence considered 



