EVOLUTION. 39 



came by spontaneous generation. Just as we see 

 crystals form themselves to-day, so by a process, 

 chemical and electrical, the atoms of carbon com- 

 bined into the speck of protoplasm or " primitive 

 slime," which constitutes the lowest living form — the 

 Moneron. No one claims that organized beings 

 have arisen spontaneously ; it is only in the case of 

 Monera — ** structureless organisms without organs" 

 — that spontaneous generation is assumed to have 

 occurred at the first beginning of organic life upon 

 the earth. 



If the whole development of life and the formation 

 of intricate organs proceed without supernatural 

 aid, why should we assume that this principle, so con- 

 trary to all observed action of nature, must have acted 

 to produce this simple beginning of life in the 

 Moneron? Chemistry and electricity are conceivable 

 agents. 



Primeval Matter, 



• 



Dr. T. Sterry Hunt has stated the hypothesis that 

 universal space is filled with a simple form of matter 

 from which the worlds have been evolved by a pro- 

 cess of chemical condensation. He found that this 

 theory had been anticipated in some little known 

 writings of Sir Isaac Newton, who suggested that all 

 space may be filled with an ethereal substance which 

 is the food of plants and the material principle of 

 life. He says : '* Thus, perhaps, all things may be 

 originated from ether." 



