ORDINARY MEETING.* 



Professor H. L. Orchard, M,A., B.Sc.,ix the Chair. 



The Minutes of he last Meetuig were read and confirmed ; 

 the Chairman then called on Mr. Slater to read his paper. 



LIFE AS COMPARED WITH THE PHYSICAL 

 FORCES. By J. W. Slater, Esq., F.C.S., F.E.S. 



THE question is often asked, " Wliat is Life ? " and to this 

 inquiry tlie most profound thinker and the most careless 

 and superficial dullard, "whether of the "classes" or the 

 " masses," is equally unable to give a reply. We may, 

 indeed, heap up words which merely darken counsel and 

 obscure what they profess to explain. 



2. We are often asked whether life is a principle or an 

 agency like the so-called " physical forces," or as tliey are 

 now more generally named, '' forms of energy." 



3. Is life at all comparable to heat, to light, to electricity, to 

 magnetism, to chemical, or to mechanical action? Some 

 persons tell us that all these forces are merely certain modes 

 of motion acting under peculiar conditions upon matter. 

 If this is the case, and if life is one of them, then a living- 

 organism also is merely matter set in motion. Let us 

 examine this doctrine. 



4. The first great difference which we can recognize between 

 life and the physical forces is this ; we can measure any of 



* February 20th, 1893. 



