312 PROFESSOR DUNS, D.D., F.K.S.K., ETC., ON 



■niorjih "" I It is to be feared that instead of its beino- a 

 rallying point, there is that in it " which scattereth." Has 

 not one authority boldly said, " the chance synthesis of the 

 simplest active compound from inorganic materials is abso- 

 lutely inconceivable " ? And has not another as boldly 

 replied, '' On the contrary if the theory expounded l)e correct, 

 the inorganic origin of optically active compounds is not only 

 conceivable, but it has a degree of probability which, 

 however small, might be calculated when we knoAv what is 

 the minimum number of molecules in a physically just 

 sensible solution and what is the majority of enantiomorphs 

 of one kind which will give you a just measurable amount of 

 rotatory polarisation " ? And has not a third said, — "Now 

 assuming, what the.ie is every reason otherwise to think 

 quite probable, that life started from some few centres, the 

 chances are not that it w-as equally divided between right 

 and left-handed forms, but that one or other of these forms 

 preponderated " ? Then, a voice comes from the Chair of the 

 British Association — " Several years ago 1 pondered on the 

 constitution of matter. I endeavoured to prove the 

 tormenting mystery of the Atom. What is the atom? Is a 

 simple atom in space solid, liquid, or gaseous ? Each of 

 these states involves ideas M'hich can only pertain to vast 

 collections of atoms. . , . An isolated atom is an 

 unknown entity difficult to conceive. The properties of 

 matter are due to molecules in a state of motion, therefore 

 matter as we know involves essentially a mode of motion ; 

 and the atom itself — intangible, invisible, inconceivable — is 

 its material basis and may indeed be styled the only true 

 maiter." Now all such utterances show that those who 

 make them hanker after the old notion of the eternity of 

 matter. They talk of the mystery of being and not being, and 

 of lite as '' one of the natural properties of things," and yet 

 refuse to listen to the request, " whence these properties of 

 things" which to them are scientifically so real and true? 

 How widely difierent the attitude of Sir John Herschel when 

 considering the substances to which Ave refer ! '• "^i'hese 

 discoveries," he said at a meeting of the Koyal Society, 

 " eftectually destroy the idea of an external self-c-xistent 

 matter, by giving to each of its atoms at once the essential 

 characteristics of a tnamifactnred article mid a subordinate agent. 

 . . . When we see a great number of things ]n-ecisely 

 alike, we do not believe the similarity to have originated 

 except IVom a comnion principle independent of tiieni." 



