"I 2J.9 °"*^ every single one of them is right 



living organisms. It is not ignorance but knowledge which 

 is the mother of wonder. 



Since seeds are among the most wonderful things in a 

 world of wonder, it is not surprising that, ever since Old 

 Testament times, they have been used in analogies and 

 metaphors. The Preacher and the Psalmist are both sound 

 enough — "In the morning sow thy seed" and "He that 

 goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed, shall 

 doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves 

 with him." So too are the Gospel authors: "Unless the 

 seed die . . ." and "Some seeds fell by the wayside." But 

 what of the modern preachers who invoke the seed to 

 "prove" that man is immortal? Are seeds really that? 



Unfortunately for the analogy they are not. They are 

 only astonishingly durable and they prove only how low 

 life can lie and how long it can endure. Doubtless the 

 coral bean which frequently waits several years before it 

 begins to grow could still germinate after a good many 

 years had passed, though after just how many I have no 

 idea. And as every gardener knows, the longer you keep a 

 packet of seeds, the smaller the proportion of them that 

 win ever grow. Hence it is obvious that the power to re- 

 sume life after dormancy varies with tlie individual even 

 within a given species. As an experiment I planted several 

 hundred seeds of wild plants which had lain in a desk 

 drawer for at least twenty years and only two sprouted. 



Nevertheless, controlled experiments do prove that some 

 may remain alive for much longer than that. In 1879 a 

 botanist at Michigan State College fiUed twenty bottles 

 with weed seed and buried the bottles eighteen inches 

 below ground. From time to time they have been taken up 



