292 Prof. Guthrie^ LL.B. — On the Subjective Causes of [April 25, 



of the present with the past, and we cannot realize a time when 

 nothing existed and something came out of this nothing. An infinite 

 period of vacuity ending with a creation is in the highest degree 

 incredible, and if we are precluded from ascribing a beginning to the 

 universe as a whole we cannot be compelled to ascribe a beginning 

 to organic life either generally or on the Earth. 



II. As to La Place's theory it must be remembered that it is only 

 a theory, and that recent discoveries in Astronomy and Geology 

 have not rendered it more plausible. 



Geology points to changes in the Earth's temperature, but certainly, 

 not to continuous change in one direction. If in the Arctic regions- 

 there are indications of there having been a higher average tempera- • 

 tore in certain remote geological periods, there are no less clear' 

 indications of a lower temperature having prevailed in regions 

 now temperate or even tropical. Geology moreover claims for the 

 formation of the Earth's crust as known to us periods of time wbkjtix 

 the physicist arguing from La Place's theory will not for a moment 

 allow. 



So also in Astronomy the observed motions of some of the Asteroids 

 and Satellites are admittedly at variance with the truth of La Place's 

 theory. 



On the whole therefore it would seem that the theory of the 

 eternal existence of organic life on the Earth is not one that is 

 to be summarily rejected as inconceivable or impossible, at the same • 

 time it is obvious that this theory is incapable of throwing any light 

 on the laws of evolution, as might indeed be concluded from the 

 consideration that what we call infinite is negative or at least 

 privative and not positive. 



(^.) Organic Life came to the Earth by Migration. 



I. Some seem to think that this hypothesis is altogether unworthy 

 of consideration, and it must be admitted that it is very difficult to 

 understand how any form of organic life that we are acquainted with 

 can have been brought to the earth from without. It would perhaps, 

 however, be too much to say that such a thing is impossible, though we 

 may safely conclude that if it has happened it is in the highest degree 

 improbable that it has happened only a few times. We are perhaps 

 too ready in placing the boundary of the possible at the limits of our 

 perceptions. We forget that in the minutest particle of meteoric dust 

 there is, in a sense, as much room as there is in a planet, and that we 

 have not the least reason to suppose that organic forms are limited as 



