EVOLUTION 23 



But out of this treatment of the subject there arises 

 a further question which may be worthy of some coq- 

 sideration. It has already been suggested that in a globe 

 cooling down from an igneous state and containing 

 carbon as an element, the probabihties are that many 

 compounds of this element would be formed. Now the 

 elements essential for living matter are carbon, hydrogen, 

 nitrogen, and oxygen, and, without raising the at present 

 unanswerable question as to the precise order of com- 

 bination and the nature of the primordial ' organic ' 

 compounds, it is quite certain that a molecule composed 

 of these four elements, even in its simplest form, is already 

 a highly complex compound from a purely chemical 

 point of view, and, as such, admits of numerous possible 

 configurations, or, in other words, would be capable of 

 existing in several isomeric or tautomeric forms. If only 

 one such quaternary compound were S3nithesized we 

 should therefore have several possible starting-points for 

 future development, and if several such compounds were 

 synthesized there would be an abundant supply of raw 

 material for the selective action of the environment. 

 If the principle of multiple S3nithesis be conceded, then 

 the earth or the ocean in azoic times may have been as 

 colonized by organic compounds as it subsequently became 

 by living organic matter during the early stages of the life 

 period. The question that may be asked is therefore 

 whether it is likely that out of a number or possibly large 

 numbers of dissiinilar or of isomeric or tautomeric com- 

 pounds one only should have possessed the necessary 

 mobility of configuration to give rise to living matter. 

 Of course this may have been the case, but, on the other 

 hand, it may not. ProbabiUty would appear to be 

 against the monogenetic development of life — so also 

 is analogy, for it is certain that similar combinations of 

 metallic and non-metallic atoms must have taken place 

 in past ages at many distinct centres as shown by the 

 occurrence of the same mineral products in widely 

 separated parts of the earth. At any rate the notion of the 



