VI 



PREFACE 



complex biological effects in bringing out the essen- 

 tial features of the work. If therefore he passes 

 over these he will find in the other chapters a 

 resume of the results which they contain. In the 

 second place, it must not be supposed that the 

 problem of the origin of life has been solvfed to the 

 satisfaction of all parties or of any, even if a clue 

 to its solution may be claimed in a suggestive 

 form. 



Since the days of the great controversy in which 

 Tyndall and Huxley took so prominent a part, the 

 interest in the question of spontaneous generation 

 has scarcely surpassed, nor in some respects does 

 it appear to have equalled, the enthusiasm which 

 these experiments, whatever their ultimate bearing 

 on the question, have aroused. 



Although it is not the object of this book to 

 lend support to the doctrine of abiogenesis, or 

 the development, at the present day, of living 

 from absolutely non-living matter, the more hopeful, 

 though as it must be admitted less gratifying, \'iew 

 to take, is that we have arrived at a method of 

 structural organic synthesis of artificial cells, which, 

 if it does not give us natural organic life such as 

 we see existing around us, gives us at least some- 

 thing which admits of being placed in the gap, or, 

 as it might preferably be called, the borderland, 

 between living and dead matter, as familiarly 

 understood. 



Those who will approach the subject will, it is 

 hoped, approach it with an open mind, and re- 



