176 THE ORIGIN OF LIFE 



in its highest sense from primitive elements. It is, 

 indeed, essentially a case of a survival of the fittest, 

 in the particular case, of a substance which can 

 reproduce its own type to a perfect degree. And, 

 therefore, that degree of perfection, although one 

 instance amongst millions that have failed, by the 

 operation of purely physical forces, stands out to- 

 day as the wonder of all civilised minds. 



We look upon the continuity throughout nature 

 as complete, notwithstanding the presence of many 

 gaps. It does not matter whether we regard the 

 organic as the product of the inorganic or the 

 inorganic as the inactive remnants of the organic. 

 The latter was the view put forward by Fechner 

 and by Preyer, who abandoned Eichter's theory of 

 cosmozoa and regarded the universe as a huge 

 organism of which inorganic nature is the ultimate 

 product, the elements being merely the more 

 stable types which result from the gradual dis- 

 integration of this agglomerated mass. Even the 

 sun itself was regarded as an organism, and the 

 elements as precipitates. 



" In accordance with these considerations," says 

 Verworn, "he sketches the picture of the deriva- 

 tion of life upon the earth. Originally the whole 

 molten mass of the earth's body was a single giant 

 organism. The powerful movement that its sub- 

 stance possessed was its life. When the earth's 

 body began to cool, the substances that could no 

 longer remain in the liquid state at that tempera- 

 ture, e.g., the heavy metals, were separated out as 



