THE DESCENT OF PROTOPLASM 183 



current through a gas. His results created intense 

 excitement at the time, and brought down upon 

 him the wrath of many divines. The bodies thus 

 obtained had the appearance of animalcules, but 

 the results were doubtless due to imperfect sterili- 

 sation, as they have never been confirmed. Lewis, 

 in his History of Philosophy, refers to these inter- 

 esting experiments. We were not aware of them 

 when our own with cyanogen and bouillon were 

 commenced some three years ago. The mere pas- 

 sage of a discharge through gas would not afi'ord 

 any reason to suppose that anything of the kind 

 should result ; but if the discharge takes place in 

 a medium containing all the necessary constituents, 

 it is quite possible indeed, not to say probable, 

 that amongst the many complicated aggregations 

 formed, a few may be of the nature of living 

 protoplasm. It seems not unlikely that cyanogen 

 should form a nucleus of the type of which we 

 have been in search. Although the living types 

 which thus result difier from those we see around 

 us, they would still most probably possess many 

 properties in common. In this way, it was hoped 

 that successful results might be obtained which 

 should resemble organic forms, but unfortunately 

 the results were negative, and if such methods ever 

 do yield the required result, it will doubtless be 

 after many failures, unless the experimenter is 

 particularly lucky. 



The most that can be done is to reason from 

 analogy : and from the results obtained, by various 



