192 THE ORIGIN OF LIFE 



most complex and most marvellous manner, though 

 in a similar way analogous phenomena are to be 

 found in a much simpler degree in other realms 

 of Nature. 



We have seen that the development of these 

 organic structures admits of being illustrated by 

 purely dynamical conceptions. By regarding biogen 

 as the intermediate stage between matter, crys- 

 tallised electricity, if we might call it so, and 

 free electricity or electrons in the so-called gaseous 

 state, we can arrive at a conception of a notion of 

 a state of electricity which is neither matter nor 

 electricity as we understand these, but an inter- 

 mediate state which is or may be regarded as 

 being the primordial substance to which life is 

 due. 



Not merely have we electrical phenomena and 

 material phenomena, but a class of phenomena 

 intermediate between these two as much pheno- 

 mena of electricity as matter itself. 



It has been said that life is as much a pheno- 

 menon of matter as electricity is. More clearly, 

 life and matter are merely different phenomena 

 of electricity, matter being merely the fossilised 

 state of biogen, and life of the phenomena 

 which take place in biogen in that stage through 

 which electronic aggregations have to pass before 

 they are converted into the crystalline forms of 

 electrons which we call the chemical atoms of 

 matter. The three states of electrons may be 

 the purely electrical, when they are perfectly free; 



