194 THE ORIGIN OF LIFE 



taneous generation on such lines as Dr. Bastian 

 and his colleagues in the past have adopted. 

 There may be, in our opinion there most assuredly 

 are, organic types quite invisible under the highest 

 microscopic powers at our disposal to-day. But even 

 if they were visible it would not get over the diffi- 

 culty that the principle of metabolism is continually 

 simplifying, and will be found to occur even 

 when we get beyond the atomic to the electrical 

 substance, which, as we have endeavoured to show, 

 should, in certain states, manifest in the most 

 elementary degree the first stages of the pheno- 

 menon of life. 



Thus it seems to us that the problem of spon- 

 taneous generation resolves itself into as great 

 an absurdity as the problem of perpetual motion ; 

 and as those who think they have arrived 

 at a satisfactory solution of the latter problem 

 will before very long find themselves running 

 counter to the principle of the conservation of 

 energy ; so, on the other hand, those again who 

 share a like enthusiasm for the notion of spon- 

 taneous generation, will doubtless find themselves 

 encountered with somewhat similar difficulties. 

 How can it be ascertained that all forms of life 

 have been destroyed ? Most assuredly it can be 

 asserted that in certain circumstances organic 

 forms can be destroyed, but it cannot be shown 

 that ultra-microscopic or even ultra-atomic types 

 of organic or inorganic life do not still remain. 



The experiments of Pasteur, however, do not throw 

 so much light upon the subject as might at first be 



