20 EVOLUTION AND THE 
case of living matter. There are no facts easily 
discoverable upon which such a fundamental assump- 
tion can be legitimately based — for it is one 
which the Evolutionist should not admit except upon 
evidence of the clearest and most unambiguous 
nature. 
The probabilities would certainly seem to be alto- 
gether in favour of the continuance of a natural 
process like Archebiosis after it had been once 
initiated, more especially when this natural process 
is so closely allied to another (namely, the ‘growth’ of 
living matter) which manifests itself with the utmost 
readiness on all parts of the earth’s surface. So 
that unless very cogent reasons can be adduced 
against the occurrence of Archebiosis at the present 
day, looked at from an @ priori point of view, there 
would seem scarcely room for doubt upon the 
subject. The properties and chemical tendencies of 
material bodies appear to be quite constant through 
both time and space. Speaking upon this subject 
in a recent discourse on ‘Molecules,’ Professor 
Clerk Maxwell says,* “We can procure specimens 
of oxygen from very different sources, from the 
air, from water, from rocks of every geological 
epoch. The history of these specimens has been 
very different, and if, during thousands of years, 
* Nature, Sep. 25, 1873, p. 440. 
