HEAT UPON LIVING MATTER, 137 
’ S 
reliable as the former) be held to prove that living 
matter can originate independently, or de xovo, 
through the mere productive properties of certain 
infusions or solutions. 
If the facts are true, is it possible to stave off the 
conclusion? Whilst the candid reader is asking him- 
self this question, I may further point out to him that 
as the previously discredited results belonging to 
Series A are no longer denied, doubt is now only 
possible upon a subject hitherto supposed to be 
settled—namely, as to whether living ‘matter is really 
killed by exposure in the moist state to a tempera- 
ture of 212° F. Obviously, at such a juncture, it 
rested more especially with those Panspermatists who 
chose still to be opponents of ‘spontaneous genera- 
tion, to show that this belief concerning the de- 
structive efficacy of boiling water, upon the truth of 
which they had previously relied, was erroneous— 
seeing that the advocates of spontaneous generation 
had demonstrated the truth of their position with 
reference to the experiments of Series A. Should the 
Panspermatists fail to:produce this evidence as to the 
untruthfulness of their-old view, they must not expect 
to hear that they have the best of the argument; and 
still less will they be able to hold their ground if, 
whilst abstaining themselves from all experiments 
belonging to Series B, their scientific opponents do 
