164 THE DESTRUCTIVE INFLUENCE OF 
Having no grounds for criticising these observations, 
we are bound to look upon them, provisionally at 
least, as correct and taken with all due care—though 
it is only fair to add that both Max Schultze and 
Cohn appear to be not altogether satisfied with 
some statements of the same kind,* Such instances, 
if thoroughly accurate, may perhaps be taken as 
examples of the- highest temperature that it is 
possible for living matter to endure, even where it 
has been inured to the influence of heat in the 
most gradual manner. And the real point of view 
from which such facts should be regarded is pointed 
out by Professor Wyman when he says: “ Having 
become adapted through a long series of years to 
their surroundings, such organisms may be supposed 
to live under circumstances the most favourable 
possible for sustaining life at a high temperature. 
It is a well-known physiological fact, that living 
beings may be slowly transferred to new and 
widely different conditions without injury; but if 
the same change is suddenly made they perish. In 
the experiments made in our laboratories, the 
change of conditions is relatively violent, and there- 
fore liable to destroy life by its suddenness,” ‘Hence 
it is that a considerably lower temperature than that 
of the springs above mentioned suffices to kill all 
* See Max Schultze, “Das Protoplasma,” Leipzig, 1863, p. 67. 
