146 CONCERNING PRESENT 



it would be necessary to try to find out from what mingling of 

 inorganic combinations organisms could arise ; to prove that 

 spontaneous generation could never have been possible is out of 

 the question. ... It would be impossible to prove by experiment 

 that spontaneous generation could never have taken place ; because 

 each negative experiment could only prove that life does not arrive 

 under the conditions of the experiment. But this by no means excludes 

 the possibility that it might arise under other conditions.'' 



What he says in the last two sentences is, of course, quite true ; 

 but what he said previously narrows the conditions of the experi- 

 ment overmuch. We do not now so much want to prove the 

 problem as it presented itself in the past, when there were only 

 " inorganic substances in existence." However interesting that 

 problem may be, our more immediate interest is to know whether 

 Archebiosis can be proved to take place now, under the easier 

 conditions provided by the plentiful existence of organic matter in 

 solution. Although experiments have been made in both directions, 

 still the trial has for the most part been made with solutions or 

 infusions containing organic matter ; and, owing to the doubts and 

 difficulties inseparable from the problem, it must be confessed that 

 the results have not been such as to carry conviction to the minds 

 of men of science generally. Many have been led, in fact, to 

 attach more weight to the supposed non-success of the experi- 

 mental evidence than there was any real warrant for, and, not 

 mindful of the strict limitations of the scope of such evidence, as 

 indicated above by Weismann, have seemingly allowed their judg- 

 ments to be unduly prejudiced in regard to the general question. 

 From this point of view the influence in this country, during the 

 last generation, of Huxley, of Tyndall, and of Herbert Spencer, 

 and, in France, of Pasteur has been altogether unduly to decry the 

 very possibility of the occurrence of Archebiosis. Only one philo- 

 sophic thinker in this country during that period seemed to feel 

 the full weight of the general evidence. That was George Henry 

 Lewes who wrote as follows:' "All the complex organisms are 

 evolved from organisms less complex, as these were evolved from 

 simpler forms : the link which unites all organisms is not always 

 the common bond of heritage, but the uniformity of organic laws 

 acting under uniform conditions. ... It is therefore consistent with 

 the hypothesis of Evolution to admit a variety of origins or starting 

 points." 



' " Fortnightly Review," 1868, 1, p, 373, II, p. 79. 



