1 882.] Organic Compounds in their Relations to Life. 975 



We are obliged, however, to suppose that these, like other solids, 

 even the densest crystals or metals, possess at all times molecular 

 activities. It is these activities that determine the respective prop- 

 erties of all substances, and constitute the multiple and varied in 

 nature. In proteine bodies, these molecular activities are much 

 more extensive and varied than are those of simpler bodies. The 

 molecular units are so much larger that their motions must be, as 

 it were, molar in comparison, while within these larger primary 

 units there are lesser units of different orders of aggregation, each 

 of which manifests its own appropriate activities, and thus modi- 

 fies the general properties of the whole. The reason why we are 

 unable to see these motions, is simply because they are still on 

 far too small a scale to be directly observed either by the eye or 

 by any of the appliances yet devised for intensifying human 



The development of the albuminoids, highly complex as they 

 are, is not alone sufficient for the immediate genesis of life. A 

 form of matter still more complex, must be reached before this re- 

 sult is possible. But there is no evidence that this form of matter 

 is produced by any different process from that by which other 

 forms of matter are produced. From the molecule of hydrogen tc 

 that of albumen, the process of evolution has been uniformly the 

 same, viz., that of compounding and recompounding, of doubly 

 and multiply compounding ; in short, it has been the process of 

 molecular aggregation. It would be contrary to the law of uni- 

 formity in natural phenomena, upon the recognition of which 

 modern science is based, to assume an abrupt change in the pro- 

 cess at this point, and upon those who maintain such a saltus 

 must rest the burden of proof. 



Dealing, as we constantly must do, with molecules only, 

 we are able to form conclusions only from observed effects, but 

 we have seen that, without changing the elementary substances 

 which analysis can demonstrate to be present at any stage of the 

 process, with each new step in the progress of aggregation new 

 and higher properties are created. From the inert properties of 

 carbon and nitrogen in the free state, of water and carbonic acid, 

 the simplest compounds, we have, by further successive com- 

 pounding, the more active ones of ammonia and nitric acid, the 

 sweet taste of sugar and glycerine, the powerful narcotic princi- 

 ples of nicotine and morphine, the deadly toxic properties of 



