PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 19 



ovum in the case of invertebrates, and it is true that in 

 many directions strong similarities may be noticed between 

 living and non-living matter, but no creation of life from 

 non-living matter has been recorded. The discontinuity 

 of nature at this point remains therefore still unbridged. 



As far as can be ascertained the principles of the Con- 

 servation of Mass and the Conservation of Energy hold 

 good for processes in the living animal and plant with the 

 same exactness as in the case of experiments on substances 

 quite independent of any life process. Further, the laws 

 of Chemical Mechanics, and the laws of Osmotic Pressure, 

 worked out for matter in general, are quite applicable to 

 living matter. It is however, I think, premature and 

 unwarranted to draw the conclusion that there is nothing 

 distinctive about the life process which places it on a 

 different plane from that of other phenomena of matter. 

 Prof. Sir Edward Schaefer has considered the question of a 

 distinction between living and non-living matter in his 

 Presidential Address to the British Association in 1912. 

 He there takes the view that there is little or no funda- 

 mental distinction between living and non-living matter, 

 but he does not carry every scientist with him to the 

 same conclusion. 



The chemical elements in (living) protoplasm are well 

 known. Protoplasm has not yet been synthesised, but there 

 is no prima facie reason why chemists should not some day 

 be able to prepare synthetically a substance of the same 

 chemical composition as protoplasm. This synthetic sub- 

 stance (which we may call neoprotoplasm) may or may not 

 have all the properties of living protoplasm; Professor 

 Schaefer however has decided opinions on the matter. He 

 says that (10) "when the chemist succeeds in building up 

 this compound, it will without doubt be found to exhibit 

 the phenomena which we are in the habit of associating 

 with the term life." 



