1882.] Distinctions between Organisms and Minerals. 15 1 
It is highly significant that, with certain exceptions, the 
rationale of which may become clear on future scrutiny, 
only those chemical elements which occur in natural 
organisms are able to take part in producing these pseudo- 
organisms. Chemists fully recognise the close analogy 
which exists between lime, strontia, and baryta. Yet whilst 
the saccharate of lime lends itself to organic formation the 
corresponding salts of strontia and baryta are excluded. 
This consideration is of grave import. It would seem to 
follow that certain chemical compounds are capable and 
naturally tend to produce organic structures, cells, tubes, 
&c., under certain conditions just as under others they give 
rise to crystals. But MM. Monnier and Vogt have gone 
even further, and have been able to specify the classes of 
structures which different compounds may form. They 
state that sulphates and phosphates originate tubes, whilst 
the carbonates give rise to cells. May not these faCts have 
their meaning, to be traced out perhaps in some country 
where biological research is free ? May they not throw 
light upon the functions of different classes of salts in the 
process of nutrition ? Has the attempt been made to 
quicken these pseudo-organisms into a higher stage of 
existence by the application of varying conditions of atmo- 
spheric pressure and composition, of light, temperature, &c.? 
At any rate these growths seem to be, from a structural 
point of view, a transition-stage between the unequivocally 
inorganic and the decidedly organic and vitalised. It is 
conceivable at least that such has been the path taken by 
Nature. 
Apart from all special scientific considerations the experi- 
ments of MM. Fournier, Monnier, and Vogt have a philo- 
sophical value as confirming the principle of continuity. 
We must take the liberty of here calling attention to 
certain researches which, though not in direCt connection 
with the experiments of M. G. Fournier and of MM. Monnier 
and C. Vogt, serve in some degree to lessen the gap between 
the organic and the inorganic worlds, or at least to throw 
light upon the cause of life from a chemical point of view.* 
Our readers are, of course, aware that sixty years ago all 
organic compounds were supposed to be due to the aCtion 
of a distinct vital force, and to be quite incapable of artificial 
production. In 1828 Woehler succeeded in constructing 
urea from dead matter. Since that time not a few organic 
compounds, formerly obtained only from plants and animals 
* Die Chemische Ursache des Lebens, Von Oscar Loew und Thomas 
Bokorny. Miinchen: J. A. Finsterlin. 
