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Any evolutionist who has a question put to him which it is 
inconvenient to answer, and which it would be imprudent on 
his part to discuss, is reviled/^ But, whatever the conse- 
quences, I shall venture to make some remarks on a few of 
Professor Huxley^s recent utterances, even at the risk of being 
also condemned as a reviler. 
What do you think of the attempt to convince people of the 
similarity or identity or close relationship between non-living 
matter and living matter, by calling a non-living particle and 
a living particle a molecular mechanism,^^ and by further 
asserting that non-living matter can be resolved into ‘‘ mole- 
cular mechanisms,'’^ and that living matter will also be resolved 
into molecular mechanisms Huxley tells the Medical 
Congress that matter is an aggregate of molecular mechanisms 
performing complicated movements of immense rapidity, and 
sensitively adjusting themselves (!) to every change in the sur- 
rounding world. But fancy giving to a particle of lead or 
iron this power of sensitively adjusting itself Is there any 
one in the world, besides Professor Huxley, who would apply 
such language to non-living matter ? By giving to the non- 
living the attributes peculiar to the living. Professor Huxley 
succeeds, according to his own satisfaction, in breaking down 
the contrast between living and non-living matter ; but will 
any one else believe that anything of the kind has been done ? 
Is it not almost a disgrace to the thought of our time that 
such transparent fallacies and absurd misrepresentations 
should not only be allowed to pa,ss without comment, but 
receive the sanction and approval of many scientific men? 
Again, Professor Huxley tells the Medical Congress that vital 
actions are nothing hut changes of place of particles of 
matter.-’^ What vital action in this world is nothing hut a 
change of place in particles of matter ? The statement seems 
not only unsound, but unfair. To say that any vital action 
is nothing hut a change of place of material particles is surely 
absolutely incorrect, for not only are all vital actions much 
more than this, but physical actions are more. It is obviously 
the something more than mere change of place that makes the 
difference between one form or kind of action and another. 
If there was nothing hut change of place, it is clear there 
would be but one action in the universe, instead of infinite 
variety of action. 
Qualities and properties are by materialistic authorities 
attributed to matter or denied to matter, as may be conve- 
nient ; but any attempt to explain the difference between a 
particle of living matter and the same matter when it has 
ceased to live, is carefully avoided. It is suggested that the 
