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just as acetic acid or alcohol could be obtained from bodies, which 
had had life, after death. You can get phosphate of lime from bones, 
and carbonate of lime from shells, but life is beyond all chemical force, 
and beyond all electrical force, marvellous as that is. How are all 
the complex organs, with which we are so well acquainted, formed out 
of the living blood ? How do the blood corpuscules perform such subtle 
chemistry? To say that the chemist can make these organic compounds 
without life is no nearer the matter than to tell me that because the 
telescope is made of brass and glass, that, therefore, the structure of the 
telescope or the microscope is only the result of the action of brass and 
glass upon one another. I should resent such a thing as an absurdity. 
But what is that wonderful, subtile thing — call it force, or vitality, or 
what you will — which is resident in me, and which is possessed of such 
marvellous powers ? How does Dr. Odling, or any other chemist, produce 
his organic compounds ? He first takes organic bodies and pulls them to 
pieces in order to find out their constituents, and then, in a roundabout way, 
he gets similar elements combined in a certain form. But my blood corpus- 
cules are constantly doing that for me in the most perfect manner, and in 
every part of my body. They do not put a crystalline lens in my hand, but 
in my organs of vision the most perfect lenses are placed in the position and 
with the surroundings best fitted for their immediate and constant use. 
Wonderful as it is that my blood corpuscules, having a life of their own, 
should be able to form such a wonderful and marvellous organ as the eye, it 
is not more wonderful than the operation of my heart, or than the construc- 
tion of my veins, with all their beautiful valves placed just where those 
valves ought to be to prevent the regurgitation of the blood. Where did that 
marvellous power come from which could make such an organ as the eye, 
which is mathematically perfect — its perfection being such that no man can 
imitate it ? How are these blood corpuscules endowed with wisdom for 
doing that ? It must have come from some other and higher source, and the 
very character of the work perfectly manifests the source whence it came. 
That wisdom could only have come from the Source of all wisdom, and all 
these results, instead of coming by chance, or being self- originating, are 
based upon knowledge as sure, as certain, and as mathematically accurate as 
anything. When I tell you that this is oxygen and this hydrogen, and that 
both combined will give me water, — if I can say that, as the result of accu- 
rate and scientific study, I am forced, by the observation of the organs of 
my own body, formed there unknown to me, and by the vital action going 
on in that body, — I am forced to acknowledge, as a scientific fact and truth, 
that all these things could only have come from the Source of all wisdom, the 
Almighty Creator of all things. (Cheers.) 
Dr. Protheroe Smith. — I wish to correct a misapprehension on the part 
of Mr. Wainwright as to what I said. I agreed that man was created per- 
fect, but I argued that he was incapable of sustaining that perfection, and 
therefore fell. 
The meeting was then adjourned. 
