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room, I may be allowed to doubt whether its scholars will ever 
perfect their task. 
A hypothetical nest for the living once fairly imagined, 
harsh denunciations against life being a direct creative act, 
are rather largely indulged in, as will be found in those 
writings where material devolution is taken up against direct 
creation. In the last-named work. Dr. Page says, that the 
essential difference between man and the animals immediately 
beneath him, “ was not a thing brought about by a direct and 
independent act.” Man was not created, is the theme. 
Nothing was created except a lump of the inorganic, is also 
the theme. Everything besides proceeded thence, according to 
the aboriginal plan of the creator of the nucleus. 
Thijs is the best side of the materialistic theory — matter im- 
pressed by the Deity with all that has appeared ; and, according 
to some, with much more still to be developed. Even here we 
do not lose that contradiction, the material generator of the 
living. So determined is this scientific section the natural 
world shall be claimed as our origin, that strong efforts are 
made to get at the ultimate particle which eventually becomes 
the perfect organism. Strive as you may for the ultimate 
principle of germinal matter; subject what you will to the 
highest microscopic powers we have; go further — bring in 
imagination to your aid; let the mind conceive subdivision of 
matter until its powers of conception are lost in the vast 
calculation — the last glimmering of connected thought in 
relation to the mass is still a divisible entity. This is not 
what we seek. We have not arrived at the ultimate particle. 
No powers possessed by humanity ever can. And if they 
could, the ultimate particle is not the life itself. All reasoning 
shows that the ultimate particle must be matter. Does matter, 
as such, grow ? Who can say it does ? Every effect of 
nature's mightiest powers is but change of matter; we can 
detect no signs of growth. It is life that grows ; and though 
it may require the inorganic for its sustenance, it is life that, 
feeding on the unformed, occupies more and more space, and 
assumes fresh forms utterly unlike those whence its nourish- 
ment is drawn, till it reach the perfect vegetable or animal 
according to its kind. It might seem of small consequence, 
whether material food under the assimilating powers of 
life, becomes instrumental toward future size and form, or 
whether matter grew, being alive. But the whole question 
hinges on this ; for if matter grew, being alive, life would 
proceed from matter : whereas, matter being acted upon by 
life, life is more independent, and eventually becomes the 
visible ruling power of the material world, so far as its con- 
stitution is suitable. 
