177 
9. “ Protoplasm, simple or nucleated, is the formal basis of 
all life • it is the clay of the potter,” says the Professor .* This 
may be very true, but we have been told before that it is 
virtually the clay and the potter too ; and all this is attributed 
to molecular action. . 
10. Professor Huxley informs us+ that the direction towards 
which modern physiology is tending, is towards the conception 
of life “as the product of a certain disposition of material 
molecules ; ” and he then seeks to show us how to escape, by 
taking refuge in the mysticism of Descartes, from the ma- 
terialism towards which modern science thus conducts us. The 
simple reply to all which seems to me to be, that all we know 
of the action of molecular forces forbids such a supposition 
being entertained for a moment. 
Fundamental Errors . 
11. It is this fundamental error — the irpHiTov iptvSoe, of this 
new school, that I here attack— the notion that molecules of 
matter may combine to act in a manner wholly foreign to the 
laws which govern them, and to produce results of organiza- 
tion which are wide as the poles asunder from all their powers. 
In order to effect this, protoplasm is made to do service in a 
wav not anticipated by Mohl, who is understood to have first 
applied the term to the substance formerly termed by the 
Germans “ Schleim/’ a much more descriptive word, for sup- 
planting which no scientific reason can be given ; “ Ur schleim 
again being far more characteristic for deep-sea protoplasm 
than the objectionable “ Bathybius ” of Huxley objectionable 
as taking for granted what is not, and probably cannot be, 
proved as to its nature. J 
12. I must next remark that those (and they are many) who 
use the terms “ molecular organization,” “ molecular forces,” 
and “ molecular machinery,” imply that they are conversant 
with, and give in their adhesion to, the atomic theory ; for it is 
only in connection with this theory that “ molecules have any 
definite meaning. At the same time, we may observe these very 
persons using the terms “ molecule ” and “ atom ” as synony- 
mous ; thus demonstrating either their entire ignorance of the 
subject, or their willingness to impose on those who incautiously 
afford them their credence, by a use of apparently learned words 
* Lay Sermons, p. 127. I Ibid., p. 142. _ 
t See Dr. Lionel Beale’s Protoplasm, pp. 20-21, for description of 
Bathybius. See also Appendix (C). 
