LIFE: ITS ORIGIN AND NATURE 55 
Moreover, it is often most difficult to decide 
just when life ends and death begins. The 
recent experiments of Prof. Osterhout have 
shown us that a living thing may be fifty per 
cent alive, and fifty per cent dead, or seventy 
per cent dead and thirty per cent alive, etc. 
Up to a certain point, revivification may take 
place; beyond that limit, life can no longer be 
made to return. This discovery—that life and 
death imperceptibly shade into each other— 
is a very significant one, which gives us much 
food for reflection; for at what point is death 
inevitable, and when may not life be revived, if 
only we know the secret hoio? 
I once saw a very striking experiment, which 
illustrated this in rather a dramatic manner. 
Two living eels were dropped into liquir air; 
that were instantaneously frozen into steel-like 
rigidity. They were then removed from the 
bottom of the jar by means of pincers (they 
had frozen to the bottom) and both held in 
the air. “Now,” said the Professor, “which eel 
shall I drop—the right or the left?” A choice 
having been made, the eel was dropped, and 
broke into a thousand fragments on the stone 
floor—as though it were made of glass. The 
other eel was replaced in the original jar of 
water, and, in a few minutes, was swimming 
about as contentedly as though nothing had 
happened to it! 
Suppose -we had chosen the other eel? Where 
was the “life” of the restored one during the 
period when it was frozen? Assuredly it was 
“dead”—as dead as ever it will be—and yet it 
was restored to life again! To what extent 
