THE PRESIDENT'S ADDRESS. 
265 
is to speak tautologically. Basis, and that of which it is basis, are 
not identical. I pass over the circumstance that Strieker and 
other German chemists give a somewhat different analysis of dead 
protoplasm, and that Beale complains of the tendency to apply 
the term to formed, as distinguished from forming, matter. 5 It is 
perhaps more to the point to remark that seeing, as Huxley admits, 
all we know of the composition of Protoplasm is that of dead 
protoplasm, this can throw no real light on what living protoplasm 
is. The tenant has vanished from the house. Hamlet is not in 
Hamlet. To a lay mind it would seem to be reasonable that there 
must be something in the living speck which cannot come under 
any test to which the dead speck is subjected; and it is that 
mysterious something which performs the wondrous operation of 
converting dead substances into living matter. The mystery of 
Life remains as great as ever. 
There is also one difficulty which some feel in accepting the 
implication of this argument from the nature of Protoplasm. 
For, observe, the argument seems to proceed on the assumption 
that if there be such a common physical basis as described, there 
need not be any organizing power sui generis — nothing other than 
what is implied in the mere interaction of the chemical substances 
that make up the basis. " Aquosity " is not needed to form water, 
and so no other " ity " is required to account for the phenomena 
of Life. The interaction, or its resultant, is the elective power 
which abstracts material from surrounding substances, and causes 
them to become "living." Now, one solid objection to this suppo- 
sition which rises to ordinary, and to some scientific, minds, is this; 
that the hypothesis does not sufficiently account for the diversity 
in the selection of surrounding substances for conversion into 
living matter. The protoplasmic cell of a nettle, an oak, a prim- 
rose, a cabbage ; and of a fly, and an elephant, and a dog — is, 
according to the hypothesis, of the same chemical elements, of the 
same powers and form of action, and yet they lay hold of unlike 
substances to convert them into their respective living matter, and 
turn the matter so seized and assimilated into such diverse com- 
binations and uses. We might suppose that they, being exactly 
alike in composition and powers, would only assimilate the sub- 
stances that were common in their respective environments. 
5 Bioplasm, pp. 9-18, 73. Cf. Stirling's As regards Protoplasm, p. 24 ; 
Contemporary Review, September, 1876, p. 553. 
T 2 
