case of living matter. There are no facts easily discoverable upon which such a fundamental assumption can be legitimately based for it is one which the Evolutionist should not admit except upon evidence of the clearest and most unambiguous

nature.

The probabilities would certainly seem to be altogether in favour of the continuance of a natural process like Archebiosis after it had been once initiated, more especially when this natural process is so closely allied to another (namely, the 'growth' of living matter) which manifests itself with the utmost readiness on all parts of the earth's surface. So that unless very cogent reasons can be adduced against the occurrence of Archebiosis at the present day, looked at from an à priori point of view, there would seem scarcely room for doubt upon the subject. The properties and chemical tendencies of material bodies appear to be quite constant through both time and space. Speaking upon this subject recent discourse on 'Molecules,' Professor Clerk Maxwell says, "We can procure specimens of oxygen from very different sources, from the air, from water, from rocks of every geological epoch. The history of these specimens has been very different, and if, during thousands of years,

in a

*

* Nature, Sep. 25, 1873, p. 440.

difference of circumstances could produce difference of properties, these specimens of oxygen would show it. In like manner, we may procure hydrogen from water, from coal, or, as Graham did, from meteoric iron. Take two litres of any specimen of hydrogen, it will combine with exactly one litre of any specimen of oxygen, and will form exactly two litres of the vapour of water.

Now, if during the whole previous history of either specimen, whether imprisoned in the rocks flowing in the sea, or careering through unknown regions with the meteorites, any modification of the molecules had taken place, these relations would no longer be preserved. . . . But we have another, and an entirely different method of comparing the properties of molecules. The molecule, though indestructible, is not a hard rigid body, but is capable of internal movements, and when these are excited it emits rays, the wave-length of which is a measure of the time of vibration of the molecule. By means of the spectroscope the wave-lengths of different kinds of light may be compared to within one ten-thousandth part. In this way it has been ascertained, not only that molecules taken from every specimen of hydrogen in our laboratories, have the same set of periods of vibration, but that light having the same set of

periods of vibration, is emitted from the sun and from the fixed stars. We are thus assured that molecules of the same nature as those of our hydrogen exist in those distant regions, or at least did exist when the light by which we see them was emitted." With evidence such as this before us, which could be multiplied to an enormous extent, we should hesitate before needlessly postulating any infringement of the uniformity of natural phenomena: we ought in fact only to entertain such a supposition when it has been lightly forced upon us. Certainly we should not resort to it and then strain the interpretation of natural and experimental phenomena into a forced accord

ance.

What, then, are the reasons assigned for the nonoccurrence at the present day of the process of Archebiosis? All that Mr. Spencer says upon the subject is, that such a process seems to him more likely to have occurred at "a time when the heat of the earth's surface was falling through those ranges of temperature at which the higher organic compounds are unstable," than at the present day. Why such conditions would be more favourable than those now existing Mr. Spencer does not say; and that such an alteration should suffice to put a stop to Archebiosis, although we see living matter still

growing freely all over the earth under the most diverse conditions as regards temperature, seems very difficult to believe. Yet no other suggestion is offered in explanation of an assumption which seems essentially unscientific. For the assumption that Archebiosis took place only in the remote. past puts this process on a quasi miraculous level, and tends to assimilate it to an act of special creation, the very notion of which Mr. Spencer, in other cases, resolutely rejects.

Again, what reason does Professor Huxley give, in explanation of his supposition as to the present nonoccurrence of Archebiosis? He says,* if it were given to him "to look beyond the abyss of geologically recorded time" to a still more remote period of the earth's history, he would expect "to be a witness to the evolution of living protoplasm from not-living matter." And the only reason distinctly implied why a similar process should not occur at the present day, is because the physical and chemical conditions of the earth's surface were different in the past from what they are now. And yet, concerning the exact nature of these differences, or the degree in which the different sets of conditions would respectively favour the occurrence or arrest of an evolution of living matter, Professor Huxley cannot possess even the vaguest

knowledge. He chooses to assume that the unknown conditions existing in the past were more favourable to Archebiosis than those now in operation. This, however, is a mere assumption which may be entirely opposed to the facts. It is useless of course to argue upon such a subject, but still it might fairly be said, in opposition to his view of the impotency of present telluric conditions, that the abundance of dead organic matter now existing in a state of solution. would seem to afford a much more easy starting-point for life-evolution than could have existed in that remote past, when no living matter had previously been formed, and consequently when no dead organic matter thence derived could have been diffused over the earth's surface.*

Professor Huxley is, however, very inconsistent, since, in spite of his declared expectation of witnessing the evolution of living from lifeless matter, if it were given him "to look beyond the abyss of geologically recorded time," he had said scarcely five minutes before, in reference to experimental evidence bearing upon the present occurrence of a similar process, that "if, in the present state of Science, the alternative is offered us, either germs can stand a greater heat than

* This is a consideration of great importance; since those who believe that Archebiosis occurs in organic solutions at the present day, have not yet professed to show that it can occur in saline solutions free from all traces of organic matter.