{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_18335/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_18335","id":"gutenberg_18335","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/18335","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Nature/Gardening/Animals","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Science - Biology","Life (Biology)"],"text":"Produced by Bryan Ness, Jamie Atiga, Leonard Johnson and\nthe Online Distributed Proofreading Team at\nhttp://www.pgdp.net\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n\nTHE\n\nBREATH OF LIFE\n\n\nBY\n\nJOHN BURROUGHS\n\n[Illustration]\n\nBOSTON AND NEW YORK\nHOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY\nThe Riverside Press Cambridge\n\n\n\n\nCOPYRIGHT, 1915, BY JOHN BURROUGHS\n\nALL RIGHTS RESERVED\n\n_Published May 1915_\n\n\n\n\nPREFACE\n\n\nAs life nears its end with me, I find myself meditating more and more\nupon the mystery of its nature and origin, yet without the least hope\nthat I can find out the ways of the Eternal in this or in any other\nworld. In these studies I fancy I am about as far from mastering the\nmystery as the ant which I saw this morning industriously exploring a\nsmall section of the garden walk is from getting a clear idea of the\ngeography of the North American Continent. But the ant was occupied and\nwas apparently happy, and she must have learned something about a small\nfraction of that part of the earth's surface.\n\nI have passed many pleasant summer days in my hay-barn study, or under\nthe apple trees, exploring these questions, and though I have not solved\nthem, I am satisfied with the clearer view I have given myself of the\nmystery that envelops them. I have set down in these pages all the\nthoughts that have come to me on this subject. I have not aimed so much\nat consistency as at clearness and definiteness of statement, letting my\nmind drift as upon a shoreless sea. Indeed, what are such questions, and\nall other ultimate questions, but shoreless seas whereon the chief\nreward of the navigator is the joy of the adventure?\n\nSir Thomas Browne said, over two hundred years ago, that in philosophy\ntruth seemed double-faced, by which I fancy he meant that there was\nalways more than one point of view of all great problems, often\ncontradictory points of view, from which truth is revealed. In the\nfollowing pages I am aware that two ideas, or principles, struggle in my\nmind for mastery. One is the idea of the super-mechanical and the\nsuper-chemical character of living things; the other is the idea of the\nsupremacy and universality of what we call natural law. The first\nprobably springs from my inborn idealism and literary habit of mind; the\nsecond from my love of nature and my scientific bent. It is hard for me\nto reduce the life impulse to a level with common material forces that\nshape and control the world of inert matter, and it is equally hard for\nme to reconcile my reason to the introduction of a new principle, or to\nsee anything in natural processes that savors of the _ab-extra_. It is\nthe working of these two different ideas in my mind that seems to give\nrise to the obvious contradictions that crop out here and there\nthroughout this volume. An explanation of life phenomena that savors of\nthe laboratory and chemism repels me, and an explanation that savors of\nthe theological point of view is equally distasteful to me. I crave and\nseek a natural explanation of all phenomena upon this earth, but the\nword \"natural\" to me implies more than mere chemistry and physics. The\nbirth of a baby, and the blooming of a flower, are natural events, but\nthe laboratory methods forever fail to give us the key to the secret of\neither.\n\nI am forced to conclude that my passion for nature and for all open-air\nlife, though tinged and stimulated by science, is not a passion for pure\nscience, but for literature and philosophy. My imagination and ingrained\nhumanism are appealed to by the facts and methods of natural history. I\nfind something akin to poetry and religion (using the latter word in its\nnon-mythological sense, as indicating the sum of mystery and reverence\nwe feel in the presence of the great facts of life and death) in the\nshows of day and night, and in my excursions to fields and woods. The\nlove of nature is a different thing from the love of science, though the\ntwo may go together. The Wordsworthian sense in nature, of \"something\nfar more deeply interfused\" than the principles of exact science, is\nprobably the source of nearly if not quite all that this volume holds.\nTo the rigid man of science this is frank mysticism; but without a sense\nof the unknown and unknowable, life is flat and barren. Without the\nemotion of the beautiful, the sublime, the mysterious, there is no art,\nno religion, no literature. How to get from the clod underfoot to the\nbrain and consciousness of man without invoking something outside of,\nand superior to, natural laws, is the question. For my own part I\ncontent myself with the thought of some unknown and doubtless unknowable\ntendency or power in the elements themselves--a kind of universal mind\npervading living matter and the reason of its living, through which the\nwhole drama of evolution is brought about.\n\nThis is getting very near to the old teleological conception, as it is\nalso near to that of Henri Bergson and Sir Oliver Lodge. Our minds\neasily slide into the groove of supernaturalism and spiritualism because\nthey have long moved therein. We have the words and they mould our\nthoughts. But science is fast teaching us that the universe is complete\nin itself; that whatever takes place in matter is by virtue of the force\nof matter; that it does not defer to or borrow from some other universe;\nthat there is deep beneath deep in it; that gross matter has its\ninterior in the molecule, and the molecule has its interior in the atom,\nand the atom has its interior in the electron, and that the electron is\nmatter in its fourth or non-material state--the point where it touches\nthe super-material. The transformation of physical energy into vital,\nand of vital into mental, doubtless takes place in this invisible inner\nworld of atoms and electrons. The electric constitution of matter is a\ndeduction of physics. It seems in some degree to bridge over the chasm\nbetween what we call the material and the spiritual. If we are not\nwithin hailing distance of life and mind, we seem assuredly on the road\nthither. The mystery of the transformation of the ethereal, imponderable\nforces into the vital and the mental seems quite beyond the power of the\nmind to solve. The explanation of it in the bald terms of chemistry and\nphysics can never satisfy a mind with a trace of idealism in it.\n\nThe greater number of the chapters of this volume are variations upon a\nsingle theme,--what Tyndall called \"the mystery and the miracle of\nvitality,\"--and I can only hope that the variations are of sufficient\ninterest to justify the inevitable repetitions which occur. I am no more\ninclined than Tyndall was to believe in miracles unless we name\neverything a miracle, while at the same time I am deeply impressed with\nthe inadequacy of all known material forces to account for the phenomena\nof living things.\n\nThat word of evil repute, materialism, is no longer the black sheep in\nthe flock that it was before the advent of modern transcendental\nphysics. The spiritualized materialism of men like Huxley and Tyndall\nneed not trouble us. It springs from the new conception of matter. It\nstands on the threshold of idealism or mysticism with the door ajar.\nAfter Tyndall had cast out the term \"vital force,\" and reduced all\nvisible phenomena of life to mechanical attraction and repulsion, after\nhe had exhausted physics, and reached its very rim, a mighty mystery\nstill hovered beyond him. He recognized that he had made no step toward\nits solution, and was forced to confess with the philosophers of all\nages that\n\n                            \"We are such stuff\n    As dreams are made on, and our little life\n    Is rounded with a sleep.\"\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\nI.    THE BREATH OF LIFE                   1\n\nII.   THE LIVING WAVE                     24\n\nIII.  A WONDERFUL WORLD                   46\n\nIV.   THE BAFFLING PROBLEM                71\n\nV.    SCIENTIFIC VITALISM                104\n\nVI.   A BIRD OF PASSAGE                  115\n\nVII.  LIFE AND MIND                      131\n\nVIII. LIFE AND SCIENCE                   159\n\nIX.   THE JOURNEYING ATOMS               188\n\nX.    THE VITAL ORDER                    212\n\nXI.   THE ARRIVAL OF THE FIT             244\n\nXII.  THE NATURALIST'S VIEW OF LIFE      254\n\n      INDEX                              291\n\nThe reproduction of the bust of Mr. Burroughs which appears as the\nfrontispiece to this volume is used by courtesy of the sculptor, C. S.\nPietro.\n\n\n\n\nI\n\nTHE BREATH OF LIFE\n\n\nI\n\nWhen for the third or fourth time during the spring or summer I take my\nhoe and go out and cut off the heads of the lusty burdocks that send out\ntheir broad leaves along the edge of my garden or lawn, I often ask\nmyself, \"What is this thing that is so hard to scotch here in the\ngrass?\" I decapitate it time after time and yet it forthwith gets itself\nanother head. We call it burdock, but what is burdock, and why does it\nnot change into yellow dock, or into a cabbage? What is it that is so\nconstant and so irrepressible, and before the summer is ended will be\nlying in wait here with its ten thousand little hooks to attach itself\nto every skirt or bushy tail or furry or woolly coat that comes along,\nin order to get free transportation to other lawns and gardens, to green\nfields and pastures new?\n\nIt is some living thing; but what is a living thing, and how does it\ndiffer from a mechanical and non-living thing? If I smash or overturn\nthe sundial with my hoe, or break the hoe itself, these things stay\nsmashed and broken, but the burdock mends itself, renews itself, and, if\nI am not on my guard, will surreptitiously mature some of the burs\nbefore the season is passed.\n\nEvidently a living thing is radically different from a mechanical thing;\nyet modern physical science tells me that the burdock is only another\nkind of machine, and manifests nothing but the activity of the\nmechanical and chemical principles that we see in operation all about us\nin dead matter; and that a little different mechanical arrangement of\nits ultimate atoms would turn it into a yellow dock or into a cabbage,\ninto an oak or into a pine, into an ox or into a man.\n\nI see that it is a machine in this respect, that it is set going by a\nforce exterior to itself--the warmth of the sun acting upon it, and upon\nthe moisture in the soil; but it is unmechanical in that it repairs\nitself and grows and reproduces itself, and after it has ceased running\ncan never be made to run again. After I have reduced all its activities\nto mechanical and chemical principles, my mind seems to see something\nthat chemistry and mechanics do not explain--something that avails\nitself of these forces, but is not of them. This may be only my\nanthropomorphic way of looking at things, but are not all our ways of\nlooking at things anthropomorphic? How can they be any other? They\ncannot be deific since we are not gods. They may be scientific. But what\nis science but a kind of anthropomorphism? Kant wisely said, \"It sounds\nat first singular, but is none the less certain, that the understanding\ndoes not derive its laws from nature, but prescribes them to nature.\"\nThis is the anthropomorphism of science.\n\nIf I attribute the phenomenon of life to a vital force or principle, am\nI any more unscientific than I am when I give a local habitation and a\nname to any other causal force, as gravity, chemical affinity, cohesion,\nosmosis, electricity, and so forth? These terms stand for certain\nspecial activities in nature and are as much the inventions of our own\nminds as are any of the rest of our ideas.\n\nWe can help ourselves out, as Haeckel does, by calling the physical\nforces--such as the magnet that attracts the iron filings, the powder\nthat explodes, the steam that drives the locomotive, and the\nlike--\"living inorganics,\" and looking upon them as acting by \"living\nforce as much as the sensitive mimosa does when it contracts its leaves\nat touch.\" But living force is what we are trying to differentiate from\nmechanical force, and what do we gain by confounding the two? We can\nonly look upon a living body as a machine by forming new conceptions of\na machine--a machine utterly unmechanical, which is a contradiction of\nterms.\n\nA man may expend the same kind of force in thinking that he expends in\nchopping his wood, but that fact does not put the two kinds of activity\non the same level. There is no question but that the food consumed is\nthe source of the energy in both cases, but in the one the energy is\nmuscular, and in the other it is nervous. When we speak of mental or\nspiritual force, we have as distinct a conception as when we speak of\nphysical force. It requires physical force to produce the effect that we\ncall mental force, though how the one can result in the other is past\nunderstanding. The law of the correlation and conservation of energy\nrequires that what goes into the body as physical force must come out in\nsome form of physical force--heat, light, electricity, and so forth.\n\nScience cannot trace force into the mental realm and connect it with our\nstates of consciousness. It loses track of it so completely that men\nlike Tyndall and Huxley and Spencer pause before it as an inscrutable\nmystery, while John Fiske helps himself out with the conception of the\nsoul as quite independent of the body, standing related to it as the\nmusician is related to his instrument. This idea is the key to Fiske's\nproof of the immortality of the soul. Finding himself face to face with\nan insoluble mystery, he cuts the knot, or rather, clears the chasm, by\nthis extra-scientific leap. Since the soul, as we know it, is\ninseparably bound up with physical conditions, it seems to me that a\nmore rational explanation of the phenomenon of mentality is the\nconception that the physical force and substance that we use up in a\nmental effort or emotional experience gives rise, through some unknown\nkind of molecular activity, to something which is analogous to the\nelectric current in a live wire, and which traverses the nerves and\nresults in our changing states of consciousness. This is the mechanistic\nexplanation of mind, consciousness, etc., but it is the only one, or\nkind of one, that lends itself to scientific interpretation. Life,\nspirit, consciousness, may be a mode of motion as distinct from all\nother modes of motion, such as heat, light, electricity, as these are\ndistinct from each other.\n\nWhen we speak of force of mind, force of character, we of course speak\nin parables, since the force here alluded to is an experience of our own\nminds entirely and would not suffice to move the finest dust-particle in\nthe air.\n\nThere could be no vegetable or animal life without the sunbeam, yet when\nwe have explained or accounted for the growth of a tree in terms of the\nchemistry and physics of the sunbeam, do we not have to figure to\nourselves something in the tree that avails itself of this chemistry,\nthat uses it and profits by it? After this mysterious something has\nceased to operate, or play its part, the chemistry of the sunbeam is no\nlonger effective, and the tree is dead.\n\nWithout the vibrations that we call light, there would have been no eye.\nBut, as Bergson happily says, it is not light passively received that\nmakes the eye; it is light meeting an indwelling need in the organism,\nwhich amounts to an active creative principle, that begets the eye. With\nfish in underground waters this need does not arise; hence they have no\nsight. Fins and wings and legs are developed to meet some end of the\norganism, but if the organism were not charged with an expansive or\ndeveloping force or impulse, would those needs arise?\n\nWhy should the vertebrate series have risen through the fish, the\nreptile, the mammal, to man, unless the manward impulse was inherent in\nthe first vertebrate; something that struggled, that pushed on and up\nfrom the more simple to the more complex forms? Why did not unicellular\nlife always remain unicellular? Could not the environment have acted\nupon it endlessly without causing it to change toward higher and more\ncomplex forms, had there not been some indwelling aboriginal tendency\ntoward these forms? How could natural selection, or any other process of\nselection, work upon species to modify them, if there were not something\nin species pushing out and on, seeking new ways, new forms, in fact some\nactive principle that is modifiable?\n\nLife has risen by stepping-stones of its dead self to higher things. Why\nhas it risen? Why did it not keep on the same level, and go through the\ncycle of change, as the inorganic does, without attaining to higher\nforms? Because, it may be replied, it was life, and not mere matter and\nmotion--something that lifts matter and motion to a new plane.\n\nUnder the influence of the life impulse, the old routine of matter--from\ncompound to compound, from solid to fluid, from fluid to gaseous, from\nrock to soil, the cycle always ending where it began--is broken into,\nand cycles of a new order are instituted. From the stable equilibrium\nwhich dead matter is always seeking, the same matter in the vital\ncircuit is always seeking the state of unstable equilibrium, or rather\nis forever passing between the two, and evolving the myriad forms of\nlife in the passage. It is hard to think of the process as the work of\nthe physical and chemical forces of inorganic nature, without\nsupplementing them with a new and different force.\n\nThe forces of life are constructive forces, and they are operative in a\nworld of destructive or disintegrating forces which oppose them and\nwhich they overcome. The physical and chemical forces of dead matter are\nat war with the forces of life, till life overcomes and uses them.\n\nThe mechanical forces go on repeating or dividing through the same\ncycles forever and ever, seeking a stable condition, but the vital force\nis inventive and creative and constantly breaks the repose that organic\nnature seeks to impose upon it.\n\nExternal forces may modify a body, but they cannot develop it unless\nthere is something in the body waiting to be developed, craving\ndevelopment, as it were. The warmth and moisture in the soil act alike\nupon the grains of sand and upon the seed-germs; the germ changes into\nsomething else, the sand does not. These agents liberate a force in the\ngerm that is not in the grain of sand. The warmth of the brooding fowl\ndoes not spend itself upon mere passive, inert matter (unless there is a\nchina egg in the nest), but upon matter straining upon its leash, and in\na state of expectancy. We do not know how the activity of the molecules\nof the egg differs from the activity of the molecules of the pebble,\nunder the influence of warmth, but we know there must be a difference\nbetween the interior movements of organized and unorganized matter.\n\nLife lifts inert matter up into a thousand varied and beautiful forms\nand holds it there for a season,--holds it against gravity and chemical\naffinity, though you may say, if you please, not without their aid,--and\nthen in due course lets go of it, or abandons it, and lets it fall back\ninto the great sea of the inorganic. Its constant tendency is to fall\nback; indeed, in animal life it does fall back every moment; it rises on\nthe one hand, serves its purpose of life, and falls back on the other.\nIn going through the cycle of life the mineral elements experience some\nchange that chemical analysis does not disclose--they are the more\nreadily absorbed again by life. It is as if the elements had profited\nin some way under the tutelage of life. Their experience has been a\nunique and exceptional one. Only a small fraction of the sum total of\nthe inert matter of the globe can have this experience. It must first go\nthrough the vegetable cycle before it can be taken up by the animal. The\nonly things we can take directly from the inorganic world are water and\nair; and the function of water is largely a mechanical one, and the\nfunction of air a chemical one.\n\nI think of the vital as flowing out of the physical, just as the\npsychical flows out of the vital, and just as the higher forms of animal\nlife flow out of the lower. It is a far cry from man to the dumb brutes,\nand from the brutes to the vegetable world, and from the vegetable to\ninert matter; but the germ and start of each is in the series below it.\nThe living came out of the not-living. If life is of physico-chemical\norigin, it is so by transformations and translations that physics cannot\nexplain. The butterfly comes out of the grub, man came out of the brute,\nbut, as Darwin says, \"not by his own efforts,\" any more than the child\nbecomes the man by its own efforts.\n\nThe push of life, of the evolutionary process, is back of all and in\nall. We can account for it all by saying the Creative Energy is immanent\nin matter, and this gives the mind something to take hold of.\n\n\nII\n\nAccording to the latest scientific views held on the question by such\nmen as Professor Loeb, the appearance of life on the globe was a purely\naccidental circumstance. The proper elements just happened to come\ntogether at the right time in the right proportions and under the right\nconditions, and life was the result. It was an accident in the thermal\nhistory of the globe. Professor Loeb has lately published a volume of\nessays and addresses called \"The Mechanistic Conception of Life,\"\nenforcing and illustrating this view. He makes war on what he terms the\nmetaphysical conception of a \"life-principle\" as the key to the problem,\nand urges the scientific conception of the adequacy of\nmechanico-chemical forces. In his view, we are only chemical mechanisms;\nand all our activities, mental and physical alike, are only automatic\nresponses to the play of the blind, material forces of external nature.\nAll forms of life, with all their wonderful adaptations, are only the\nchance happenings of the blind gropings and clashings of dead matter:\n\"We eat, drink, and reproduce [and, of course, think and speculate and\nwrite books on the problems of life], not because mankind has reached an\nagreement that this is desirable, but because, machine-like, we are\ncompelled to do so!\"\n\nHe reaches the conclusion that all our inner subjective life is\namenable to physico-chemical analysis, because many cases of simple\nanimal instinct and will can be explained on this basis--the basis of\nanimal tropism. Certain animals creep or fly to the light, others to the\ndark, because they cannot help it. This is tropism. He believes that the\norigin of life can be traced to the same physico-chemical activities,\nbecause, in his laboratory experiments, he has been able to dispense\nwith the male principle, and to fertilize the eggs of certain low forms\nof marine life by chemical compounds alone. \"The problem of the\nbeginning and end of individual life is physico-chemically clear\"--much\nclearer than the first beginnings of life. All individual life begins\nwith the egg, but where did we get the egg? When chemical synthesis will\ngive us this, the problem is solved. We can analyze the material\nelements of an organism, but we cannot synthesize them and produce the\nleast spark of living matter. That all forms of life have a mechanical\nand chemical basis is beyond question, but when we apply our analysis to\nthem, life evaporates, vanishes, the vital processes cease. But apply\nthe same analysis to inert matter, and only the form is changed.\n\nProfessor Loeb's artificially fathered embryo and starfish and\nsea-urchins soon die. If his chemism could only give him the\nmother-principle also! But it will not. The mother-principle is at the\nvery foundations of the organic world, and defies all attempts of\nchemical synthesis to reproduce it.\n\nIt would be presumptive in the extreme for me to question Professor\nLoeb's scientific conclusions; he is one of the most eminent of living\nexperimental biologists. I would only dissent from some of his\nphilosophical conclusions. I dissent from his statement that only the\nmechanistic conception of life can throw light on the source of ethics.\nIs there any room for the moral law in a world of mechanical\ndeterminism? There is no ethics in the physical order, and if humanity\nis entirely in the grip of that order, where do moral obligations come\nin? A gun, a steam-engine, knows no ethics, and to the extent that we\nare compelled to do things, are we in the same category. Freedom of\nchoice alone gives any validity to ethical consideration. I dissent from\nthe idea to which he apparently holds, that biology is only applied\nphysics and chemistry. Is not geology also applied physics and\nchemistry? Is it any more or any less? Yet what a world of difference\nbetween the two--between a rock and a tree, between a man and the soil\nhe cultivates. Grant that the physical and the chemical forces are the\nsame in both, yet they work to such different ends in each. In one case\nthey are tending always to a deadlock, to the slumber of a static\nequilibrium; in the other they are ceaselessly striving to reach a state\nof dynamic activity--to build up a body that hangs forever between a\nstate of integration and disintegration. What is it that determines this\nnew mode and end of their activities?\n\nIn all his biological experimentation, Professor Loeb starts with living\nmatter and, finding its processes capable of physico-chemical analysis,\nhe hastens to the conclusion that its genesis is to be accounted for by\nthe action and interaction of these principles alone.\n\nIn the inorganic world, everything is in its place through the operation\nof blind physical forces; because the place of a dead thing, its\nrelation to the whole, is a matter of indifference. The rocks, the\nhills, the streams are in their place, but any other place would do as\nwell. But in the organic world we strike another order--an order where\nthe relation and subordination of parts is everything, and to speak of\nhuman existence as a \"matter of chance\" in the sense, let us say, that\nthe forms and positions of inanimate bodies are matters of chance, is to\nconfuse terms.\n\nOrganic evolution upon the earth shows steady and regular progression;\nas much so as the growth and development of a tree. If the evolutionary\nimpulse fails on one line, it picks itself up and tries on another, it\nexperiments endlessly like an inventor, but always improves on its last\nattempts. Chance would have kept things at a standstill; the principle\nof chance, give it time enough, must end where it began. Chance is a\nman lost in the woods; he never arrives; he wanders aimlessly. If\nevolution pursued a course equally fortuitous, would it not still be\nwandering in the wilderness of the chaotic nebulae?\n\n\nIII\n\nA vastly different and much more stimulating view of life is given by\nHenri Bergson in his \"Creative Evolution.\" Though based upon biological\nscience, it is a philosophical rather than a scientific view, and\nappeals to our intuitional and imaginative nature more than to our\nconstructive reason. M. Bergson interprets the phenomena of life in\nterms of spirit, rather than in terms of matter as does Professor Loeb.\nThe word \"creative\" is the key-word to his view. Life is a creative\nimpulse or current which arose in matter at a certain time and place,\nand flows through it from form to form, from generation to generation,\naugmenting in force as it advances. It is one with spirit, and is\nincessant creation; the whole organic world is filled, from bottom to\ntop, with one tremendous effort. It was long ago felicitously stated by\nWhitman in his \"Leaves of Grass,\" \"Urge and urge, always the procreant\nurge of the world.\"\n\nThis conception of the nature and genesis of life is bound to be\nchallenged by modern physical science, which, for the most part, sees in\nbiology only a phase of physics; but the philosophic mind and the\ntrained literary mind will find in \"Creative Evolution\" a treasure-house\nof inspiring ideas, and engaging forms of original artistic expression.\nAs Mr. Balfour says, \"M. Bergson's 'Evolution Creatrice' is not merely a\nphilosophical treatise, it has all the charm and all the audacities of a\nwork of art, and as such defies adequate reproduction.\"\n\nIt delivers us from the hard mechanical conception of determinism, or of\na closed universe which, like a huge manufacturing plant, grinds out\nvegetables and animals, minds and spirits, as it grinds out rocks and\nsoils, gases and fluids, and the inorganic compounds.\n\nWith M. Bergson, life is the flowing metamorphosis of the poets,--an\nunceasing becoming,--and evolution is a wave of creative energy\noverflowing through matter \"upon which each visible organism rides\nduring the short interval of time given it to live.\" In his view, matter\nis held in the iron grip of necessity, but life is freedom itself.\n\"Before the evolution of life ... the portals of the future remain wide\nopen. It is a creation that goes on forever in virtue of an initial\nmovement. This movement constitutes the unity of the organized world--a\nprolific unity, of an infinite richness, superior to any that the\nintellect could dream of, for the intellect is only one of its aspects\nor products.\"\n\nWhat a contrast to Herbert Spencer's view of life and evolution!\n\"Life,\" says Spencer, \"consists of inner action so adjusted as to\nbalance outer action.\" True enough, no doubt, but not interesting. If\nthe philosopher could tell us what it is that brings about the\nadjustment, and that profits by it, we should at once prick up our ears.\nOf course, it is life. But what is life? It is inner action so adjusted\nas to balance outer action!\n\nA recent contemptuous critic of M. Bergson's book, Hugh S. R. Elliot,\npoints out, as if he were triumphantly vindicating the physico-chemical\ntheory of the nature and origin of life, what a complete machine a\ncabbage is for converting solar energy into chemical and vital\nenergy--how it takes up the raw material from the soil by a chemical and\nmechanical process, how these are brought into contact with the light\nand air through the leaves, and thus the cabbage is built up. In like\nmanner, a man is a machine for converting chemical energy derived from\nthe food he eats into motion, and the like. As if M. Bergson, or any one\nelse, would dispute these things! In the same way, a steam-engine is a\nmachine for converting the energy latent in coal into motion and power;\nbut what force lies back of the engine, and was active in the\nconstruction?\n\nThe final question of the cabbage and the man still remains--Where did\nyou get them?\n\nYou assume vitality to start with--how did you get it? Did it arise\nspontaneously out of dead matter? Mechanical and chemical forces do all\nthe work of the living body, but who or what controls and directs them,\nso that one compounding of the elements begets a cabbage, and another\ncompounding of the same elements begets an oak--one mixture of them and\nwe have a frog, another and we have a man? Is there not room here for\nsomething besides blind, indifferent forces? If we make the molecules\nthemselves creative, then we are begging the question. The creative\nenergy by any other name remains the same.\n\n\nIV\n\nIf life itself is not a force or a form of energy, yet behold what\nenergy it is capable of exerting! It seems to me that Sir Oliver Lodge\nis a little confusing when he says in a recent essay that \"life does not\nexert force--not even the most microscopical force--and certainly does\nnot supply energy.\" Sir Oliver is thinking of life as a distinct\nentity--something apart from the matter which it animates. But even in\nthis case can we not say that the mainspring of the energy of living\nbodies is the life that is in them?\n\nApart from the force exerted by living animal bodies, see the force\nexerted by living plant bodies. I thought of the remark of Sir Oliver\none day not long after reading it, while I was walking in a beech wood\nand noted how the sprouting beechnuts had sent their pale radicles down\nthrough the dry leaves upon which they were lying, often piercing two\nor three of them, and forcing their way down into the mingled soil and\nleaf-mould a couple of inches. Force was certainly expended in doing\nthis, and if the life in the sprouting nut did not exert it or expend\nit, what did?\n\nWhen I drive a peg into the ground with my axe or mallet, is the life in\nmy arm any more strictly the source (the secondary source) of the energy\nexpended than is the nut in this case? Of course, the sun is the primal\nsource of the energy in both cases, and in all cases, but does not life\nexert the force, use it, bring it to bear, which it receives from the\nuniversal fount of energy?\n\nLife cannot supply energy _de novo_, cannot create it out of nothing,\nbut it can and must draw upon the store of energy in which the earth\nfloats as in a sea. When this energy or force is manifest through a\nliving body, we call it vital force; when it is manifest through a\nmechanical contrivance, we call it mechanical force; when it is\ndeveloped by the action and reaction of chemical compounds, we call it\nchemical force; the same force in each case, but behaving so differently\nin the one case from what it does in the other that we come to think of\nit as a new and distinct entity. Now if Sir Oliver or any one else could\ntell us what force is, this difference between the vitalists and the\nmechanists might be reconciled.\n\nDarwin measured the force of the downward growth of the radicle, such as\nI have alluded to, as one quarter of a pound, and its lateral pressure\nas much greater. We know that the roots of trees insert themselves into\nseams in the rocks, and force the parts asunder. This force is\nmeasurable and is often very great. Its seat seems to be in the soft,\nmilky substance called the cambium layer under the bark. These minute\ncells when their force is combined may become regular rock-splitters.\n\nOne of the most remarkable exhibitions of plant force I ever saw was in\na Western city where I observed a species of wild sunflower forcing its\nway up through the asphalt pavement; the folded and compressed leaves of\nthe plant, like a man's fist, had pushed against the hard but flexible\nconcrete till it had bulged up and then split, and let the irrepressible\nplant through. The force exerted must have been many pounds. I think it\ndoubtful if the strongest man could have pushed his fist through such a\nresisting medium. If it was not life which exerted this force, what was\nit? Life activities are a kind of explosion, and the slow continued\nexplosions of this growing plant rent the pavement as surely as powder\nwould have done. It is doubtful if any cultivated plant could have\novercome such odds. It required the force of the untamed hairy plant of\nthe plains to accomplish this feat.\n\nThat life does not supply energy, that is, is not an independent source\nof energy, seems to me obvious enough, but that it does not manifest\nenergy, use energy, or \"exert force,\" is far from obvious. If a growing\nplant or tree does not exert force by reason of its growing, or by\nvirtue of a specific kind of activity among its particles, which we name\nlife, and which does not take place in a stone or in a bar of iron or in\ndead timber, then how can we say that any mechanical device or explosive\ncompound exerts force? The steam-engine does not create force, neither\ndoes the exploding dynamite, but these things exert force. We have to\nthink of the sum total of the force of the universe, as of matter\nitself, as a constant factor, that can neither be increased nor\ndiminished. All activity, organic and inorganic, draws upon this force:\nthe plant and tree, as well as the engine and the explosive--the winds,\nthe tides, the animal, the vegetable alike. I can think of but one\nforce, but of any number of manifestations of force, and of two distinct\nkinds of manifestations, the organic and the inorganic, or the vital and\nthe physical,--the latter divisible into the chemical and the\nmechanical, the former made up of these two working in infinite\ncomplexity because drawn into new relations, and lifted to higher ends\nby this something we call life.\n\nWe think of something in the organic that lifts and moves and\nredistributes dead matter, and builds it up into the ten thousand new\nforms which it would never assume without this something; it lifts lime\nand iron and silica and potash and carbon, against gravity, up into\ntrees and animal forms, not by a new force, but by an old force in the\nhands of a new agent.\n\nThe cattle move about the field, the drift boulders slowly creep down\nthe slopes; there is no doubt that the final source of the force is in\nboth cases the same; what we call gravity, a name for a mystery, is the\nform it takes in the case of the rocks, and what we call vitality,\nanother name for a mystery, is the form it takes in the case of the\ncattle; without the solar and stellar energy, could there be any motion\nof either rock or beast?\n\nForce is universal, it pervades all nature, one manifestation of it we\ncall heat, another light, another electricity, another cohesion,\nchemical affinity, and so on. May not another manifestation of it be\ncalled life, differing from all the rest more radically than they differ\nfrom one another; bound up with all the rest and inseparable from them\nand identical with them only in its ultimate source in the Creative\nEnergy that is immanent in the universe? I have to think of the Creative\nEnergy as immanent in all matter, and the final source of all the\ntransformations and transmutations we see in the organic and the\ninorganic worlds. The very nature of our minds compels us to postulate\nsome power, or some principle, not as lying back of, but as active in,\nall the changing forms of life and nature, and their final source and\ncause.\n\nThe mind is satisfied when it finds a word that gives it a hold of a\nthing or a process, or when it can picture to itself just how the thing\noccurs. Thus, for instance, to account for the power generated by the\nrushing together of hydrogen and oxygen to produce water, we have to\nconceive of space between the atoms of these elements, and that the\nforce generated comes from the immense velocity with which the\ninfinitesimal atoms rush together across this infinitesimal space. It is\nquite possible that this is not the true explanation at all, but it\nsatisfies the mind because it is an explanation in terms of mechanical\nforces that we know.\n\nThe solar energy goes into the atoms or corpuscles one thing, and it\ncomes out another; it goes in as inorganic force, and it comes out as\norganic and psychic. The change or transformation takes place in those\ninvisible laboratories of the infinitesimal atoms. It helps my mental\nprocesses to give that change a name--vitality--and to recognize it as a\nsupra-mechanical force. Pasteur wanted a name for it and called it\n\"dissymmetric force.\"\n\nWe are all made of one stuff undoubtedly, vegetable and animal, man and\nwoman, dog and donkey, and the secret of the difference between us, and\nof the passing along of the difference from generation to generation\nwith but slight variations, may be, so to speak, in the way the\nmolecules and atoms of our bodies take hold of hands and perform their\nmystic dances in the inner temple of life. But one would like to know\nwho or what pipes the tune and directs the figures of the dance.\n\nIn the case of the beechnuts, what is it that lies dormant in the\nsubstance of the nuts and becomes alive, under the influence of the\nwarmth and moisture of spring, and puts out a radicle that pierces the\ndry leaves like an awl? The pebbles, though they contain the same\nchemical elements, do not become active and put out a radicle.\n\nThe chemico-physical explanation of the universe goes but a little way.\nThese are the tools of the creative process, but they are not that\nprocess, nor its prime cause. Start the flame of life going, and the\nrest may be explained in terms of chemistry; start the human body\ndeveloping, and physiological processes explain its growth; but why it\nbecomes a man and not a monkey--what explains that?\n\n\n\n\nII\n\nTHE LIVING WAVE\n\n\nI\n\nIf one attempts to reach any rational conclusion on the question of the\nnature and origin of life on this planet, he soon finds himself in close\nquarters with two difficulties. He must either admit of a break in the\ncourse of nature and the introduction of a new principle, the vital\nprinciple, which, if he is a man of science, he finds it hard to do; or\nhe must accept the theory of the physico-chemical origin of life, which,\nas a being with a soul, he finds it equally hard to do. In other words,\nhe must either draw an arbitrary line between the inorganic and the\norganic when he knows that drawing arbitrary lines in nature, and\nfencing off one part from another, is an unscientific procedure, and one\nthat often leads to bewildering contradictions; or he must look upon\nhimself with all his high thoughts and aspirations, and upon all other\nmanifestations of life, as merely a chance product of the blind\nmechanical and chemical action and interaction of the inorganic forces.\n\nEither conclusion is distasteful. One does not like to think of himself\nas a chance hit of the irrational physical elements; neither does he\nfeel at ease with the thought that he is the result of any break or\ndiscontinuity in natural law. He likes to see himself as vitally and\ninevitably related to the physical order as is the fruit to the tree\nthat bore it, or the child to the mother that carried it in her womb,\nand yet, if only mechanical and chemical forces entered into his\ngenesis, he does not feel himself well fathered and mothered.\n\nOne may evade the difficulty, as Helmholtz did, by regarding life as\neternal--that it had no beginning in time; or, as some other German\nbiologists have done, that the entire cosmos is alive and the earth a\nliving organism.\n\nIf biogenesis is true, and always has been true,--no life without\nantecedent life,--then the question of a beginning is unthinkable. It is\njust as easy to think of a stick with only one end.\n\nSuch stanch materialists and mechanists as Haeckel and Verworn seem to\nhave felt compelled, as a last resort, to postulate a psychic principle\nin nature, though of a low order. Haeckel says that most chemists and\nphysicists will not hear a word about a \"soul\" in the atom. \"In my\nopinion, however,\" he says, \"in order to explain the simplest physical\nand chemical processes, we must necessarily assume a low order of\npsychical activity among the homogeneous particles of plasm, rising a\nvery little above that of the crystal.\" In crystallization he sees a\nlow degree of sensation and a little higher degree in the plasm.\n\nHave we not in this rudimentary psychic principle which Haeckel ascribes\nto the atom a germ to start with that will ultimately give us the mind\nof man? With this spark, it seems to me, we can kindle a flame that will\nconsume Haeckel's whole mechanical theory of creation. Physical science\nis clear that the non-living or inorganic world was before the living or\norganic world, but that the latter in some mysterious way lay folded in\nthe former. Science has for many years been making desperate efforts to\nawaken this slumbering life in its laboratories, but has not yet\nsucceeded, and probably never will succeed. Life without antecedent life\nseems a biological impossibility. The theory of spontaneous generation\nis rejected by the philosophical mind, because our experience tells us\nthat everything has its antecedent, and that there is and can be no end\nto the causal sequences.\n\nSpencer believes that the organic and inorganic fade into each other by\ninsensible gradations--that no line can be drawn between them so that\none can say, on this side is the organic, on that the inorganic. In\nother words, he says it is not necessary for us to think of an absolute\ncommencement of organic life, or of a first organism--organic matter was\nnot produced all at once, but was reached through steps or gradations.\nYet it puzzles one to see how there can be any gradations or degrees\nbetween being and not being. Can there be any halfway house between\nsomething and nothing?\n\n\nII\n\nThere is another way out of the difficulty that besets our rational\nfaculties in their efforts to solve this question, and that is the\naudacious way of Henri Bergson in his \"Creative Evolution.\" It is to\ndeny any validity to the conclusion of our logical faculties upon this\nsubject. Our intellect, Bergson says, cannot grasp the true nature of\nlife, nor the meaning of the evolutionary movement. With the emphasis of\nitalics he repeats that \"_the intellect is characterized by a natural\ninability to comprehend life_.\" He says this in a good many pages and in\na good many different ways; the idea is one of the main conclusions of\nhis book. Our intuitions, our spiritual nature, according to this\nphilosopher, are more _en rapport_ with the secrets of the creative\nenergy than are our intellectual faculties; the key to the problem is to\nbe found here, rather than in the mechanics and chemistry of the latter.\nOur intellectual faculties can grasp the physical order because they are\nformed by a world of solids and fluids and give us the power to deal\nwith them and act upon them. But they cannot grasp the nature and the\nmeaning of the vital order.\n\n\"We treat the living like the lifeless, and think all reality, however\nfluid, under the form of the sharply defined solid. We are at ease only\nin the discontinuous, in the immobile, in the dead. Perceiving in an\norganism only parts external to parts, the understanding has the choice\nbetween two systems of explanation only: either to regard the infinitely\ncomplex (and thereby infinitely well contrived) organization as a\nfortuitous concatenation of atoms, or to relate it to the\nincomprehensible influence of an external force that has grouped its\nelements together.\"\n\n\"Everything is obscure in the idea of creation, if we think of things\nwhich are created and a thing which creates.\" If we follow the lead of\nour logical, scientific faculties, then, we shall all be mechanists and\nmaterialists. Science can make no other solution of the problem because\nit sees from the outside. But if we look from the inside, with the\nspirit or \"with that faculty of seeing which is immanent in the faculty\nof acting,\" we shall escape from the bondage of the mechanistic view\ninto the freedom of the larger truth of the ceaseless creative view; we\nshall see the unity of the creative impulse which is immanent in life\nand which, \"passing through generations, links individuals with\nindividuals, species with species, and makes of the whole series of the\nliving one single immense wave flowing over matter.\"\n\nI recall that Tyndall, who was as much poet as scientist, speaks of\nlife as a wave \"which at no two consecutive moments of its existence is\ncomposed of the same particles.\" In his more sober scientific mood\nTyndall would doubtless have rejected M. Bergson's view of life, yet his\nimage of the wave is very Bergsonian. But what different meanings the\ntwo writers aim to convey: Tyndall is thinking of the fact that a living\nbody is constantly taking up new material on the one side and dropping\ndead or outworn material on the other. M. Bergson's mind is occupied\nwith the thought of the primal push or impulsion of matter which travels\nthrough it as the force in the wave traverses the water. The wave\nembodies a force which lifts the water up in opposition to its tendency\nto seek and keep a level, and travels on, leaving the water behind. So\ndoes this something we call life break the deadlock of inert matter and\nlift it into a thousand curious and beautiful forms, and then, passing\non, lets it fall back again into a state of dead equilibrium.\n\nTyndall was one of the most eloquent exponents of the materialistic\ntheory of the origin of life, and were he living now would probably feel\nlittle or no sympathy with the Bergsonian view of a primordial life\nimpulse. He found the key to all life phenomena in the hidden world of\nmolecular attraction and repulsion. He says: \"Molecular forces determine\nthe form which the solar energy will assume. [What a world of mystery\nlies in that determinism of the hidden molecular forces!] In the\nseparation of the carbon and oxygen this energy may be so conditioned as\nto result in one case in the formation of a cabbage and in another case\nin the formation of an oak. So also as regards the reunion of the carbon\nand the oxygen [in the animal organism] the molecular machinery through\nwhich the combining energy acts may in one case weave the texture of a\nfrog, while in another it may weave the texture of a man.\"\n\nBut is not this molecular force itself a form of solar energy, and can\nit differ in kind from any other form of physical force? If molecular\nforces determine whether the solar energy shall weave a head of a\ncabbage or a head of a Plato or a Shakespeare, does it not meet all the\nrequirements of our conception of creative will?\n\nTyndall thinks that a living man--Socrates, Aristotle, Goethe, Darwin, I\nsuppose--could be produced directly from inorganic nature in the\nlaboratory if (and note what a momentous \"if\" this is) we could put\ntogether the elements of such a man in the same relative positions as\nthose which they occupy in his body, \"with the selfsame forces and\ndistribution of forces, the selfsame motions and distribution of\nmotions.\" Do this and you have a St. Paul or a Luther or a Lincoln. Dr.\nVerworn said essentially the same thing in a lecture before one of our\ncolleges while in this country a few years ago--easy enough to\nmanufacture a living being of any order of intellect if you can\nreproduce in the laboratory his \"internal and external _vital\nconditions_.\" (The italics are mine.) To produce those vital conditions\nis where the rub comes. Those vital conditions, as regards the minutest\nbit of protoplasm, science, with all her tremendous resources, has not\nyet been able to produce. The raising of Lazarus from the dead seems no\nmore a miracle than evoking vital conditions in dead matter. External\nand internal vital conditions are no doubt inseparably correlated, and\nwhen we can produce them we shall have life. Life, says Verworn, is like\nfire, and \"is a phenomenon of nature which appears as soon as the\ncomplex of its conditions is fulfilled.\" We can easily produce fire by\nmechanical and chemical means, but not life. Fire is a chemical process,\nit is rapid oxidation, and oxidation is a disintegrating process, while\nlife is an integrating process, or a balance maintained between the two\nby what we call the vital force. Life is evidently a much higher form of\nmolecular activity than combustion. The old Greek Heraclitus saw, and\nthe modern scientist sees, very superficially in comparing the two.\n\nI have no doubt that Huxley was right in his inference \"that if the\nproperties of matter result from the nature and disposition of its\ncomponent molecules, then there is no intelligible ground for refusing\nto say that the properties of protoplasm result from the nature and\ndisposition of its molecules.\" It is undoubtedly in that nature and\ndisposition of the biological molecules that Tyndall's whole \"mystery\nand miracle of vitality\" is wrapped up. If we could only grasp what it\nis that transforms the molecule of dead matter into the living molecule!\nPasteur called it \"dissymmetric force,\" which is only a new name for the\nmystery. He believed there was an \"irrefragable physical barrier between\norganic and inorganic nature\"--that the molecules of an organism\ndiffered from those of a mineral, and for this difference he found a\nname.\n\n\nIII\n\nThere seems to have been of late years a marked reaction, even among men\nof science, from the mechanistic conception of life as held by the band\nof scientists to which I have referred. Something like a new vitalism is\nmaking headway both on the Continent and in Great Britain. Its exponents\nurge that biological problems \"defy any attempt at a mechanical\nexplanation.\" These men stand for the idea \"of the creative\nindividuality of organisms\" and that the main factors in organic\nevolution cannot be accounted for by the forces already operative in the\ninorganic world.\n\nThere is, of course, a mathematical chance that in the endless changes\nand permutations of inert matter the four principal elements that make\nup a living body may fall or run together in just that order and number\nthat the kindling of the flame of life requires, but it is a disquieting\nproposition. One atom too much or too little of any of them,--three of\noxygen where two were required, or two of nitrogen where only one was\nwanted,--and the face of the world might have been vastly different. Not\nonly did much depend on their coming together, but upon the order of\ntheir coming; they must unite in just such an order. Insinuate an atom\nor corpuscle of hydrogen or carbon at the wrong point in the ranks, and\nthe trick is a failure. Is there any chance that they will hit upon a\ncombination of things and forces that will make a machine--a watch, a\ngun, or even a row of pins?\n\nWhen we regard all the phenomena of life and the spell it seems to put\nupon inert matter, so that it behaves so differently from the same\nmatter before it is drawn into the life circuit, when we see how it\nlifts up a world of dead particles out of the soil against gravity into\ntrees and animals; how it changes the face of the earth; how it comes\nand goes while matter stays; how it defies chemistry and physics to\nevoke it from the non-living; how its departure, or cessation, lets the\nmatter fall back to the inorganic--when we consider these and others\nlike them, we seem compelled to think of life as something, some force\nor principle in itself, as M. Bergson and Sir Oliver Lodge do, existing\napart from the matter it animates.\n\nSir Oliver Lodge, famous physicist that he is, yet has a vein of\nmysticism and idealism in him which sometimes makes him recoil from the\nhard-and-fast interpretations of natural phenomena by physical science.\nLike M. Bergson, he sees in life some tendency or impetus which arose in\nmatter at a definite time and place, \"and which has continued to\ninteract with and incarnate itself in matter ever since.\"\n\nIf a living body is a machine, then we behold a new kind of machine with\nnew kinds of mechanical principles--a machine that repairs itself, that\nreproduces itself, a clock that winds itself up, an engine that stokes\nitself, a gun that aims itself, a machine that divides and makes two,\ntwo unite and make four, a million or more unite and make a man or a\ntree--a machine that is nine tenths water, a machine that feeds on other\nmachines, a machine that grows stronger with use; in fact, a machine\nthat does all sorts of unmechanical things and that no known combination\nof mechanical and chemical principles can reproduce--a vital machine.\nThe idea of the vital as something different from and opposed to the\nmechanical must come in. Something had to be added to the mechanical and\nchemical to make the vital.\n\nSpencer explains in terms of physics why an ox is larger than the sheep,\nbut he throws no light upon the subject of the individuality of these\nanimals--what it is that makes an ox an ox or a sheep a sheep. These\nanimals are built up out of the same elements by the same processes, and\nthey may both have had the same stem form in remote biologic time. If\nso, what made them diverge and develop into such totally different\nforms? After the living body is once launched many, if not all, of its\noperations and economies can be explained on principles of mechanics and\nchemistry, but the something that avails itself of these principles and\ndevelops an ox in the one case and a sheep in the other--what of that?\n\nSpencer is forced into using the terms \"amount of vital capital.\" How\nmuch more of it some men, some animals, some plants have than others!\nWhat is it? What did Spencer mean by it? This capital augments from\nyouth to manhood, and then after a short or long state of equilibrium\nslowly declines to the vanishing-point.\n\nAgain, what a man does depends upon what he is, and what he is depends\nupon what he does. Structure determines function, and function reacts\nupon structure. This interaction goes on throughout life; cause and\neffect interchange or play into each other's hands. The more power we\nspend within limits the more power we have. This is another respect in\nwhich life is utterly unmechanical. A machine does not grow stronger by\nuse as our muscles do; it does not store up or conserve the energy it\nexpends. The gun is weaker by every ball it hurls; not so the baseball\npitcher; he is made stronger up to the limit of his capacity for\nstrength.\n\nIt is plain enough that all living beings are machines in this\nrespect--they are kept going by the reactions between their interior and\ntheir exterior; these reactions are either mechanical, as in flying,\nswimming, walking, and involve gravitation, or they are chemical and\nassimilative, as in breathing and eating. To that extent all living\nthings are machines--some force exterior to themselves must aid in\nkeeping them going; there is no spontaneous or uncaused movement in\nthem; and yet what a difference between a machine and a living thing!\n\nTrue it is that a man cannot live and function without heat and oxygen,\nnor long without food, and yet his relation to his medium and\nenvironment is as radically different from that of the steam-engine as\nit is possible to express. His driving-wheel, the heart, acts in\nresponse to some stimulus as truly as does the piston of the engine, and\nthe principles involved in circulation are all mechanical; and yet the\nmain thing is not mechanical, but vital. Analyze the vital activities\ninto principles of mechanics and of chemistry, if you will, yet there is\nsomething involved that is neither mechanical nor chemical, though it\nmay be that only the imagination can grasp it.\n\nThe type that prints the book is set up and again distributed by a\npurely mechanical process, but that which the printed page signifies\ninvolves something not mechanical. The mechanical and chemical\nprinciples operative in men's bodies are all the same; the cell\nstructure is the same, and yet behold the difference between men in\nsize, in strength, in appearance, in temperament, in disposition, in\ncapacities! All the processes of respiration, circulation, and nutrition\nin our bodies involve well-known mechanical principles, and the body is\naccurately described as a machine; and yet if there were not something\nin it that transcends mechanics and chemistry would you and I be here? A\nmachine is the same whether it is in action or repose, but when a body\nceases to function, it is not the same. It cannot be set going like a\nmachine; the motor power has ceased to be. But if the life of the body\nwere no more than the sum of the reactions existing between the body and\nthe medium in which it lives, this were not so. A body lives as long as\nthere is a proper renewal of the interior medium through exchanges with\nits environment.\n\nMechanical principles are operative in every part of the body--in the\nheart, in the arteries, in the limbs, in the joints, in the bowels, in\nthe muscles; and chemical principles are operative in the lungs, in the\nstomach, in the liver, in the kidneys; but to all these things do we not\nhave to add something that is not mechanical or chemical to make the\nman, to make the plant? A higher mechanics, a higher chemistry, if you\nprefer, a force, but a force differing in kind from the physical forces.\n\nThe forces of life are constructive forces, and work in a world of\ndisintegrating or destructive forces which oppose them and which they\novercome. The mechanical and the chemical forces of dead matter are the\nenemies of the forces of life till life overcomes and uses them; as much\nso as gravity, fire, frost, water are man's enemies till he has learned\nhow to subdue and use them.\n\n\nIV\n\nIt is a significant fact that the four chief elements which in various\ncombinations make up living bodies are by their extreme mobility well\nsuited to their purpose. Three of these are gaseous; only the carbon is\na solid. This renders them facile and adaptive in the ever-changing\nconditions of organic evolution. The solid carbon forms the vessel in\nwhich the precious essence of life is carried. Without carbon we should\nevaporate or flow away and escape. Much of the oxygen and hydrogen\nenters into living bodies as water; nine tenths of the human body is\nwater; a little nitrogen and a few mineral salts make up the rest. So\nthat our life in its final elements is little more than a stream of\nwater holding in solution carbonaceous and other matter and flowing,\nforever flowing, a stream of fluid and solid matter plus something else\nthat scientific analysis cannot reach--some force or principle that\ncombines and organizes these elements into the living body.\n\nIf a man could be reduced instantly into his constituent elements we\nshould see a pail or two of turbid fluid that would flow down the bank\nand soon be lost in the soil. That which gives us our form and stability\nand prevents us from slowly spilling down the slope at all times is the\nmysterious vital principle or force which knits and marries these\nunstable elements together and raises up a mobile but more or less\nstable form out of the world of fluids. Venus rising from the sea is a\nsymbol of the genesis of every living thing.\n\nInorganic matter seeks only rest. \"Let me alone,\" it says; \"do not break\nmy slumbers.\" But as soon as life awakens in it, it says: \"Give me room,\nget out of my way. Ceaseless activity, ceaseless change, a thousand new\nforms are what I crave.\" As soon as life enters matter, matter meets\nwith a change of heart. It is lifted to another plane, the\nsupermechanical plane; it behaves in a new way; its movements from being\ncalculable become incalculable. A straight line has direction, that is\nmechanics; what direction has the circle? That is life, a change of\ndirection every instant. An aeroplane is built entirely on mechanical\nprinciples, but something not so built has to sit in it and guide it; in\nfact, had to build it and adjust it to its end.\n\nMechanical forces seek an equilibrium or a state of rest. The whole\ninorganic world under the influence of gravity would flow as water\nflows, if it could, till it reached a state of absolute repose. But\nvital forces struggle against a state of repose, which to them means\ndeath. They are vital by virtue of their tendency to resist the repose\nof inert matter; chemical activity disintegrates a stone or other metal,\nbut the decay of organized matter is different in kind; living organisms\ndecompose it and resolve it into its original compounds.\n\nVital connections and mechanical connections differ in kind. You can\ntreat mechanical principles mathematically, but can you treat life\nmathematically? Will your formulas and equations apply here? You can\nfigure out the eclipses of the sun and moon for centuries to come, but\nwho can figure out the eclipses of nations or the overthrow of parties\nor the failures of great men? And it is not simply because the problem\nis so vastly more complex; it is because you are in a world where\nmathematical principles do not apply. Mechanical forces will determine\nthe place and shape of every particle of inert matter any number of\nyears or centuries hence, but they will not determine the place and\ncondition of matter imbued with the principle of life.\n\nWe can graft living matter, we can even graft a part of one animal's\nbody into another animal's body, but the mechanical union which we\nbring about must be changed into vital union to be a success, the\nspirit of the body has to second our efforts. The same in grafting a\ntree or anything else: the mechanical union which we effect must become\na vital union; and this will not take place without some degree of\nconsanguinity, the live scion must be recognized and adapted by the\nstock in which we introduce it.\n\nLiving matter may be symbolized by a stream; it is ever and never the\nsame; life is a constant becoming; our minds and our bodies are never\nthe same at any two moments of time; life is ceaseless change.\n\nNo doubt it is between the stable and the unstable condition of the\nmolecules of matter that life is born. The static condition to which all\nthings tend is death. Matter in an unstable condition tends either to\nexplode or to grow or to disintegrate. So that an explosion bears some\nanalogy to life, only it is quickly over and the static state of the\nelements is restored. Life is an infinitely slower explosion, or a\nprolonged explosion, during which some matter of the organism is being\nconstantly burned up, and thus returned to a state of inorganic repose,\nwhile new matter is taken in and kindled and consumed by the fires of\nlife. One can visualize all this and make it tangible to the intellect.\nGet your fire of life started and all is easy, but how to start it is\nthe rub. Get your explosive compound, and something must break the\ndeadlock of the elements before it will explode. So in life, what is it\nthat sets up this slow gentle explosion that makes the machinery of our\nvital economies go--that draws new matter into the vortex and casts the\nused-up material out--in short, that creates and keeps up the unstable\ncondition, the seesaw upon which life depends? To enable the mind to\ngrasp it we have to invent or posit some principle, call it the vital\nforce, as so many have done and still do, or call it molecular force, as\nTyndall does, or the power of God, as our orthodox brethren do, it\nmatters not. We are on the border-land between the knowable and the\nunknowable, where the mind can take no further step. There is no life\nwithout carbon and oxygen, hydrogen and nitrogen, but there is a world\nof these elements without life. What must be added to them to set up the\nreaction we call life? Nothing that chemistry can disclose.\n\nNew tendencies and activities are set up among these elements, but the\nelements themselves are not changed; oxygen is still oxygen and carbon\nstill carbon, yet behold the wonder of their new workmanship under the\ntutelage of life!\n\nLife only appears when the stable passes into the unstable, yet this\nchange takes place all about us in our laboratories, and no life\nappears. We can send an electric spark through a room full of oxygen and\nhydrogen gas, and with a tremendous explosion we have water--an element\nof life, but not life.\n\nSome of the elements seem nearer life than others. Water is near life;\nheat, light, the colloid state are near life; osmosis, oxidation,\nchemical reactions are near life; the ashes of inorganic bodies are\nnearer life than the same minerals in the rocks and soil; but none of\nthese things is life.\n\nThe chemical mixture of some of the elements gives us our high\nexplosives--gunpowder, guncotton, and the like; their organic mixture\ngives a slower kind of explosive--bread, meat, milk, fruit, which, when\nacted upon by the vital forces of the body, yield the force that is the\nequivalent of the work the body does. But to combine them in the\nlaboratory so as to produce the compounds out of which the body can\nextract force is impossible. We can make an unstable compound that will\nhurl a ton of iron ten miles, but not one that when exploded in the\ndigestive tract of the human body will lift a hair.\n\nWe may follow life down to the ground, yes, under the ground, into the\nvery roots of matter and motion, yea, beyond the roots, into the\nimaginary world of molecules and atoms, and their attractions and\nrepulsions and not find its secret. Indeed, science--the new\nscience--pursues matter to the vanishing-point, where it ceases to\nbecome matter and becomes pure force or spirit. What takes place in that\nimaginary world where ponderable matter ends and becomes disembodied\nforce, and where the hypothetical atoms are no longer divisible, we may\nconjecture but may never know. We may fancy the infinitely little going\nthrough a cycle of evolution like that of the infinitely great, and\nsolar systems developing and revolving inside of the ultimate atoms, but\nthe Copernicus or the Laplace of the atomic astronomy has not yet\nappeared. The atom itself is an invention of science. To get the mystery\nof vitality reduced to the atom is getting it in very close quarters,\nbut it is a very big mystery still. Just how the dead becomes alive,\neven in the atom, is mystery enough to stagger any scientific mind. It\nis not the volume of the change; it is the quality or kind. Chemistry\nand mechanics we have always known, and they always remain chemistry and\nmechanics. They go into our laboratories and through our devices\nchemistry and mechanics, and they come out chemistry and mechanics. They\nwill never come out life, conjure with them as we will, and we can get\nno other result. We cannot inaugurate the mystic dance among the atoms\nthat will give us the least throb of life.\n\nThe psychic arises out of the organic and the organic arises out of the\ninorganic, and the inorganic arises out of--what? The relation of each\nto the other is as intimate as that of the soul to the body; we cannot\nget between them even in thought, but the difference is one of kind and\nnot of degree. The vital transcends the mechanical, and the psychic\ntranscends the vital--is on another plane, and yet without the sun's\nenergy there could be neither. Thus are things knit together; thus does\none thing flow out of or bloom out of another. We date from the rocks,\nand the rocks date from the fiery nebulae, and the loom in which the\ntexture of our lives was woven is the great loom of vital energy about\nus and in us; but what hand guided the shuttle and invented the\npattern--who knows?\n\n\n\n\nIII\n\nA WONDERFUL WORLD\n\n\nI\n\nScience recognizes a more fundamental world than that of matter. This is\nthe electro-magnetic world which underlies the material world and which,\nas Professor Soddy says, probably completely embraces it, and has no\nmechanical analogy. To those accustomed only to the grosser ideas of\nmatter and its motions, says the British scientist, this\nelectro-magnetic world is as difficult to conceive of as it would be for\nus to walk upon air. Yet many times in our lives is this world in\noverwhelming evidence before us. During a thunderstorm we get an inkling\nof how fearfully and wonderfully the universe in which we live is made,\nand what energy and activity its apparent passivity and opacity mark. A\nflash of lightning out of a storm-cloud seems instantly to transform the\nwhole passive universe into a terrible living power. This slow, opaque,\nindifferent matter about us and above us, going its silent or noisy\nround of mechanical and chemical change, ponderable, insensate,\nobstructive, slumbering in the rocks, quietly active in the soil, gently\nrustling in the trees, sweetly purling in the brooks, slowly, invisibly\nbuilding and shaping our bodies--how could we ever dream that it held in\nleash such a terrible, ubiquitous, spectacular thing as this of the\nforked lightning? If we were to see and hear it for the first time,\nshould we not think that the Judgment Day had really come? that the\ngreat seals of the Book of Fate were being broken?\n\nWhat an awakening it is! what a revelation! what a fearfully dramatic\nactor suddenly leaps upon the stage! Had we been permitted to look\nbehind the scenes, we could not have found him; he was not there, except\npotentially; he was born and equipped in a twinkling. One stride, and\none word which shakes the house, and he is gone; gone as quickly as he\ncame. Look behind the curtain and he is not there. He has vanished more\ncompletely than any stage ghost ever vanished--he has withdrawn into the\ninnermost recesses of the atomic structure of matter, and is diffused\nthrough the clouds, to be called back again, as the elemental drama\nproceeds, as suddenly as before.\n\nAll matter is charged with electricity, either actual or potential; the\nsun is hot with it, and doubtless our own heart-beats, our own thinking\nbrains, are intimately related to it; yet it is palpable and visible\nonly in this sudden and extraordinary way. It defies our analysis, it\ndefies our definitions; it is inscrutable and incomprehensible, yet it\nwill do our errands, light our houses, cook our dinners, and pull our\nloads.\n\nHow humdrum and constant and prosaic the other forces--gravity,\ncohesion, chemical affinity, and capillary attraction--seem when\ncompared with this force of forces, electricity! How deep and prolonged\nit slumbers at one time, how terribly active and threatening at another,\nbellowing through the heavens like an infuriated god seeking whom he may\ndestroy!\n\nThe warring of the elements at such times is no figure of speech. What\nhas so disturbed the peace in the electric equilibrium, as to make\npossible this sudden outburst, this steep incline in the stream of\nenergy, this ethereal Niagara pouring from heaven to earth? Is a\nthunderstorm a display of the atomic energy of which the physicists\nspeak, and which, were it available for our use, would do all the work\nof the world many times over?\n\nHow marvelous that the softest summer breeze, or the impalpable currents\nof the calmest day, can be torn asunder with such suddenness and\nviolence, by the accumulated energy that slumbers in the imaginary\natoms, as to give forth a sound like the rending of mountains or the\ndetonations of earthquakes!\n\nElectricity is the soul of matter. If Whitman's paradox is true, that\nthe soul and body are one, in the same sense the scientific paradox is\ntrue: that matter and electricity are one, and both are doubtless a\nphase of the universal ether--a reality which can be described only in\nterms of the negation of matter. In a flash of lightning we see pure\ndisembodied energy--probably that which is the main-spring of the\nuniverse. Modern science is more and more inclined to find the\nexplanation of all vital phenomena in electrical stress and change. We\nknow that an electric current will bring about chemical changes\notherwise impracticable. Nerve force, if not a form of electricity, is\nprobably inseparable from it. Chemical changes equivalent to the\ncombustion of fuel and the corresponding amount of available energy\nreleased have not yet been achieved outside of the living body without\ngreat loss. The living body makes a short cut from fuel to energy, and\nthis avoids the wasteful process of the engine. What part electricity\nplays in this process is, of course, only conjectural.\n\n\nII\n\nOur daily lives go on for the most part in two worlds, the world of\nmechanical transposition and the world of chemical transformations, but\nwe are usually conscious only of the former. This is the visible,\npalpable world of motion and change that rushes and roars around us in\nthe winds, the storms, the floods, the moving and falling bodies, and\nthe whole panorama of our material civilization; the latter is the\nworld of silent, invisible, unsleeping, and all-potent chemical\nreactions that take place all about us and is confined to the atoms and\nmolecules of matter, as the former is confined to its visible\naggregates.\n\nMechanical forces and chemical affinities rule our physical lives, and\nindirectly our psychic lives as well. When we come into the world and\ndraw our first breath, mechanics and chemistry start us on our career.\nBreathing is a mechanical, or a mechanico-vital, act; the mechanical\nprinciple involved is the same as that involved in the working of a\nbellows, but the oxidation of the blood when the air enters the lungs is\na chemical act, or a chemico-vital act. The air gives up a part of its\noxygen, which goes into the arterial circulation, and its place is taken\nby carbonic-acid gas and watery vapor. The oxygen feeds and keeps going\nthe flame of life, as literally as it feeds and keeps going the fires in\nour stoves and furnaces.\n\nHence our most constant and vital relation to the world without is a\nchemical one. We can go without food for some days, but we can exist\nwithout breathing only a few moments. Through these spongy lungs of ours\nwe lay hold upon the outward world in the most intimate and constant\nway. Through them we are rooted to the air. The air is a mechanical\nmixture of two very unlike gases--nitrogen and oxygen; one very inert,\nthe other very active. Nitrogen is like a cold-blooded, lethargic\nperson--it combines with other substances very reluctantly and with but\nlittle energy. Oxygen is just its opposite in this respect: it gives\nitself freely; it is \"Hail, fellow; well met!\" with most substances, and\nit enters into co-partnership with them on such a large scale that it\nforms nearly one half of the material of the earth's crust. This\ninvisible gas, this breath of air, through the magic of chemical\ncombination, forms nearly half the substance of the solid rocks. Deprive\nit of its affinity for carbon, or substitute nitrogen or hydrogen in its\nplace, and the air would quickly suffocate us. That changing of the dark\nvenous blood in our lungs into the bright, red, arterial blood would\ninstantly cease. Fancy the sensation of inhaling an odorless,\nnon-poisonous atmosphere that would make one gasp for breath! We should\nbe quickly poisoned by the waste of our own bodies. All things that live\nmust have oxygen, and all things that burn must have oxygen. Oxygen does\nnot burn, but it supports combustion.\n\nAnd herein is one of the mysteries of chemistry again. This support\nwhich the oxygen gives is utterly unlike any support we are acquainted\nwith in the world of mechanical forces. Oxygen supports combustion by\ncombining chemically with carbon, and the evolution of heat and light is\nthe result. And this is another mystery--this chemical union which takes\nplace in the ultimate particles of matter and which is so radically\ndifferent from a mechanical mixture. In a chemical union the atoms are\nnot simply in juxtaposition; they are, so to speak, inside of one\nanother--each has swallowed another and lost its identity, an impossible\nfeat, surely, viewed in the light of our experiences with tangible\nbodies. In the visible, mechanical world no two bodies can occupy the\nsame place at the same time, but apparently in chemistry they can and\ndo. An atom of oxygen and one of carbon, or of hydrogen, unite and are\nlost in each other; it is a marriage wherein the two or three become\none. In dealing with the molecules and atoms of matter we are in a world\nwherein the laws of solid bodies do not apply; friction is abolished,\nelasticity is perfect, and place and form play no part. We have escaped\nfrom matter as we know it, the solid, fluid, or gaseous forms, and are\ndealing with it in its fourth or ethereal estate. In breathing, the\noxygen goes into the blood, not to stay there, but to unite with and\nbring away the waste of the system in the shape of carbon, and re-enter\nthe air again as one of the elements of carbonic-acid gas, CO_{2}. Then\nthe reverse process takes place in the vegetable world, the leaves\nbreathe this poisonous gas, release the oxygen under the chemistry of\nthe sun's rays, and appropriate and store up the carbon. Thus do the\nanimal and vegetable worlds play into each other's hands. The animal is\ndependent upon the vegetable for its carbon, which it releases again,\nthrough the life processes, as carbonic-acid gas, to be again drawn into\nthe cycle of vegetable life.\n\nThe act of breathing well illustrates our mysterious relations to\nNature--the cunning way in which she plays the principal part in our\nlives without our knowledge. How certain we are that we draw the air\ninto our lungs--that we seize hold of it in some way as if it were a\ncontinuous substance, and pull it into our bodies! Are we not also\ncertain that the pump sucks the water up through the pipe, and that we\nsuck our iced drinks through a straw? We are quite unconscious of the\nfact that the weight of the superincumbent air does it all, that\nbreathing is only to a very limited extent a voluntary act. It is\ncontrolled by muscular machinery, but that machinery would not act in a\nvacuum. We contract the diaphragm, or the diaphragm contracts under\nstimuli received through the medulla oblongata from those parts of the\nbody which constantly demand oxygen, and a vacuum tends to form in the\nchest, which is constantly prevented by the air rushing in to fill it.\nThe expansive force of the air under its own weight causes the lungs to\nfill, just as it causes the bellows of the blacksmith to fill when he\nworks the lever, and the water to rise in the pump when we force out the\nair by working the handle. Another unconscious muscular effort under the\ninfluence of nerve stimulus, and the air is forced out of the lungs,\ncharged with the bodily waste which it is the function to relieve. But\nthe wonder of it all is how slight a part our wills play in the process,\nand how our lives are kept going by a mechanical force from without,\nseconded or supplemented by chemical and vital forces from within.\n\nThe one chemical process with which we are familiar all our lives, but\nwhich we never think of as such, is fire. Here on our own hearthstones\ngoes on this wonderful spectacular and beneficent transformation of\nmatter and energy, and yet we are grown so familiar with it that it\nmoves us not. We can describe combustion in terms of chemistry, just as\nwe can describe the life-processes in similar terms, yet the mystery is\nno more cleared up in the one case than in the other. Indeed, it seems\nto me that next to the mystery of life is the mystery of fire. The\noxidizing processes are identical, only one is a building up or\nintegrating process, and the other is a pulling down or disintegrating\nprocess. More than that, we can evoke fire any time, by both mechanical\nand chemical means, from the combustible matter about us; but we cannot\nevoke life. The equivalents of life do not slumber in our tools as do\nthe equivalents of fire. Hence life is the deeper mystery. The ancients\nthought of a spirit of fire as they did of a spirit of health and of\ndisease, and of good and bad spirits all about them, and as we think of\na spirit of life, or of a creative life principle. Are we as wide of\nthe mark as they were? So think many earnest students of living things.\nWhen we do not have to pass the torch of life along, but can kindle it\nin our laboratories, then this charge will assume a different aspect.\n\n\nIII\n\nNature works with such simple means! A little more or a little less of\nthis or that, and behold the difference! A little more or a little less\nheat, and the face of the world is changed.\n\n    \"And the little more, and how much it is,\n    And the little less, and what worlds away!\"\n\nAt one temperature water is solid, at another it is fluid, at another it\nis a visible vapor, at a still higher it is an invisible vapor that\nburns like a flame. All possible shades of color lurk in a colorless ray\nof light. A little more or a little less heat makes all the difference\nbetween a nebula and a sun, and between a sun and a planet. At one\ndegree of heat the elements are dissociated; at a lower degree they are\nunited. At one point in the scale of temperatures life appears; at\nanother it disappears. With heat enough the earth would melt like a\nsnowball in a furnace, with still more it would become a vapor and float\naway like a cloud. More or less heat only makes the difference between\nthe fluidity of water and the solidity of the rocks that it beats\nagainst, or of the banks that hold it.\n\nThe physical history of the universe is written in terms of heat and\nmotion. Astronomy is the story of cooling suns and worlds. At a low\nenough temperature all chemical activity ceases. In our own experience\nwe find that frost will blister like flame. In the one case heat passes\ninto the tissues so quickly and in such quantity that a blister ensues;\nin the other, heat is abstracted so quickly and in such quantity that a\nlike effect is produced. In one sense, life is a thermal phenomenon; so\nare all conditions of fluids and solids thermal phenomena.\n\nGreat wonders Nature seems to achieve by varying the arrangement of the\nsame particles. Arrange or unite the atoms of carbon in one way and you\nhave charcoal; assemble the same atoms in another order, and you have\nthe diamond. The difference between the pearl and the oyster-shell that\nholds it is one of structure or arrangement of the same particles of\nmatter. Arrange the atoms of silica in one way and you have a quartz\npebble, in another way and you have a precious stone. The chemical\nconstituents of alcohol and ether are the same; the difference in their\nqualities and properties arises from the way the elements are\ncompounded--the way they take hold of hands, so to speak, in that\nmarriage ceremony which constitutes a chemical compound. Compounds\nidentical in composition and in molecular formulae may yet differ widely\nin physical properties; the elements are probably grouped in different\nways, the atoms of carbon or of hydrogen probably carry different\namounts of potential energy, so that the order in which they stand\nrelated to one another accounts for the different properties of the same\nchemical compounds. Different groupings of the same atoms of any of the\nelements result in a like difference of physical properties.\n\nThe physicists tell us that what we call the qualities of things, and\ntheir structure and composition, are but the expressions of internal\natomic movements. A complex substance simply means a whirl, an intricate\ndance, of which chemical composition, histological structure, and gross\nconfiguration are the figures. How the atoms take hold of hands, as it\nwere, the way they face, the poses they assume, the speed of their\ngyrations, the partners they exchange, determine the kinds of phenomena\nwe are dealing with.\n\nThere is a striking analogy between the letters of our alphabet and\ntheir relation to the language of the vast volume of printed books, and\nthe eighty or more primary elements and their relation to the vast\nuniverse of material things. The analogy may not be in all respects a\nstrictly true one, but it is an illuminating one. Our twenty-six letters\ncombined and repeated in different orders give us the many thousand\nwords our language possesses, and these words combined and repeated in\ndifferent orders give us the vast body of printed books in our\nlibraries. The ultimate parts--the atoms and molecules of all\nliterature, so to speak--are the letters of the alphabet. How often by\nchanging a letter in a word, by reversing their order, or by\nsubstituting one letter for another, we get a word of an entirely\ndifferent meaning, as in umpire and empire, petrifaction and\nputrefaction, malt and salt, tool and fool. And by changing the order of\nthe words in a sentence we express all the infinite variety of ideas and\nmeanings that the books of the world hold.\n\nThe eighty or more primordial elements are Nature's alphabet with which\nshe writes her \"infinite book of secrecy.\" Science shows pretty\nconclusively that the character of the different substances, their\ndiverse qualities and properties, depend upon the order in which the\natoms and molecules are combined. Change the order in which the\nmolecules of the carbon and oxygen are combined in alcohol, and we get\nether--the chemical formula remaining the same. Or take ordinary spirits\nof wine and add four more atoms of carbon to the carbon molecules, and\nwe have the poison, carbolic acid. Pure alcohol is turned into a deadly\npoison by taking from it one atom of carbon and two of hydrogen. With\nthe atoms of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, by combining them in\ndifferent proportions and in different orders, Nature produces such\ndiverse bodies as acetic acid, alcohol, sugar, starch, animal fats,\nvegetable oils, glycerine, and the like. So with the long list of\nhydrocarbons--gaseous, liquid, and solid--called paraffins, that are\nobtained from petroleum and that are all composed of hydrogen and\ncarbon, but with a different number of atoms of each, like a different\nnumber of a's or b's or c's in a word.\n\nWhat an enormous number of bodies Nature forms out of oxygen by uniting\nit chemically with other primary elements! Thus by uniting it with the\nelement silica she forms half of the solid crust of the globe; by\nuniting it with hydrogen in the proportion of two to one she forms all\nthe water of the globe. With one atom of nitrogen united chemically with\nthree atoms of hydrogen she forms ammonia. With one atom of carbon\nunited with four atoms of hydrogen she spells marsh gas; and so on.\nCarbon occurs in inorganic nature in two crystalline forms,--the diamond\nand black lead, or graphite,--their physical differences evidently being\nthe result of their different molecular structure. Graphite is a good\nconductor of heat and electricity, and the diamond is not. Carbon in the\norganic world, where it plays such an important part, is\nnon-crystalline. Under the influence of life its molecules are\ndifferently put together, as in sugar, starch, wood, charcoal, etc.\nThere are also two forms of phosphorus, but not two kinds; the same\natoms are probably united differently in each. The yellow waxy variety\nhas such an affinity for oxygen that it will burn in water, and it is\npoisonous. Bring this variety to a high temperature away from the air,\nand its molecular structure seems to change, and we have the red\nvariety, which is tasteless, odorless, and non-poisonous, and is not\naffected by contact with the air. Such is the mystery of chemical\nchange.\n\n\nIV\n\nScience has developed methods and implements of incredible delicacy. Its\n\"microbalance\" can estimate \"the difference of weight of the order of\nthe millionth of a milligram.\" Light travels at the speed of 186,000\nmiles a second, yet science can follow it with its methods, and finds\nthat it travels faster with the current of running water than against\nit. Science has perfected a thermal instrument by which it can detect\nthe heat of a lighted candle six miles away, and the warmth of the human\nface several miles distant. It has devised a method by which it can\ncount the particles in the alpha rays of radium that move at a velocity\nof twenty thousand kilometers a second, and a method by which, through\nthe use of a screen of zinc-sulphide, it can see the flashes produced by\nthe alpha atoms when they strike this screen. It weighs and counts and\ncalculates the motions of particles of matter so infinitely small that\nonly the imagination can grasp them. Its theories require it to treat\nthe ultimate particles into which it resolves matter, and which are so\nsmall that they are no longer divisible, as if they were solid bodies\nwith weight and form, with centre and circumference, colliding with one\nanother like billiard-balls, or like cosmic bodies in the depths of\nspace, striking one another squarely, and, for aught I know, each going\nthrough another, or else grazing one another and glancing off. To\nparticles of matter so small that they can no longer be divided or made\nsmaller, the impossible feat of each going through the centre of\nanother, or of each enveloping the other, might be affirmed of them\nwithout adding to their unthinkableness. The theory is that if we divide\na molecule of water the parts are no longer water, but atoms of hydrogen\nand oxygen--real bodies with weight and form, and storehouses of energy,\nbut no longer divisible.\n\nIndeed, the atomic theory of matter leads us into a non-material world,\nor a world the inverse of the solid, three-dimensioned world that our\nsenses reveal to us, or to matter in a fourth estate. We know solids and\nfluids and gases; but emanations which are neither we know only as we\nknow spirits and ghosts--by dreams or hearsay. Yet this fourth or\nethereal estate of matter seems to be the final, real, and fundamental\ncondition.\n\nHow it differs from spirit is not easy to define. The beta ray of radium\nwill penetrate solid iron a foot thick, a feat that would give a spirit\npause. The ether of space, which science is coming more and more to look\nupon as the mother-stuff of all things, has many of the attributes of\nDeity. It is omnipresent and all-powerful. Neither time nor space has\ndominion over it. It is the one immutable and immeasurable thing in the\nuniverse. From it all things arise and to it they return. It is\neverywhere and nowhere. It has none of the finite properties of\nmatter--neither parts, form, nor dimension; neither density nor tenuity;\nit cannot be compressed nor expanded nor moved; it has no inertia nor\nmass, and offers no resistance; it is subject to no mechanical laws, and\nno instrument or experiment that science has yet devised can detect its\npresence; it has neither centre nor circumference, neither extension nor\nboundary. And yet science is as convinced of its existence as of the\nsolid ground beneath our feet. It is the one final reality in the\nuniverse, if we may not say that it is the universe. Tremors or\nvibrations in it reach the eye and make an impression that we call\nlight; electrical oscillations in it are the source of other phenomena.\nIt is the fountain-head of all potential energy. The ether is an\ninvention of the scientific imagination. We had to have it to account\nfor light, gravity, and the action of one body upon another at a\ndistance, as well as to account for other phenomena. The ether is not a\nbody, it is a medium. All bodies are in motion; matter moves; the ether\nis in a state of absolute rest. Says Sir Oliver Lodge, \"The ether is\nstrained, and has the property of exerting strain and recoil.\" An\nelectron is like a knot in the ether. The ether is the fluid of fluids,\nyet its tension or strain is so great that it is immeasurably more dense\nthan anything else--a phenomenon that may be paralleled by a jet of\nwater at such speed that it cannot be cut with a sword or severed by a\nhammer. It is so subtle or imponderable that solid bodies are as vacuums\nto it, and so pervasive that all conceivable space is filled with it;\n\"so full,\" says Clerk Maxwell, \"that no human power can remove it from\nthe smallest portion of space, or produce the slightest flaw in its\ninfinite continuity.\"\n\nThe scientific imagination, in its attempts to master the workings of\nthe material universe, has thus given us a creation which in many of its\nattributes rivals Omnipotence. It is the sum of all contradictions, and\nthe source of all reality. The gross matter which we see and feel is one\nstate of it; electricity, which is without form and void, is another\nstate of it; and our minds and souls, Sir Oliver Lodge intimates, may be\nstill another state of it. But all these theories of physical science\nare justified by their fruits. The atomic theory of matter, and the\nkinetic theory of gases, are mathematically demonstrated. However unreal\nand fantastic they may appear to our practical faculties, conversant\nonly with ponderable bodies, they bear the test of the most rigid and\nexact experimentation.\n\n\nV\n\nAfter we have marveled over all these hidden things, and been impressed\nby the world within world of the material universe, do we get any nearer\nto the mystery of life? Can we see where the tremendous change from the\nnon-living to the living takes place? Can we evoke life from the\nomnipotent ether, or see it arise in the whirling stream of atoms and\nelectrons? Molecular science opens up to us a world where the infinitely\nlittle matches the infinitely great, where matter is dematerialized and\nanswers to many of the conceptions of spirit; but does it bring us any\nnearer the origin of life? Is radio-active matter any nearer living\nmatter than is the clod under foot? Are the darting electrons any more\nvital than the shooting-stars? Can a flash of radium emanations on a\nzinc-sulphide plate kindle the precious spark? It is probably just as\npossible to evoke vitality out of the clash of billiard-balls as out of\nthe clash of atoms and electrons. This allusion to billiard-balls\nrecalls to my mind a striking passage from Tyndall's famous Belfast\nAddress which he puts in the mouth of Bishop Butler in his imaginary\nargument with Lucretius, and which shows how thoroughly Tyndall\nappreciated the difficulties of his own position in advocating the\ntheory of the physico-chemical origin of life.\n\nThe atomic and electronic theory of matter admits one to a world that\ndoes indeed seem unreal and fantastic. \"If my bark sinks,\" says the\npoet, \"'t is to another sea.\" If the mind breaks through what we call\ngross matter, and explores its interior, it finds itself indeed in a\nvast under or hidden world--a world almost as much a creation of the\nimagination as that visited by Alice in Wonderland, except that the\nexistence of this world is capable of demonstration. It is a world of\nthe infinitely little which science interprets in terms of the\ninfinitely large. Sir Oliver Lodge sees the molecular spaces that\nseparate the particles of any material body relatively like the\ninterstellar spaces that separate the heavenly bodies. Just as all the\nso-called solid matter revealed by our astronomy is almost infinitesimal\ncompared with the space through which it is distributed, so the\nelectrons which compose the matter with which we deal are comparable to\nthe bodies of the solar system moving in vast spaces. It is indeed a\nfantastic world where science conceives of bodies a thousand times\nsmaller than the hydrogen atom--the smallest body known to science;\nwhere it conceives of vibrations in the ether millions of millions times\na second; where we are bombarded by a shower of corpuscles from a\nburning candle, or a gas-jet, or a red-hot iron surface, moving at the\nspeed of one hundred thousand miles a second! But this almost omnipotent\nether has, after all, some of the limitations of the finite. It takes\ntime to transmit the waves of light from the sun and the stars. This\nmeasurable speed, says Sir Oliver Lodge, gives the ether away, and shows\nits finite character.\n\nIt seems as if the theory of the ether must be true, because it fits in\nso well with the enigmatic, contradictory, incomprehensible character of\nthe universe as revealed to our minds. We can affirm and deny almost\nanything of the ether--that it is immaterial, and yet the source of all\nmaterial; that it is absolutely motionless, yet the cause of all motion;\nthat it is the densest body in nature, and yet the most rarified; that\nit is everywhere, but defies detection; that it is as undiscoverable as\nthe Infinite itself; that our physics cannot prove it, though they\ncannot get along without it. The ether inside a mass of iron or of lead\nis just as dense as the ether outside of it--which means that it is not\ndense at all, in our ordinary use of the term.\n\n\nVI\n\nThere are physical changes in matter, there are chemical changes, and\nthere is a third change, as unlike either of these as they are unlike\neach other. I refer to atomic change, as in radio-activity, which gives\nus lead from helium--a spontaneous change of the atoms. The energy that\nkeeps the earth going, says Soddy, is to be sought for in the individual\natoms; not in the great heaven-shaking voice of thunder, but in the\nstill small voice of the atoms. Radio-activity is the mainspring of the\nuniverse. The only elements so far known that undergo spontaneous change\nare uranium and thorium. One pound of uranium contains and slowly gives\nout the same amount of energy that a hundred tons of coal evolves in its\ncombustion, but only one ten-billionth part of this amount is given out\nevery year.\n\nMan, of course, reaps where he has not sown. How could it be otherwise?\nIt takes energy to sow or plant energy. We are exhausting the coal, the\nnatural gas, the petroleum of the rocks, the fertility of the soil. But\nwe cannot exhaust the energy of the winds or the tides, or of falling\nwater, because this energy is ever renewed by gravity and the sun. There\ncan be no exhaustion of our natural mechanical and chemical resources,\nas some seem to fear.\n\nI recently visited a noted waterfall in the South where electric power\nis being developed on a large scale. A great column of water makes a\nvertical fall of six hundred feet through a steel tube, and in the fall\ndevelops two hundred and fifty thousand horse-power. The water comes out\nof the tunnel at the bottom, precisely the same water that went in at\nthe top; no change whatever has occurred in it, yet a vast amount of\npower has been taken out of it, or, rather, generated by its fall.\nAnother drop of six hundred feet would develop as much more; in fact,\nthe process may be repeated indefinitely, the same amount of power\nresulting each time, without effecting any change in the character of\nthe water. The pull of gravity is the source of the power which is\ndistributed hundreds of miles across the country as electricity. Two\nhundred and fifty thousand invisible, immaterial, noiseless horses are\nstreaming along these wires with incredible speed to do the work of men\nand horses in widely separated parts of the country. A river of sand\nfalling down those tubes, if its particles moved among themselves with\nthe same freedom that those of the water do, would develop the same\npower. The attraction of gravitation is not supposed to be electricity,\nand yet here out of its pull upon the water comes this enormous voltage!\nThe fact that such a mysterious and ubiquitous power as electricity can\nbe developed from the action of matter without any alteration in its\nparticles, suggests the question whether or not this something that we\ncall life, or life-force, may not slumber in matter in the same way; but\nthe secret of its development we have not yet learned, as we have that\nof electricity.\n\nRadio-activity is uninfluenced by external conditions; hence we are thus\nfar unable to control it. Nothing that is known will effect the\ntransmutation of one element into another. It is spontaneous and\nuncontrollable. May not life be spontaneous in the same sense?\n\nThe release of the energy associated with the structure of the atoms is\nnot available by any of our mechanical appliances. The process of\nradio-activity involves the expulsion of atoms of helium with a velocity\nthree hundred times greater than that ever previously known for any\nmaterial mass or particle, and this power we are incompetent to use. The\natoms remain unchanged amid the heat and pressure of the laboratory of\nnature. Iron and oxygen and so forth remain the same in the sun as here\non the earth.\n\nScience strips gross matter of its grossness. When it is done with it,\nit is no longer the obstructive something we know and handle; it is\nreduced to pure energy--the line between it and spirit does not exist.\nWe have found that bodies are opaque only to certain rays; the X-ray\nsees through this too too solid flesh. Bodies are ponderable only to our\ndull senses; to a finer hand than this the door or the wall might offer\nno obstruction; a finer eye than this might see the emanations from the\nliving body; a finer ear might hear the clash of electrons in the air.\nWho can doubt, in view of what we already know, that forces and\ninfluences from out the heavens above, and from the earth beneath, that\nare beyond our ken, play upon us constantly?\n\nThe final mystery of life is no doubt involved in conditions and forces\nthat are quite outside of or beyond our conscious life activities, in\nforces that play about us and upon and through us, that we know not of,\nbecause a knowledge of them is not necessary to our well-being. \"Our\neye takes in only an octave of the vibrations we call light,\" because no\nmore is necessary for our action or our dealing with things. The\ninvisible rays of the spectrum are potent, but they are beyond the ken\nof our senses. There are sounds or sound vibrations that we do not hear;\nour sense of touch cannot recognize a gossamer, or the gentler air\nmovements.\n\nI began with the contemplation of the beauty and terror of the\nthunderbolt--\"God's autograph,\" as one of our poets (Joel Benton) said,\n\"written upon the sky.\" Let me end with an allusion to another aspect of\nthe storm that has no terror in it--the bow in the clouds: a sudden\napparition, a cosmic phenomenon no less wonderful and startling than the\nlightning's flash. The storm with terror and threatened destruction on\none side of it, and peace and promise on the other! The bow appears like\na miracle, but it is a commonplace of nature; unstable as life, and\nbeautiful as youth. The raindrops are not changed, the light is not\nchanged, the laws of the storms are not changed; and yet, behold this\nwonder!\n\nBut all these strange and beautiful phenomena springing up in a world of\ninert matter are but faint symbols of the mystery and the miracle of the\nchange of matter from the non-living to the living, from the elements in\nthe clod to the same elements in the brain and heart of man.\n\n\n\n\nIV\n\nTHE BAFFLING PROBLEM\n\n\nI\n\nStill the problem of living things haunts my mind and, let me warn my\nreader, will continue to haunt it throughout the greater part of this\nvolume. The final truth about it refuses to be spoken. Every effort to\ndo so but gives one new evidence of how insoluble the problem is.\n\nIn this world of change is there any other change to be compared with\nthat in matter, from the dead to the living?--a change so great that\nmost minds feel compelled to go outside of matter and invoke some\nsuper-material force or agent to account for it. The least of living\nthings is so wonderful, the phenomena it exhibits are so fundamentally\nunlike those of inert matter, that we invent a word for it, _vitality_;\nand having got the word, we conceive of a vital force or principle to\nexplain vital phenomena. Hence vitalism--a philosophy of living things,\nmore or less current in the world from Aristotle's time down to our own.\nIt conceives of something in nature super-mechanical and super-chemical,\nthough inseparably bound up with these things. There is no life without\nmaterial and chemical forces, but material and chemical forces do not\nhold the secret of life. This is vitalism as opposed to mechanism, or\nscientific materialism, which is the doctrine of the all-sufficiency of\nthe physical forces operating in the inorganic world to give rise to all\nthe phenomena of the organic world--a doctrine coming more and more in\nvogue with the progress of physical science. Without holding to any\nbelief in the supernatural or the teleological, and while adhering to\nthe idea that there has been, and can be, no break in the causal\nsequence in this world, may one still hold to some form of vitalism, and\nsee in life something more than applied physics and chemistry?\n\nIs biology to be interpreted in the same physical and chemical terms as\ngeology? Are biophysics and geophysics one and the same? One may freely\nadmit that there cannot be two kinds of physics, nor two kinds of\nchemistry--not one kind for a rock, and another kind for a tree, or a\nman. There are not two species of oxygen, nor two of carbon, nor two of\nhydrogen and nitrogen--one for living and one for dead matter. The water\nin the human body is precisely the same as the water that flows by in\nthe creek or that comes down when it rains; and the sulphur and the lime\nand the iron and the phosphorus and the magnesium are identical, so far\nas chemical analysis can reveal, in the organic and the inorganic\nworlds. But are we not compelled to think of a kind of difference\nbetween a living and a non-living body that we cannot fit into any of\nthe mechanical or chemical concepts that we apply to the latter?\nProfessor Loeb, with his \"Mechanistic Conception of Life\"; Professor\nHenderson, of Harvard, with his \"Fitness of the Environment\"; Professor\nLe Dantec, of the Sorbonne in Paris, with his volume on \"The Nature and\nOrigin of Life,\" published a few years since; Professor Schaefer,\nPresident of the British Association, Professor Verworn of Bonn, and\nmany others find in the laws and properties of matter itself a\nsufficient explanation of all the phenomena of life. They look upon the\nliving body as only the sum of its physical and chemical activities;\nthey do not seem to feel the need of accounting for life itself--for\nthat something which confers vitality upon the heretofore non-vital\nelements. That there is new behavior, that there are new chemical\ncompounds called organic,--tens of thousands of them not found in\ninorganic nature,--that there are new processes set up in aggregates of\nmatter,--growth, assimilation, metabolism, reproduction, thought,\nemotion, science, civilization,--no one denies.\n\nHow are we going to get these things out of the old physics and\nchemistry without some new factor or agent or force? To help ourselves\nout here with a \"vital principle,\" or with spirit, or a creative\nimpulse, as Bergson does, seems to be the only course open to certain\ntypes of mind. Positive science cannot follow us in this step, because\nscience is limited to the verifiable. The stream of forces with which it\ndeals is continuous; it must find the physical equivalents of all the\nforces that go into the body in the output of the body, and it cannot\nadmit of a life force which it cannot trace to the physical forces.\n\nWhat has science done to clear up this mystery of vitality? Professor\nLoeb, our most eminent experimental biologist, has succeeded in\nfertilizing the eggs of some low forms of sea life by artificial means;\nand in one instance, at least, it is reported that the fatherless form\ngrew to maturity. This is certainly an interesting fact, but takes us no\nnearer the solution of the mystery of vitality than the fact that\ncertain chemical compounds may stimulate the organs of reproduction\nhelps to clear up the mystery of generation; or the fact that certain\nother chemical compounds help the digestive and assimilative processes\nand further the metabolism of the body assists in clearing up the\nmystery that attaches to these things. In all such cases we have the\nliving body to begin with. The egg of the sea-urchin and the egg of the\njelly-fish are living beings that responded to certain chemical\nsubstances, so that a process is set going in their cell life that is\nequivalent to fertilization. It seems to me that the result of all\nProfessor Loeb's valuable inquiries is only to give us a more intimate\nsense of how closely mechanical and chemical principles are associated\nand identified with all the phenomena of life and with all animal\nbehavior. Given a living organism, mechanics and chemistry will then\nexplain much of its behavior--practically all the behavior of the lower\norganisms, and much of that of the higher. Even when we reach man, our\nreactions to the environment and to circumstances play a great part in\nour lives; but dare we say that will, liberty of choice, ideation, do\nnot play a part also? How much reality there is in the so-called animal\nwill, is a problem; but that there is a foundation for our belief in the\nreality of the human will, I, for one, do not for a moment doubt. The\ndiscontinuity here is only apparent and not real. We meet with the same\nbreak when we try to get our mental states, our power of thought--a\npoem, a drama, a work of art, a great oration--out of the food we eat;\nbut life does it, though our science is none the wiser for it. Our\nphysical life forms a closed circle, science says, and what goes into\nour bodies as physical force, must come out in physical force, or as\nsome of its equivalents. Well, one of the equivalents, transformed by\nsome unknown chemism within us, is our psychic force, or states of\nconsciousness. The two circles, the physical and the psychical, are not\nconcentric, as Fiske fancied, but are linked in some mysterious way.\n\nProfessor Loeb is a master critic of the life processes; he and his\ncompeers analyze them as they have never been analyzed before; but the\nsolution of the great problem of life that we are awaiting does not\ncome. A critic may resolve all of Shakespeare's plays into their\nhistoric and other elements, but that will not account for Shakespeare.\nNature's synthesis furnishes occasions for our analysis. Most assuredly\nall psychic phenomena have a physical basis; we know the soul only\nthrough the body; but that they are all of physico-chemical origin, is\nanother matter.\n\n\nII\n\nBiological science has hunted the secret of vitality like a detective;\nand it has done some famous work; but it has not yet unraveled the\nmystery. It knows well the part played by carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen\nin organic chemistry, that without water and carbon dioxide there could\nbe no life; it knows the part played by light, air, heat, gravity,\nosmosis, chemical affinity, and all the hundreds or thousands of organic\ncompounds; it knows the part played by what are called the enzymes, or\nferments, in all living bodies, but it does not know the secret of these\nferments; it knows the part played by colloids, or jelly-like compounds,\nthat there is no living body without colloids, though there are colloid\nbodies that are not living; it knows the part played by oxidation, that\nwithout it a living body ceases to function, though everywhere all about\nus is oxidation without life; it knows the part played by chlorophyll in\nthe vegetable kingdom, and yet how chlorophyll works such magic upon the\nsun's rays, using the solar energy to fix the carbon of carbonic acid in\nthe air, and thereby storing this energy as it is stored in wood and\ncoal and in much of the food we consume, is a mystery. Chemistry cannot\nrepeat the process in its laboratories. The fungi do not possess this\nwonderful chlorophyllian power, and hence cannot use the sunbeam to\nsnatch their carbon from the air; they must get it from decomposed\nvegetable matter; they feed, as the animals do, upon elements that have\ngone through the cycle of vegetable life. The secret of vegetable life,\nthen, is in the green substance of the leaf where science is powerless\nto unlock it. Conjure with the elements as it may, it cannot produce the\nleast speck of living matter. It can by synthesis produce many of the\norganic compounds, but only from matter that has already been through\nthe organic cycle. It has lately produced rubber, but from other\nproducts of vegetable life.\n\nAs soon as the four principal elements, carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, and\nnitrogen, that make up the living body, have entered the world of living\nmatter, their activities and possible combinations enormously increase;\nthey enter into new relations with one another and form compounds of\ngreat variety and complexity, characterized by the instability which\nlife requires. The organic compounds are vastly more sensitive to light\nand heat and air than are the same elements in the inorganic world. What\nhas happened to them? Chemistry cannot tell us. Oxidation, which is only\nslow combustion, is the main source of energy in the body, as it is in\nthe steam-engine. The storing of the solar energy, which occurs only in\nthe vegetable, is by a process of reduction, that is, the separation of\nthe carbon and oxygen in carbonic acid and water. The chemical reactions\nwhich liberate energy in the body are slow; in dead matter they are\nrapid and violent, or explosive and destructive. It is the chemistry in\nthe leaf of the plant that diverts or draws the solar energy into the\nstream of life, and how it does it is a mystery.\n\nThe scientific explanations of life phenomena are all after the fact;\nthey do not account for the fact; they start with the ready-made\norganism and then reduce its activities and processes to their physical\nequivalents. Vitality is given, and then the vital processes are fitted\ninto mechanical and chemical concepts, or into moulds derived from inert\nmatter--not a difficult thing to do, but no more an explanation of the\nmystery of vitality than a painting or a marble bust of Tyndall would be\nan explanation of that great scientist.\n\nAll Professor Loeb's experiments and criticisms throw light upon the\nlife processes, or upon the factors that take part in them, but not upon\nthe secret of the genesis of the processes themselves. Amid all the\nactivities of his mechanical and chemical factors, there is ever present\na factor which he ignores, which his analytical method cannot seize;\nnamely, what Verworn calls \"the specific energy of living substance.\"\nWithout this, chemism and mechanism would work together to quite other\nends. The water in the wave, and the laws that govern it, do not differ\nat all from the water and its laws that surround it; but unless one\ntakes into account the force that makes the wave, an analysis of the\nphenomena will leave one where he began.\n\nProfessor Le Dantec leaves the subject where he took it up, with the\norigin of life and the life processes unaccounted for. His work is a\ndescription, and not an explanation. All our ideas about vitality, or an\nunknown factor in the organic world, he calls \"mystic\" and unscientific.\nA sharp line of demarcation between living and non-living bodies is not\npermissible. This, he says, is the anthropomorphic error which puts some\nmysterious quality or force in all bodies considered to be living. To Le\nDantec, the difference between the quick and the dead is of the same\norder as the difference which exists between two chemical compounds--for\nexample, as that which exists between alcohol and an aldehyde, a liquid\nthat has two less atoms of hydrogen in its composition. Modify your\nchemistry a little, add or subtract an atom or two, more or less, of\nthis or that gas, and dead matter thrills into life, or living matter\nsinks to the inert. In other words, life is the gift of chemistry, its\nparticular essence is of the chemical order--a bold inference from the\nfact that there is no life without chemical reactions, no life without\noxidation. Yet chemical reactions in the laboratory cannot produce life.\nWith Le Dantec, biology, like geology and astronomy, is only applied\nmechanics and chemistry.\n\n\nIII\n\nSuch is the result of the rigidly objective study of life--the only\nmethod analytical science can pursue. The conception of vitality as a\nfactor in itself answers to nothing that the objective study of life can\ndisclose; such a study reveals a closed circle of physical forces,\nchemical and mechanical, into which no immaterial force or principle can\nfind entrance. \"The fact of being conscious,\" Le Dantec says with\nemphasis, \"does not intervene in the slightest degree in directing vital\nmovements.\" But common sense and everyday observation tell us that\nstates of consciousness do influence the bodily processes--influence the\ncirculation, the digestion, the secretions, the respiration.\n\nAn objective scientific study of a living body yields results not\nunlike those which we might get from an objective study of a book\nconsidered as something fabricated--its materials, its construction, its\ntypography, its binding, the number of its chapters and pages, and so\non--without giving any heed to the meaning of the book--its ideas, the\nhuman soul and personality that it embodies, the occasion that gave rise\nto it, indeed all its subjective and immaterial aspects. All these\nthings, the whole significance of the volume, would elude scientific\nanalysis. It would seem to be a manufactured article, representing only\nso much mechanics and chemistry. It is the same with the living body.\nUnless we permit ourselves to go behind the mere facts, the mere\nmechanics and chemistry of life phenomena, and interpret them in the\nlight of immaterial principles, in short, unless we apply some sort of\nphilosophy to them, the result of our analysis will be but dust in our\neyes, and ashes in our mouths. Unless there is something like mind or\nintelligence pervading nature, some creative and transforming impulse\nthat cannot be defined by our mechanical concepts, then, to me, the\nwhole organic world is meaningless. If man is not more than an \"accident\nin the history of the thermic evolution of the globe,\" or the result of\nthe fortuitous juxtaposition and combination of carbonic acid gas and\nwater and a few other elements, what shall we say? It is at least a\nbewildering proposition.\n\nCould one by analyzing a hive of bees find out the secret of its\norganization--its unity as an aggregate of living insects? Behold its\nwonderful economics, its division of labor, its complex social\nstructure,--the queen, the workers, the drones,--thousands of bees\nwithout any head or code of laws or directing agent, all acting as one\nindividual, all living and working for the common good. There is no\nconfusion or cross-purpose in the hive. When the time of swarming comes,\nthey are all of one mind and the swarm comes forth. Who or what decides\nwho shall stay and who shall go? When the honey supply fails, or if it\nfail prematurely, on account of a drought, the swarming instinct is\ninhibited, and the unhatched queens are killed in their cells. Who or\nwhat issues the regicide order? We can do no better than to call it the\nSpirit of the Hive, as Maeterlinck has done. It is a community of mind.\nWhat one bee knows and feels, they all know and feel at the same\ninstant. Something like that is true of a living body; the cells are\nlike the bees: they work together, they build up the tissues and organs,\nsome are for one thing and some for another, each community of cells\nplays its own part, and they all pull together for the good of the\nwhole. We can introduce cells and even whole organs, for example a\nkidney from another living body, and all goes well; and yet we cannot\nfind the seat of the organization. Can we do any better than to call it\nthe Spirit of the Body?\n\n\nIV\n\nOur French biologist is of the opinion that the artificial production of\nthat marvel of marvels, the living cell, will yet take place in the\nlaboratory. But the enlightened mind, he says, does not need such proof\nto be convinced that there is no essential difference between living and\nnon-living matter.\n\nProfessor Henderson, though an expounder of the mechanistic theory of\nthe origin of life, admits that he does not know of a biological chemist\nto whom the \"mechanistic origin of a cell is scientifically imaginable.\"\nLike Professor Loeb, he starts with the vital; how he came by it we get\nno inkling; he confesses frankly that the biological chemist cannot even\nface the problem of the origin of life. He quotes with approval a remark\nof Liebig's, as reported by Lord Kelvin, that he (Liebig) could no more\nbelieve that a leaf or a flower could be formed or could grow by\nchemical forces \"than a book on chemistry, or on botany, could grow out\nof dead matter.\" Is not this conceding to the vitalists all that they\nclaim? The cell is the unit of life; all living bodies are but vast\nconfraternities of cells, some billions or trillions of them in the\nhuman body; the cell builds up the tissues, the tissues build up the\norgans, the organs build up the body. Now if it is not thinkable that\nchemism could beget a cell, is it any more thinkable that it could build\na living tissue, and then an organ, and then the body as a whole? If\nthere is an inscrutable something at work at the start, which organizes\nthat wonderful piece of vital mechanism, the cell, is it any the less\noperative ever after, in all life processes, in all living bodies and\ntheir functions,--the vital as distinguished from the mechanical and\nchemical? Given the cell, and you have only to multiply it, and organize\nthese products into industrial communities, and direct them to specific\nends,--certainly a task which we would not assign to chemistry or\nphysics any more than we would assign to them the production of a work\non chemistry or botany,--and you have all the myriad forms of\nterrestrial life.\n\nThe cell is the parent of every living thing on the globe; and if it is\nunthinkable that the material and irrational forces of inert matter\ncould produce it, then mechanics and chemistry must play second fiddle\nin all that whirl and dance of the atoms that make up life. And that is\nall the vitalists claim. The physico-chemical forces do play second\nfiddle; that inexplicable something that we call vitality dominates and\nleads them. True it is that a living organism yields to scientific\nanalysis only mechanical and chemical forces--a fact which only limits\nthe range of scientific analysis, and which by no means exhausts the\npossibilities of the living organism. The properties of matter and the\nlaws of matter are intimately related to life, yea, are inseparable\nfrom it, but they are by no means the whole story. Professor Henderson\nrepudiates the idea of any extra-physical influence as being involved in\nthe processes of life, and yet concedes that the very foundation of all\nliving matter, yea, the whole living universe in embryo--the cell--is\nbeyond the possibilities of physics and chemistry alone. Mechanism and\nchemism are adequate to account for astronomy and geology, and\ntherefore, he thinks, are sufficient to account for biology, without\ncalling in the aid of any Bergsonian life impulse. Still these forces\nstand impotent before that microscopic world, the cell, the foundation\nof all life.\n\nOur professor makes the provisional statement, not in obedience to his\nscience, but in obedience to his philosophy, that something more than\nmechanics and chemistry may have had a hand in shaping the universe,\nsome primordial tendency impressed upon or working in matter \"just\nbefore mechanism begins to act\"--\"a necessary and preestablished\nassociate of mechanism.\" So that if we start with the universe, with\nlife, and with this tendency, mechanism will do all the rest. But this\nis not science, of course, because it is not verifiable; it is\npractically the philosophy of Bergson.\n\nThe cast-iron conclusions of physical science do pinch the Harvard\nprofessor a bit, and he pads them with a little of the Bergsonian\nphilosophy. Bergson himself is not pinched at all by the conclusions of\npositive science. He sees that we, as human beings, cannot live in this\nuniverse without supplementing our science with some sort of philosophy\nthat will help us to escape from the fatalism of matter and force into\nthe freedom of the spiritual life. If we are merely mechanical and\nchemical accidents, all the glory of life, all the meaning of our moral\nand spiritual natures, go by the board.\n\nProfessor Henderson shows us how well this planet, with its oceans and\ncontinents, and its mechanical and chemical forces and elements, is\nsuited to sustain life, but he brings us no nearer the solution of the\nmystery than we were before. His title, to begin with, is rather\nbewildering. Has the \"fitness of the environment\" ever been questioned?\nThe environment is fit, of course, else living bodies would not be here.\nWe are used to taking hold of the other end of the problem. In living\nnature the foot is made to fit the shoe, and not the shoe the foot. The\nenvironment is the mould in which the living organism is cast. Hence, it\nseems to me, that seeking to prove the fitness of the environment is\nvery much like seeking to prove the fitness of water for fish to swim\nin, or the fitness of the air for birds to fly in. The implication seems\nto be made that the environment anticipates the organism, or meets it\nhalf way. But the environment is rather uncompromising. Man alone\nmodifies his environment by the weapon of science; but not radically; in\nthe end he has to fit himself to it. Life has been able to adjust\nitself to the universal forces and so go along with them; otherwise we\nshould not be here. We may say, humanly speaking, that the water is\nfriendly to the swimmer, if he knows how to use it; if not, it is his\ndeadly enemy. The same is true of all the elements and forces of nature.\nWhether they be for or against us, depends upon ourselves. The wind is\nnever tempered to the shorn lamb, the shorn lamb must clothe itself\nagainst the wind. Life is adaptive, and this faculty of adaptation to\nthe environment, of itself takes it out of the category of the\nphysico-chemical. The rivers and seas favor navigation, if we have\ngumption enough to use and master their forces. The air is good to\nbreathe, and food to eat, for those creatures that are adapted to them.\nBergson thinks, not without reason, that life on other planets may be\nquite different from what it is on our own, owing to a difference in\nchemical and physical conditions. Change the chemical constituents of\nsea water, and you radically change the lower organisms. With an\natmosphere entirely of oxygen, the processes of life would go on more\nrapidly and perhaps reach a higher form of development. Life on this\nplanet is limited to a certain rather narrow range of temperature; the\nspan may be the same in other worlds, but farther up or farther down the\nscale. Had the air been differently constituted, would not our lungs\nhave been different? The lungs of the fish are in his gills: he has to\nfilter his air from a much heavier medium. The nose of the pig is fitted\nfor rooting; shall we say, then, that the soil was made friable that\npigs might root in it? The webbed foot is fitted to the water; shall we\nsay, then, that water is liquid in order that geese and ducks may swim\nin it? One more atom of oxygen united to the two atoms that go to make\nthe molecule of air, and we should have had ozone instead of the air we\nnow breathe. How unsuited this would have made the air for life as we\nknow it! Oxidation would have consumed us rapidly. Life would have met\nthis extra atom by some new device.\n\nOne wishes Professor Henderson had told us more about how life fits\nitself to the environment--how matter, moved and moulded only by\nmechanical and chemical forces, yet has some power of choice that a\nmachine does not have, and can and does select the environment best\nsuited to its well-being. In fact, that it should have, or be capable\nof, any condition of well-being, if it is only a complex of physical and\nchemical forces, is a problem to wrestle with. The ground we walk on is\nsuch a complex, but only the living bodies it supports have conditions\nof well-being.\n\nProfessor Henderson concedes very little to the vitalists or the\nteleologists. He is a thorough mechanist. \"Matter and energy,\" he says,\n\"have an original property, assuredly not by chance, which organizes\nthe universe in space and time.\" Where or how matter got this organizing\nproperty, he offers no opinion. \"Given the universe, life, and the\ntendency [the tendency to organize], mechanism is inductively proved\nsufficient to account for all phenomena.\" Biology, then, is only\nmechanics and chemistry engaged in a new role without any change of\ncharacter; but what put them up to this new role? \"The whole\nevolutionary process, both cosmic and organic, is one, and the biologist\nmay now rightly regard the universe in its very essence as biocentric.\"\n\n\nV\n\nAnother Harvard voice is less pronounced in favor of the mechanistic\nconception of life. Professor Rand thinks that in a mechanically\ndetermined universe, \"our conscious life becomes a meaningless replica\nof an inexorable physical concatenation\"--the soul the result of a\nfortuitous concourse of atoms. Hence all the science and art and\nliterature and religion of the world are merely the result of a\nmolecular accident.\n\nDr. Rand himself, in wrestling with the problem of organization in a\nlate number of \"Science,\" seems to hesitate whether or not to regard man\nas a molecular accident, an appearance presented to us by the results of\nthe curious accidents of molecules--which is essentially Professor\nLoeb's view; or whether to look upon the living body as the result of a\n\"specific something\" that organizes, that is, of \"dominating organic\nagencies,\" be they psychic or super-mundane, which dominate and\ndetermine the organization of the different parts of the body into a\nwhole. Yet he is troubled with the idea that this specific something may\nbe \"nothing more than accidental chemical peculiarities of cells.\" But\nwould these accidental peculiarities be constant? Do accidents happen\nmillions of times in the same way? The cell is without variableness or\nshadow of turning. The cells are the minute people that build up all\nliving forms, and what prompts them to build a man in the one case, and\nthe man's dog in another, is the mystery that puzzles Professor Rand.\n\"Tissue cells,\" he says, \"are not structures like stone blocks\nlaboriously carved and immovably cemented in place. They are rather like\nthe local eddies in an ever-flowing and ever-changing stream of fluids.\nSubstance which was at one moment a part of a cell, passes out and a new\nsubstance enters. What is it that prevents the local whirl in this\nunstable stream from changing its form? How is it that a million muscle\ncells remain alike, collectively ready to respond to a nerve impulse?\"\nAccording to one view, expressed by Professor Rand, \"Organization is\nsomething that we read into natural phenomena. It is in itself nothing.\"\nThe alternative view holds that there is a specific organizing agent\nthat brings about the harmonious operation of all the organs and parts\nof the system--a superior dynamic force controlling and guiding all the\nindividual parts.\n\nA most determined and thorough-going attempt to hunt down the secret of\nvitality, and to determine how far its phenomena can be interpreted in\nterms of mechanics and chemistry, is to be found in Professor H. W.\nConn's volume entitled \"The Living Machine.\" Professor Conn justifies\nhis title by defining a machine as \"a piece of apparatus so designed\nthat it can change one kind of energy into another for a definite\npurpose.\" Of course the adjective \"living\" takes it out of the category\nof all mere mechanical devices and makes it super-mechanical, just as\nHaeckel's application of the word \"living\" to his inorganics (\"living\ninorganics\"), takes them out of the category of the inorganic. In every\nmachine, properly so called, all the factors are known; but do we know\nall the factors in a living body? Professor Conn applies his searching\nanalysis to most of the functions of the human body, to digestion, to\nassimilation, to circulation, to respiration, to metabolism, and so on,\nand he finds in every function something that does not fall within his\ncategory--some force not mechanical nor chemical, which he names vital.\n\nIn following the processes of digestion, all goes well with his\nchemistry and his mechanics till he comes to the absorption of\nfood-particles, or their passage through the walls of the intestines\ninto the blood. Here, the ordinary physical forces fail him, and living\nmatter comes to his aid. The inner wall of the intestine is not a\nlifeless membrane, and osmosis will not solve the mystery. There is\nsomething there that seizes hold of the droplets of oil by means of\nlittle extruded processes, and then passes them through its own body to\nexcrete them on an inner surface into the blood-vessels. \"This fat\nabsorption thus appears to be a vital process and not one simply\ncontrolled by physical forces like osmosis. Here our explanation runs\nagainst what we call 'vital power' of the ultimate elements of the\nbody.\" Professor Conn next analyzes the processes of circulation, and\nhis ready-made mechanical concepts carry him along swimmingly, till he\ntries to explain by them the beating of the heart, and the contraction\nof the small blood-vessels which regulate the blood-supply. Here comes\nin play the mysterious vital power again. He comes upon the same power\nwhen he tries to determine what it is that enables the muscle-fibre to\ntake from the lymph the material needed for its use, and to discard the\nrest. The fibre acts as if it knew what it wanted--a very unmechanical\nattribute.\n\nThen Professor Conn applies his mechanics and chemistry to the\nrespiratory process and, of course, makes out a very clear case till he\ncomes to the removal of the waste, or ash. The steam-engine cannot\nremove its own ash; the \"living machine\" can. Much of this ash takes\nthe form of urea, and \"the seizing upon the urea by the kidney cells is\na vital phenomenon.\" Is not the peristaltic movement of the bowels, by\nwhich the solid matter is removed, also a vital phenomenon? Is not the\nconception of a pipe or a tube that forces semi-fluid matter along its\nhollow interior, by the contraction of its walls, quite beyond the reach\nof mechanics? The force is as mechanical as the squeezing of the bulb of\na syringe by the hand, but in the case of the intestines, what does the\nsqueezing? The vital force?\n\nWhen the mechanical and chemical concepts are applied to the phenomena\nof the nervous system, they work very well till we come to mental\nphenomena. When we try to correlate physical energy with thought or\nconsciousness, we are at the end of our tether. Here is a gulf we cannot\nspan. The theory of the machine breaks down. Some other force than\nmaterial force is demanded here, namely, psychical,--a force or\nprinciple quite beyond the sphere of the analytic method.\n\nHence Professor Conn concludes that there are vital factors and that\nthey are the primal factors in the organism. The mechanical and chemical\nforces are the secondary factors. It is the primal factors that elude\nscientific analysis. Why a muscle contracts, or why a gland secretes, or\n\"why the oxidation of starch in the living machine gives rise to motion,\ngrowth, and reproduction, while if the oxidation occurs in the\nchemist's laboratory ... it simply gives rise to heat,\" are questions he\ncannot answer. In all his inquiries into the parts played by mechanical\nand chemical laws in the organism, he is compelled to \"assume as their\nfoundation the simple vital properties of living phenomena.\"\n\n\nVI\n\nIt should not surprise nor disturb us that the scientific interpretation\nof life leads to materialism, or to the conviction of the\nall-sufficiency of the mechanical and chemical forces of dead matter to\naccount for all living phenomena. It need not surprise us because\npositive science, as such, can deal only with physical and chemical\nforces. If there is anything in this universe besides physical and\nchemical force, science does not know it. It does not know it because it\nis absolutely beyond the reach of its analysis. When we go beyond the\nsphere of the concrete, the experimental, the verifiable, only our\nphilosophy can help us. The world within us, the world of psychic\nforces, is beyond the ken of science. It can analyze the living body,\ntrace all its vital processes, resolve them into their mechanical and\nchemical equivalents, show us the parts played by the primary elements,\nthe part played by the enzymes, or ferments, and the like, and yet it\ncannot tell us the secret of life--of that which makes organic chemistry\nso vastly different from inorganic. It discloses to us the wonders of\nthe cell--a world of mystery by itself; it analyzes the animal body into\norgans, and the organs into tissues, and the tissues into cells, but the\nsecret of organization utterly baffles it. After Professor Wilson had\nconcluded his masterly work on the cell, he was forced to admit that the\nfinal mystery of the cell eluded him, and that his investigation \"on the\nwhole seemed to widen rather than to narrow the enormous gap that\nseparates even the lowest forms of life from the inorganic world.\"\n\nAll there is outside the sphere of physical science belongs to religion,\nto philosophy, to art, to literature. Huxley spoke strictly and honestly\nas a man of science, when he related consciousness to the body, as the\nsound of a clock when it strikes is related to the machinery of the\nclock. The scientific analysis of a living body reveals nothing but the\naction of the mechanical and chemical principles. If you analyze it by\nfire or by cremation, you get gases and vapors and mineral ash, that is\nall; the main thing about the live body--its organization, its life--you\ndo not get. Of course science knows this; and to account for this\nmissing something, it philosophizes, and relegates it to the interior\nworld of molecular physics--it is all in the way the ultimate particles\nof matter were joined or compounded, were held together in the bonds of\nmolecular matrimony. What factor or agent or intelligence is active or\ndirective in this molecular marriage of the atoms, science does not\ninquire. Only philosophy can deal with that problem.\n\nWhat can science see or find in the brain of man that answers to the\nsoul? Only certain movements of matter in the brain cortex. What\ndifference does it find between inert matter and a living organism? Only\na vastly more complex mechanics and chemistry in the latter. A wide\ndifference, not of kind, but of degree. The something we call vitality,\nthat a child recognizes, science does not find; vitality is something\n_sui generis_. Scientific analysis cannot show us the difference between\nthe germ cell of a starfish and the germ cell of a man; and yet think of\nwhat a world of difference is hidden in those microscopic germs! What\nforce is there in inert matter that can build a machine by the\nadjustment of parts to each other? We can explain the most complex\nchemical compounds by the action of chemical forces and chemical\naffinity, but they cannot explain that adjustment of parts to each\nother, the cooerdination of their activities that makes a living machine.\n\nIn organized matter there is something that organizes. \"The cell itself\nis an organization of smaller units,\" and to drive or follow the\norganizing principle into the last hiding-place is past the power of\nbiological chemistry. What constitutes the guiding force or principle of\na living body, adjusting all its parts, making them pull together,\nmaking of the circulation one system in which the heart, the veins, the\narteries, the lungs, all work to one common end, cooerdinating several\ndifferent organs into a digestive system, and other parts into the\nnervous system, is a mystery that no objective analysis of the body can\ndisclose.\n\nTo refer vitality to complexity alone, is to dodge the question.\nMultiplying the complexity of a machine, say of a watch, any conceivable\nnumber of times would not make it any the less a machine, or change it\nfrom the automatic order to the vital order. A motor-car is a vastly\nmore complex mechanism than a wheelbarrow, and yet it is not the less a\nmachine. On the other hand, an amoeba is a far simpler animal than a\nman, and yet it is just as truly living. To refer life to complexity\ndoes not help us; we want to know what lies back of the complexity--what\nmakes it a new species of complexity.\n\nWe cannot explain the origin of living matter by the properties which\nliving matter possesses. There are three things that mechanics and\nchemistry cannot explain: the relation of the psychical to the physical\nthrough the law of the conservation and correlation of forces; the agent\nor principle that guides the blind chemical and physical forces so as to\nproduce the living body; and the kind of forces that have contributed to\nthe origin of that morphological unit--the cell.\n\nA Western university professor in a recent essay sounds quite a\ndifferent note on this subject from the one that comes to us from\nHarvard. Says Professor Otto C. Glaser, of the University of Michigan,\nin a recent issue of the \"Popular Science Monthly\": \"Does not the\nfitness of living things; the fact that they perform acts useful to\nthemselves in an environment which is constantly shifting, and often\nvery harsh; the fact that in general everything during development,\nduring digestion, during any of the complicated chains of processes\nwhich we find, happens at the right time, in the right place, and to the\nproper extent; does not all this force us to believe that there is\ninvolved something more than mere chemistry and physics?--something, not\nconsciousness necessarily, yet its analogue--a vital _x_?\"\n\nThere is this suggestive fact about these recent biological experiments\nof Dr. Carrel, of the Rockefeller Institute: they seem to prove that the\nlife of a man is not merely the sum of the life of the myriad cells of\nhis body. Stab the man to death, and the cells of his body still live\nand will continue to live if grafted upon another live man. Probably\nevery part of the body would continue to live and grow indefinitely, in\nthe proper medium. That the cell life should continue after the soul\nlife has ceased is very significant. It seems a legitimate inference\nfrom this fact that the human body is the organ or instrument of some\nagent that is not of the body. The functional or physiological life of\nthe body as a whole, also seems quite independent of our conscious\nvolitional or psychic life. That which repairs and renews the body,\nheals its wounds, controls and coordinates its parts, adapts it to its\nenvironment, carries on its processes during sleep, in fact in all our\ninvoluntary life, seems quite independent of the man himself. Is the\nspirit of a race or a nation, or of the times in which we live, another\nillustration of the same mysterious entity?\n\nIf the vital principle, or vital force, is a fiction, invented to give\nthe mind something to take hold of, we are in no worse case than we are\nin some other matters. Science tells us that there is no such _thing_ as\nheat, or light; these are only modes of activity in matter.\n\nIn the same way we seem forced to think of life, vitality, as an\nentity--a fact as real as electricity or light, though it may be only a\nmode of motion. It may be of physico-chemical origin, as much so as\nheat, or light; and yet it is something as distinctive as they are among\nmaterial things, and is involved in the same mystery. Is magnetism or\ngravitation a real thing? or, in the moral world, is love, charity, or\nconsciousness itself? The world seems to be run by nonentities. Heat,\nlight, life, seem nonentities. That which organizes the different parts\nor organs of the human body into a unit, and makes of the many organs\none organism, is a nonentity. That which makes an oak an oak, and a\npine a pine, is a nonentity. That which makes a sheep a sheep, and an ox\nan ox, is to science a nonentity. To physical science the soul is a\nnonentity.\n\nThere is something in the cells of the muscles that makes them contract,\nand in the cells of the heart that makes it beat; that something is not\nactive in the other cells of the body. But it is a nonentity. The body\nis a machine and a laboratory combined, but that which cooerdinates them\nand makes them work together--what is that? Another nonentity. That\nwhich distinguishes a living machine from a dead machine, science has no\nname for, except molecular attraction and repulsion, and these are names\nmerely; they are nonentities. Is there not molecular attraction and\nrepulsion in a steam-engine also? And yet it is not alive. What has to\nsupplement the mechanical and the chemical to make matter alive? We have\nno name for it but the vital, be it an entity or a nonentity. We have no\nname for a flash of lightning but electricity, be it an entity or a\nnonentity. We have no name for that which distinguishes a man from a\nbrute, but mind, soul, be it an entity or a nonentity. We have no name\nfor that which distinguishes the organic from the inorganic but\nvitality, be it an entity or a nonentity.\n\n\nVII\n\nWithout metaphysics we can do nothing; without mental concepts, where\nare we? Natural selection is as much a metaphysical phrase as is\nconsciousness, or the subjective and the objective. Natural selection is\nnot an entity, it is a name for what we conceive of as a process. It is\nnatural rejection as well. The vital principle is a metaphysical\nconcept; so is instinct; so is reason; so is the soul; so is God.\n\nMany of our concepts have been wrong. The concept of witches, of disease\nas the work of evil spirits, of famine and pestilence as the visitation\nof the wrath of God, and the like, were unfounded. Science sets us right\nabout all such matters. It corrects our philosophy, but it cannot\ndispense with the philosophical attitude of mind. The philosophical must\nsupplement the experimental.\n\nIn fact, in considering this question of life, it is about as difficult\nfor the unscientific mind to get along without postulating a vital\nprinciple or force--which, Huxley says, is analogous to the idea of a\nprinciple of aquosity in water--as it is to walk upon the air, or to\nhang one's coat upon a sunbeam. It seems as if something must breathe\nupon the dead matter, as at the first, to make it live. Yet if there is\na distinct vital force it must be correlated with physical force, it\nmust be related causally to the rest. The idea of a vital force as\nsomething new and distinct and injected into matter from without at a\ngiven time and place in the earth's history, must undoubtedly be given\nup. Instead of escaping from mechanism, this notion surrenders one into\nthe hands of mechanism, since to supplement or reinforce a principle\nwith some other principle from without, is strictly a mechanical\nprocedure. But the conception of vitality as potential in matter, or of\nthe whole universe as permeated with spirit, which to me is the same\nthing, is a conception that takes life out of the categories of the\nfortuitous and the automatic.\n\nNo doubt but that all things in the material world are causally related,\nno doubt of the constancy of matter and force, no doubt but that all\nphenomena are the result of natural principles, no doubt that the living\narose from the non-living, no doubt that the evolution process was\ninherent in the constitution of the world; and yet there is a mystery\nabout it all that is insoluble. The miracle of vitality takes place\nbehind a veil that we cannot penetrate, in the inmost sanctuary of the\nmolecules of matter, in that invisible, imaginary world on the\nborderland between the material and the immaterial. We may fancy that it\nis here that the psychical effects its entrance into the physical--that\nspirit weds matter--that the creative energy kindles the spark we call\nvitality. At any rate, vitality evidently begins in that inner world of\natoms and molecules; but whether as the result of their peculiar and\nvery complex compounding or as the cause of the compounding--how are we\never to know? Is it not just as scientific to postulate a new principle,\nthe principle of vitality, as to postulate a new process, or a new\nbehavior of an old principle? In either case, we are in the world of the\nunverifiable; we take a step in the dark. Most of us, I fancy, will\nsympathize with George Eliot, who says in one of her letters: \"To me the\nDevelopment Theory, and all other explanations of processes by which\nthings came to be, produce a feeble impression compared with the mystery\nthat lies under the processes.\"\n\n\n\n\nV\n\nSCIENTIFIC VITALISM\n\nI\n\n\nAll living bodies, when life leaves them, go back to the earth from\nwhence they came. What was it in the first instance that gathered their\nelements from the earth and built them up into such wonderful\nmechanisms? If we say it was nature, do we mean by nature a physical\nforce or an immaterial principle? Did the earth itself bring forth a\nman, or did something breathe upon the inert clay till it became a\nliving spirit?\n\nAs life is a physical phenomenon, appearing in a concrete physical\nworld, it is, to that extent, within the domain of physical science, and\nappeals to the scientific mind. Physical science is at home only in the\nexperimental, the verifiable. Its domain ends where that of philosophy\nbegins.\n\nThe question of how life arose in a universe of dead matter is just as\nbaffling a question to the ordinary mind, as how the universe itself\narose. If we assume that the germs of life drifted to us from other\nspheres, propelled by the rays of the sun, or some other celestial\nagency, as certain modern scientific philosophers have assumed, we have\nonly removed the mystery farther away from us. If we assume that it\ncame by spontaneous generation, as Haeckel and others assume, then we\nare only cutting a knot which we cannot untie. The god of spontaneous\ngeneration is as miraculous as any other god. We cannot break the causal\nsequence without a miracle. If something came from nothing, then there\nis not only the end of the problem, but also the end of our boasted\nscience.\n\nScience is at home in discussing all the material manifestations of\nlife--the parts played by colloids and ferments, by fluids and gases,\nand all the organic compounds, and by mechanical and chemical\nprinciples; it may analyze and tabulate all life processes, and show the\nliving body as a most wonderful and complex piece of mechanism, but\nbefore the question of the origin of life itself it stands dumb, and,\nwhen speaking through such a man as Tyndall, it also stands humble and\nreverent. After Tyndall had, to his own satisfaction, reduced all like\nphenomena to mechanical attraction and repulsion, he stood with\nuncovered head before what he called the \"mystery and miracle of\nvitality.\" The mystery and miracle lie in the fact that in the organic\nworld the same elements combine with results so different from those of\nthe inorganic world. Something seems to have inspired them with a new\npurpose. In the inorganic world, the primary elements go their ceaseless\nround from compound to compound, from solid to fluid or gaseous, and\nback again, forming the world of inert matter as we know it, but in the\norganic world the same elements form thousands of new combinations\nunknown to them before, and thus give rise to the myriad forms of life\nthat inhabit the earth.\n\nThe much-debated life question has lately found an interesting exponent\nin Professor Benjamin Moore, of the University of Liverpool. His volume\non the subject in the \"Home University Library\" is very readable, and,\nin many respects, convincing. At least, so far as it is the word of\nexact science on the subject it is convincing; so far as it is\nspeculative, or philosophical, it is or is not convincing, according to\nthe type of mind of the reader. Professor Moore is not a bald mechanist\nor materialist like Professor Loeb, or Ernst Haeckel, nor is he an\nidealist or spiritualist, like Henri Bergson or Sir Oliver Lodge. He may\nbe called a scientific vitalist. He keeps close to lines of scientific\nresearch as these lines lead him through the maze of the primordial\nelements of matter, from electron to atom, from atom to molecule, from\nmolecule to colloid, and so up to the border of the living world. His\nanalysis of the processes of molecular physics as they appear in the\norganism leads him to recognize and to name a new force, or a new\nmanifestation of force, which he hesitates to call vital, because of the\nassociations of this term with a prescientific age, but which he calls\n\"biotic energy.\"\n\nBiotic energy is peculiar to living bodies, and \"there are precisely the\nsame criteria for its existence,\" says Professor Moore, \"as for the\nexistence of any one of the inorganic energy types, viz., a set of\ndiscrete phenomena; and its nature is as mysterious to us as the cause\nof any one of these inorganic forms about which also we know so little.\nIt is biotic energy which guides the development of the ovum, which\nregulates the exchanges of the cell, and causes such phenomena as nerve\nimpulse, muscular contraction, and gland secretion, and it is a form of\nenergy which arises in colloidal structures, just as magnetism appears\nin iron, or radio-activity in uranium or radium, and in its\nmanifestations it undergoes exchanges with other forms of energy, in the\nsame manner as these do among one another.\"\n\nLike Professor Henderson, Professor Moore concedes to the vitalists\nabout all they claim--namely, that there is some form of force or\nmanifestation of energy peculiar to living bodies, and one that cannot\nbe adequately described in terms of physics and chemistry. Professor\nMoore says this biotic energy \"arises in colloidal structures,\" and so\nfar as biochemistry can make out, arises _spontaneously_ and gives rise\nto that marvelous bit of mechanism, the cell. In the cell appears \"a\nform of energy unknown outside life processes which leads the mazy dance\nof life from point to point, each new development furnishing a starting\npoint for the next one.\" It not only leads the dance along our own line\nof descent from our remote ancestors--it leads the dance along the long\nroad of evolution from the first unicellular form in the dim palaeozoic\nseas to the complex and highly specialized forms of our own day.\n\nThe secret of this life force, or biotic energy, according to Professor\nMoore, is in the keeping of matter itself. The steps or stages from the\ndepths of matter by which life arose, lead up from that imaginary\nsomething, the electron, to the inorganic colloids, or to the\ncrystallo-colloids, which are the threshold of life, each stage showing\nsome new transformation of energy. There must be an all-potent energy\ntransformation before we can get chemical energy out of physical energy,\nand then biotic energy out of chemical energy. This transformation of\ninorganic energy into life energy cannot be traced or repeated in the\nlaboratory, yet science believes the secret will sometime be in its\nhands. It is here that the materialistic philosophers, such as\nProfessors Moore and Loeb, differ from the spiritualistic philosophers,\nsuch as Bergson, Sir Oliver Lodge, Professor Thompson, and others.\n\nProfessor Moore has no sympathy with those narrow mechanistic views that\nsee in the life processes \"no problems save those of chemistry and\nphysics.\" \"Each link in the living chain may be physico-chemical, but\nthe chain as a whole, and its purpose, is something else.\" He draws an\nanalogy from the production of music in which purely physical factors\nare concerned; the laws of harmonics account for all; but back of all is\nsomething that is not mechanical and chemical--there is the mind of the\ncomposer, and the performers, and the auditors, and something that takes\ncognizance of the whole effect. A complete human philosophy cannot be\nbuilt upon physical science alone. He thinks the evolution of life from\ninert matter is of the same type as the evolution of one form of matter\nfrom another, or the evolution of one form of energy from another--a\nmystery, to be sure, but little more startling in the one case than in\nthe other. \"The fundamental mystery lies in the existence of those\nentities, or things, which we call matter and energy,\" out of the play\nand interaction of which all life phenomena have arisen. Organic\nevolution is a series of energy exchanges and transformations from lower\nto higher, but science is powerless to go behind the phenomena presented\nand name or verify the underlying mystery. Only philosophy can do this.\nAnd Professor Moore turns philosopher when he says there is beauty and\ndesign in it all, \"and an eternal purpose which is ever progressing.\"\n\nBergson sets forth his views of evolution in terms of literature and\nphilosophy. Professor Moore embodies similar views in his volume, set\nforth in terms of molecular science. Both make evolution a creative and\na continuous process. Bergson lays the emphasis upon the cosmic spirit\ninteracting with matter. Professor Moore lays the emphasis upon the\nindwelling potencies of matter itself (probably the same spirit\nconceived of in different terms). Professor Moore philosophizes as truly\nas does Bergson when he says \"there must exist a whole world of living\ncreatures which the microscope has never shown us, leading up to the\nbacteria and the protozoa. The brink of life lies not at the production\nof protozoa and bacteria, which are highly developed inhabitants of our\nworld, but away down among the colloids; and the beginning of life was\nnot a fortuitous event occurring millions of years ago and never again\nrepeated, but one which in its primordial stages keeps on repeating\nitself all the time in our generation. So that if all intelligent\ncreatures were by some holocaust destroyed, up out of the depths in\nprocess of millions of years, intelligent beings would once more\nemerge.\" This passage shows what a speculative leap or flight the\nscientific mind is at times compelled to take when it ventures beyond\nthe bounds of positive methods. It is good philosophy, I hope, but we\ncannot call it science. Thrilled with cosmic emotion, Walt Whitman made\na similar daring assertion:--\n\n    \"There is no stoppage, and never can be stoppage,\n    If I, you, and the worlds, and all beneath or upon their surfaces,\n      were this moment reduced back to a pallid float, it would\n      not avail in the long run,\n    We should surely bring up again where we now stand,\n    And surely go as much farther, and then farther and farther.\"\n\n\nII\n\nEvolution is creative, whether it works in matter--as Bergson describes,\nor whether its path lies up through electrons and atoms and molecules,\nas Professor Moore describes. There is something that creates and makes\nmatter plastic to its will. Whether we call matter \"the living garment\nof God,\" as Goethe did, or a reservoir of creative energy, as Tyndall\nand his school did, and as Professor Moore still does, we are paying\nhomage to a power that is super-material. Life came to our earth, says\nProfessor Moore, through a \"well-regulated orderly development,\" and it\n\"comes to every mother earth of the universe in the maturity of her\ncreation when the conditions arrive within suitable limits.\" That no\nintelligent beings appeared upon the earth for millions upon millions of\nyears, that for whole geologic ages there was no creature with more\nbrains than a snail possesses, shows the almost infinitely slow progress\nof development, and that there has been no arbitrary or high-handed\nexercise of creative power. The universe is not run on principles of\nmodern business efficiency, and man is at the head of living forms, not\nby the fiat of some omnipotent power, some superman, but as the result\nof the operation of forces that balk at no delay, or waste, or failure,\nand that are dependent upon the infinitely slow ripening and\namelioration of both cosmic and terrestrial conditions.\n\nWe do not get rid of God by any such dictum, but we get rid of the\nanthropomorphic views which we have so long been wont to read into the\nprocesses of nature. We dehumanize the universe, but we do not render it\nthe less grand and mysterious. Professor Moore points out to us how life\ncame to a cooling planet as soon as the temperature became low enough\nfor certain chemical combinations to appear. There must first be oxides\nand saline compounds, there must be carbonates of calcium and magnesium,\nand the like. As the temperature falls, more and more complex compounds,\nsuch as life requires, appear; till, in due time, carbon dioxide and\nwater are at hand, and life can make a start. At the white heat of some\nof the fixed stars, the primary chemical elements are not yet evolved;\nbut more and more elements appear, and more and more complex compounds\nare formed as the cooling process progresses.\n\n\"This note cannot be too strongly sounded, that as matter is allowed\ncapacity for assuming complex forms, those complex forms appear. As soon\nas oxides can be there, oxides appear; when temperature admits of\ncarbonates, then carbonates are forthwith formed. These are experiments\nwhich any chemist can to-day repeat in a crucible. And on a cooling\nplanet, as soon as temperature will admit the presence of life, then\nlife appears, as the evidence of geology shows us.\" When we speak of the\nbeginning of life, it is not clear just what we mean. The unit of all\norganized bodies is the cell, but the cell is itself an organized body,\nand must have organic matter to feed upon. Hence the cell is only a more\ncomplex form of more primitive living matter. As we go down the scale\ntoward the inorganic, can we find the point where the living and the\nnon-living meet and become one? \"Life had to surge a long way up from\nthe depths before a green plant cell came into being.\" When the green\nplant cell was found, life was fairly launched. This plant cell, in the\nform of chlorophyll, by the aid of water and the trace of carbon dioxide\nin the air, began to store up the solar energy in fruit and grain and\nwoody tissue, and thus furnish power to run all forms of life machinery.\n\nThe materialists or naturalists are right in urging that we live in a\nmuch more wonderful universe than we have ever imagined, and that in\nmatter itself sleep potencies and possibilities not dreamt of in our\nphilosophy. The world of complex though invisible activities which\nscience reveals all about us, the solar and stellar energies raining\nupon us from above, the terrestrial energies and influences playing\nthrough us from below, the transformations and transmutations taking\nplace on every hand, the terrible alertness and potency of the world of\ninert matter as revealed by a flash of lightning, the mysteries of\nchemical affinity, of magnetism, of radio-activity, all point to deep\nbeneath deep in matter itself. It is little wonder that men who dwell\nhabitually upon these things and are saturated with the spirit and\ntraditions of laboratory investigation, should believe that in some way\nmatter itself holds the mystery of the origin of life. On the other\nhand, a different type of mind, the more imaginative, artistic, and\nreligious type, recoils from the materialistic view.\n\nThe sun is the source of all terrestrial energy, but the different forms\nthat energy takes--in the plant, in the animal, in the brain of\nman--this type of mind is bound to ask questions about that. Gravity\npulls matter down; life lifts it up; chemical forces pull it to pieces;\nvital forces draw it together and organize it; the winds and the waters\ndissolve and scatter it; vegetation recaptures and integrates it and\ngives it new qualities. At every turn, minds like that of Sir Oliver\nLodge are compelled to think of life as a principle or force doing\nsomething with matter. The physico-chemical forces will not do in the\nhands of man what they do in the hands of Nature. Such minds, therefore,\nfeel justified in thinking that something which we call \"the hands of\nNature,\" plays a part--some principle or force which the hands of man do\nnot hold.\n\n\n\n\nVI\n\nA BIRD OF PASSAGE\n\nI\n\n\nThere is one phase of the much-discussed question of the nature and\norigin of life which, so far as I know, has not been considered either\nby those who hold a brief for the physico-chemical view or by those who\nstand for some form of vitalism or idealism. I refer to the small part\nthat life plays in the total scheme of things. The great cosmic machine\nwould go on just as well without it. Its relation to the whole appears\nto be little different from that of a man to the train in which he\njourneys. Life rides on the mechanical and chemical forces, but it does\nnot seem to be a part of them, nor identical with them, because they\nwere before it, and will continue after it is gone.\n\nThe everlasting, all-inclusive thing in this universe seems to be inert\nmatter with the energy it holds; while the slight, flitting, casual\nthing seems to be living matter. The inorganic is from all eternity to\nall eternity; it is distributed throughout all space and endures through\nall time, while the organic is, in comparison, only of the here and the\nnow; it was not here yesterday, and it may not be here to-morrow; it\ncomes and goes. Life is like a bird of passage which alights and tarries\nfor a time and is gone, and the places where it perched and nested and\nled forth its brood know it no more. Apparently it flits from world to\nworld as the great cosmic spring comes to each, and departs as the\ncosmic winter returns to each. It is a visitor, a migrant, a frail,\ntimid thing, which waits upon the seasons and flees from the coming\ntempests and vicissitudes.\n\nHow casual, uncertain, and inconsequential the vital order seems in our\nown solar system--a mere incident or by-product in its cosmic evolution!\nAstronomy sounds the depths of space, and sees only mechanical and\nchemical forces at work there. It is almost certain that only a small\nfraction of the planetary surfaces is the abode of life. On the earth\nalone, of all the great family of planets and satellites, is the vital\norder in full career. It may yet linger upon Mars, but it is evidently\nwaning. On the inferior planets it probably had its day long ago, while\nit must be millions of years before it comes to the superior planets, if\nit ever comes to them. What a vast, inconceivable outlay of time and\nenergy for such small returns! Evidently the vital order is only an\nepisode, a transient or secondary phase of matter in the process of\nsidereal evolution. Astronomic space is strewn with dead worlds, as a\nNew England field is with drift boulders. That life has touched and\ntarried here and there upon them can hardly be doubted, but if it is\nanything more than a passing incident, an infant crying in the night, a\nflush of color upon the cheek, a flower blooming by the wayside,\nappearances are against it.\n\nWe read our astronomy and geology in the light of our enormous egotism,\nand appropriate all to ourselves; but science sees in our appearance\nhere a no more significant event than in the foam and bubbles that whirl\nand dance for a moment upon the river's current. The bubbles have their\nreason for being; all the mysteries of molecular attraction and\nrepulsion may be involved in their production; without the solar energy,\nand the revolution of the earth upon its axis, they would not appear;\nand yet they are only bubbles upon the river's current, as we are\nbubbles upon the stream of energy that flows through the universe.\nApparently the cosmic game is played for us no more than for the\nparasites that infest our bodies, or for the frost ferns that form upon\nour window-panes in winter. The making of suns and systems goes on in\nthe depths of space, and doubtless will go on to all eternity, without\nany more reference to the vital order than to the chemical compounds.\n\nThe amount of living matter in the universe, so far as we can penetrate\nit, compared with the non-living, is, in amount, like a flurry of snow\nthat whitens the fields and hills of a spring morning compared to the\nmiles of rock and soil beneath it; and with reference to geologic time\nit is about as fleeting. In the vast welter of suns and systems in the\nheavens above us, we see only dead matter, and most of it is in a\ncondition of glowing metallic vapor. There are doubtless living\norganisms upon some of the invisible planetary bodies, but they are\nprobably as fugitive and temporary as upon our own world. Much of the\nsurface of the earth is clothed in a light vestment of life, which, back\nin geologic time, seems to have more completely enveloped it than at\npresent, as both the arctic and the antarctic regions bear evidence in\ntheir coal-beds and other fossil remains of luxuriant vegetable growths.\n\nStrip the earth of its thin pellicle of soil, thinner with reference to\nthe mass than is the peel to the apple, and you have stripped it of its\nlife. Or, rob it of its watery vapor and the carbon dioxide in the air,\nboth stages in its evolution, and you have a dead world. The huge globe\nswings through space only as a mass of insensate rock. So limited and\nevanescent is the world of living matter, so vast and enduring is the\nworld of the non-living. Looked at in this way, in the light of physical\nscience, life, I repeat, seems like a mere passing phase of the cosmic\nevolution, a flitting and temporary stage of matter which it passes\nthrough in the procession of changes on the surface of a cooling planet.\nBetween the fiery mist of the nebula, and the frigid and consolidated\nglobe, there is a brief span, ranging over about one hundred and twenty\ndegrees of temperature, where life appears and organic evolution takes\nplace. Compared with the whole scale of temperature, from absolute zero\nto the white heat of the hottest stars, it is about a hand's-breadth\ncompared to a mile.\n\nLife processes cease, but chemical and mechanical processes go on\nforever. Life is as fugitive and uncertain as the bow in the clouds,\nand, like the bow in the clouds, is confined to a limited range of\nconditions. Like the bow, also, it is a perpetual creation, a constant\nbecoming, and its source is not in the matter through which it is\nmanifested, though inseparable from it. The material substance of life,\nlike the rain-drops, is in perpetual flux and change; it hangs always on\nthe verge of dissolution and vanishes when the material conditions fail,\nto be renewed again when they return. We know, do we not? that life is\nas literally dependent upon the sun as is the rainbow, and equally\ndependent upon the material elements; but whether the physical\nconditions sum up the whole truth about it, as they do with the bow, is\nthe insoluble question. Science says \"Yes,\" but our philosophy and our\nreligion say \"No.\" The poets and the prophets say \"No,\" and our hopes\nand aspirations say \"No.\"\n\n\nII\n\nWhere, then, shall we look for the key to this mysterious thing we call\nlife? Modern biochemistry will not listen to the old notion of a vital\nforce--that is only a metaphysical will-o'-the-wisp that leaves us\nfloundering in the quagmire. If I question the forces about me, what\nanswer do I get? Molecular attraction and repulsion seem to say, \"It is\nnot in us; we are as active in the clod as in the flower.\" The four\nprincipal elements--oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen, and carbon--say, \"It is\nnot in us, because we are from all eternity, and life is not; we form\nonly its physical basis.\" Warmth and moisture say, \"It is not in us; we\nare only its faithful nurses and handmaidens.\" The sun says: \"It is not\nin me; I shine on dead worlds as well. I but quicken life after it is\nplanted.\" The stars say, \"It is not in us; we have seen life come and go\namong myriads of worlds for untold ages.\" No questioning of the heavens\nabove nor of the earth below can reveal to us the secret we are in quest\nof.\n\nI can fancy brute matter saying to life: \"You tarry with me at your\nperil. You will always be on the firing-line of my blind, contending\nforces; they will respect you not; you must take your chances amid my\nflying missiles. My forces go their eternal round without variableness\nor shadow of turning, and woe to you if you cross their courses. You\nmay bring all your gods with you--gods of love, mercy, gentleness,\naltruism; but I know them not. Your prayers will fall upon ears of\nstone, your appealing gesture upon eyes of stone, your cries for mercy\nupon hearts of stone. I shall be neither your enemy nor your friend. I\nshall be utterly indifferent to you. My floods will drown you, my winds\nwreck you, my fires burn you, my quicksands suck you down, and not know\nwhat they are doing. My earth is a theatre of storms and cyclones, of\navalanches and earthquakes, of lightnings and cloudbursts; wrecks and\nruins strew my course. All my elements and forces are at your service;\nall my fluids and gases and solids; my stars in their courses will fight\non your side, if you put and keep yourself in right relations to them.\nMy atoms and electrons will build your houses, my lightning do your\nerrands, my winds sail your ships, on the same terms. You cannot live\nwithout my air and my water and my warmth; but each of them is a source\nof power that will crush or engulf or devour you before it will turn one\nhair's-breadth from its course. Your trees will be uprooted by my\ntornadoes, your fair fields will be laid waste by floods or fires; my\nmountains will fall on your delicate forms and utterly crush and bury\nthem; my glaciers will overspread vast areas and banish or destroy whole\ntribes and races of your handiwork; the shrinking and wrinkling crust of\nmy earth will fold in its insensate bosom vast forests of your tropical\ngrowths, and convert them into black rock, and I will make rock of the\nmyriad forms of minute life with which you plant the seas; through\nimmense geologic ages my relentless, unseeing, unfeeling forces will\ndrive on like the ploughshare that buries every flower and grass-blade\nand tiny creature in its path. My winds are life-giving breezes to-day,\nand the besom of destruction to-morrow; my rains will moisten and\nnourish you one day, and wash you into the gulf the next; my earthquakes\nwill bury your cities as if they were ant-hills. So you must take your\nchances, but the chances are on your side. I am not all tempest, or\nflood, or fire, or earthquake. Your career will be a warfare, but you\nwill win more battles than you will lose. But remember, you are nothing\nto me, while I am everything to you. I have nothing to lose or gain,\nwhile you have everything to gain. Without my soils and moisture and\nwarmth, without my carbon and oxygen and nitrogen and hydrogen, you can\ndo or be nothing; without my sunshine you perish; but you have these\nthings on condition of effort and struggle. You have evolution on\ncondition of pain and failure and the hazard of the warring geologic\nages. Fate and necessity rule in my realm. When you fail, or are crushed\nor swallowed by my remorseless forces, do not blame my gods, or your\nown; there is no blame, there is only the price to be paid: the hazards\nof invading the closed circle of my unseeing forces.\"\n\nIn California I saw an epitome of the merciless way inorganic Nature\ndeals with life. An old, dried, and hardened asphalt lake near Los\nAngeles tells a horrible tale of animal suffering and failure. It had\nbeen a pit of horrors for long ages; it was Nature concentrated--her\nwild welter of struggling and devouring forms through the geologic ages\nmade visible and tangible in a small patch of mingled pitch and animal\nbones. There was nearly as much bone as pitch. The fate of the unlucky\nflies that alight upon tangle-foot fly-paper in our houses had been the\nfate of the victims that had perished here. How many wild creatures had\nturned appealing eyes to the great unheeding void as they felt\nthemselves helpless and sinking in this all-engulfing pitch! In like\nmanner how many human beings in storms and disasters at sea and in flood\nand fire upon land have turned the same appealing look to the unpitying\nheavens! There is no power in the world of physical forces, or apart\nfrom our own kind, that heeds us or turns aside for us, or bestows one\npitying glance upon us. Life has run, and still runs, the gantlet of a\nlong line of hostile forces, and escapes by dint of fleetness of foot,\nor agility in dodging, or else by toughness of fibre.\n\nYet here we are; here is love and charity and mercy and intelligence;\nthe fair face of childhood, the beautiful face of youth, the clear,\nstrong face of manhood and womanhood, and the calm, benign face of old\nage, seen, it is true, as against a background of their opposites, but\nseeming to indicate something above chance and change at the heart of\nNature. Here is life in the midst of death; but death forever playing\ninto the hands of life; here is the organic in the midst of the\ninorganic, at strife with it, hourly crushed by it, yet sustained and\nkept going by its aid.\n\n\nIII\n\nVitality is only a word, but it marks a class of phenomena in nature\nthat stands apart from all merely mechanical manifestations in the\nuniverse. The cosmos is a vast machine, but in this machine--this\ntremendous complex of physical forces--there appears, at least on this\nearth, in the course of its evolution, this something, or this peculiar\nmanifestation of energy, that we call vital. Apparently it is a\ntransient phase of activity in matter, which, unlike other chemical and\nphysical activities, has its beginning and its ending, and out of which\nhave arisen all the myriad forms of terrestrial life. The merely\nmaterial forces, blind and haphazard from the first, did not arise in\nmatter; they are inseparable from it; they are as eternal as matter\nitself; but the activities called vital arose in time and place, and\nmust eventually disappear as they arose, while the career of the\ninorganic elements goes on as if life had never visited the sphere. Was\nit, or is it, a visitation--something _ab extra_ that implies\nsuper-mundane, or supernatural, powers?\n\nAdded to this wonder is the fact that the vital order has gone on\nunfolding through the geologic ages, mounting from form to form, or from\norder to order, becoming more and more complex, passing from the\nemphasis of size of body, to the emphasis of size of brain, and finally\nfrom instinct and reflex activities to free volition, and the reason and\nconsciousness of man; while the purely physical and chemical forces\nremain where they began. There has been endless change among them,\nendless shifting of the balance of power, but always the tendency to a\ndead equilibrium, while the genius of the organic forces has been in the\npower to disturb the equilibrium and to ride into port on the crest of\nthe wave it has created, or to hang forever between the stable and the\nunstable.\n\nSo there we are, confronted by two apparently contrary truths. It is to\nme unthinkable that the vital order is not as truly rooted in the\nconstitution of things as are the mechanical and chemical orders; and\nyet, here we are face to face with its limited, fugitive, or\ntransitional character. It comes and goes like the dews of the morning;\nit has all the features of an exceptional, unexpected, extraordinary\noccurrence--of miracle, if you will; but if the light which physical\nscience turns on the universe is not a delusion, if the habit of mind\nwhich it begets is not a false one, then life belongs to the same\ncategory of things as do day and night, rain and sun, rest and motion.\nWho shall reconcile these contradictions?\n\nHuxley spoke for physical science when he said that he did not know what\nit was that constituted life--what it was that made the \"wonderful\ndifference between the dead particles and the living particles of matter\nappearing in other respects identical.\" He thought there might be some\nbond between physico-chemical phenomena, on the one hand, and vital\nphenomena, on the other, which philosophers will some day find out.\nLiving matter is characterized by \"spontaneity of action,\" which is\nentirely absent from inert matter. Huxley cannot or does not think of a\nvital force distinct from all other forces, as the cause of life\nphenomena, as so many philosophers have done, from Aristotle down to our\nday. He finds protoplasm to be the physical basis of life; it is one in\nboth the vegetable and animal worlds; the animal takes it from the\nvegetable, and the vegetable, by the aid of sunlight, takes or\nmanufactures it from the inorganic elements. But protoplasm is living\nmatter. Before there was any protoplasm, what brought about the\nstupendous change of the dead into the living? Protoplasm makes more\nprotoplasm, as fire makes more fire, but what kindled the first spark of\nthis living flame? Here we corner the mystery, but it is still a\nmystery that defies us. Cause and effect meet and are lost in each\nother. Science cannot admit a miracle, or a break in the continuity of\nlife, yet here it reaches a point where no step can be taken. Huxley's\nillustrations do not help his argument. \"Protoplasm,\" he says, \"is the\nclay of the potter; which, bake it and paint it as he will, remains\nclay, separated by artifice, and not by nature, from the commonest brick\nor sun-dried clod.\" Clay is certainly the physical basis of the potter's\nart, but would there be any pottery in the world if it contained only\nclay? Do we not have to think of the potter? In the same way, do we not\nhave to think of something that fashions these myriad forms of life out\nof protoplasm?--and back of that, of something that begat protoplasm out\nof non-protoplasmic matter, and started the flame of life going? Life\naccounts for protoplasm, but what accounts for life? We have to think of\nthe living clay as separated by Nature from the inert \"sun-dried clod.\"\nThere is something in the one that is not in the other. There is really\nno authentic analogy between the potter's art and Nature's art of life.\n\nThe force of the analogy, if it has any, drives us to the conclusion\nthat life is an entity, or an agent, working upon matter and independent\nof it.\n\nThere is more wit than science in Huxley's question, \"What better\nphilosophical status has vitality than aquosity?\" There is at least this\ndifference: When vitality is gone, you cannot recall it, or reproduce\nit by your chemistry; but you can recombine the two gases in which you\nhave decomposed water, any number of times, and get your aquosity back\nagain; it never fails; it is a power of chemistry. But vitality will not\ncome at your beck; it is not a chemical product, at least in the same\nsense that water is; it is not in the same category as the wetness or\nliquidity of water. It is a name for a phenomenon--the most remarkable\nphenomenon in nature. It is one that the art of man is powerless to\nreproduce, while water may be made to go through its cycle of\nchange--solid, fluid, vapor, gas--and always come back to water. Well\ndoes the late Professor Brooks, of Johns Hopkins, say that \"living\nthings do, in some way and in some degree, control or condition\ninorganic nature; that they hold their own by setting the mechanical\nproperties of matter in opposition to each other, and that this is their\nmost notable and distinctive characteristic.\" Does not Ray Lankester,\nthe irate champion of the mechanistic view of life, say essentially the\nsame thing when he calls man the great Insurgent in Nature's\ncamp--\"crossing her courses, reversing her processes, and defeating her\nends?\"\n\nLife appears like the introduction of a new element or force or tendency\ninto the cosmos. Henceforth the elements go new ways, form new\ncompounds, build up new forms, and change the face of nature. Rivers\nflow where they never would have flowed without it, mountains fall in a\nspace of time during which they never would have fallen; barriers arise,\nrough ways are made smooth, a new world appears--the world of man's\nphysical and mental activities.\n\nIf the gods of the inorganic elements are neither for nor against us,\nbut utterly indifferent to us, how came we here? Nature's method is\nalways from the inside, while ours is from the outside; hers is circular\nwhile ours is direct. We think, as Bergson says, of things created, and\nof a thing that creates, but things in nature are not created, they are\nevolved; they grow, and the thing that grows is not separable from the\nforce that causes it to grow. The water turns the wheel, and can be shut\noff or let on. This is the way of the mechanical world. But the wheels\nin organic nature go around from something inside them, a kind of\nperpetual motion, or self-supplying power. They are not turned, they\nturn; they are not repaired, they repair. The nature of living things\ncannot be interpreted by the laws of mechanical and chemical things,\nthough mechanics and chemistry play the visible, tangible part in them.\nIf we must discard the notion of a vital force, we may, as Professor\nHartog suggests, make use of the term \"vital behavior.\"\n\nOf course man tries everything by himself and his own standards. He\nknows no intelligence but his own, no prudence, no love, no mercy, no\njustice, no economy, but his own, no god but such a one as fits his\nconception.\n\nIn view of all these things, how man got here is a problem. Why the\nslender thread of his line of descent was not broken in the warrings and\nupheavals of the terrible geologic ages, what power or agent took a hand\nin furthering his development, is beyond the reach of our biologic\nscience.\n\nMan's is the only intelligence, as we understand the word, in the\nuniverse, and his intelligence demands something akin to intelligence in\nthe nature from which he sprang.\n\n\n\n\nVII\n\nLIFE AND MIND\n\nI\n\n\nThere are three kinds of change in the world in which we live--physical\nand mechanical change which goes on in time and place among the tangible\nbodies about us, chemical change which goes on in the world of hidden\nmolecules and atoms of which bodies are composed, and vital change which\ninvolves the two former, but which also involves the mysterious\nprinciple or activity which we call life. Life comes and goes, but the\nphysical and chemical orders remain. The vegetable and animal kingdoms\nwax and wane, or disappear entirely, but the physico-chemical forces are\nas indestructible as matter itself. This fugitive and evanescent\ncharacter of life, the way it uses and triumphs over the material\nforces, setting up new chemical activities in matter, sweeping over the\nland-areas of the earth like a conflagration, lifting the inorganic\nelements up into myriads of changing and beautiful forms, instituting a\nvast number of new chemical processes and compounds, defying the\nlaboratory to reproduce it or kindle its least spark--a flame that\ncannot exist without carbon and oxygen, but of which carbon and oxygen\ndo not hold the secret, a fire reversed, building up instead of pulling\ndown, in the vegetable with power to absorb and transmute the inorganic\nelements into leaves and fruit and tissue; in the animal with power to\nchange the vegetable products into bone and muscle and nerve and brain,\nand finally into thought and consciousness; run by the solar energy and\ndependent upon it, yet involving something which the sunlight cannot\ngive us; in short, an activity in matter, or in a limited part of\nmatter, as real as the physico-chemical activity, but, unlike it,\ndefying all analysis and explanation and all our attempts at synthesis.\nIt is this character of life, I say, that so easily leads us to look\nupon it as something _ab extra_, or super-added to matter, and not an\nevolution from it. It has led Sir Oliver Lodge to conceive of life as a\ndistinct entity, existing independent of matter, and it is this\nconception that gives the key to Henri Bergson's wonderful book,\n\"Creative Evolution.\"\n\nThere is possibly or probably a fourth change in matter, physical in its\nnature, but much more subtle and mysterious than any of the physical\nchanges which our senses reveal to us. I refer to radioactive change, or\nto the atomic transformation of one element into another, such as the\nchange of radium into helium, and the change of helium into lead--a\nsubject that takes us to the borderland between physics and chemistry\nwhere is still debatable ground.\n\nI began by saying that there were three kinds of changes in matter--the\nphysical, the chemical, and the vital. But if we follow up this idea and\ndeclare that there are three kinds of force also, claiming this\ndistinction for the third term of our proposition, we shall be running\ncounter to the main current of recent biological science. \"The idea that\na peculiar 'vital force' acts in the chemistry of life,\" says Professor\nSoddy, \"is extinct.\"\n\n\"Only chemical and physical agents influence the vital processes,\" says\nProfessor Czapek, of the University of Prague, \"and we need no longer\ntake refuge in mysterious 'vital forces' when we want to explain these.\"\n\nTyndall was obliged to think of a force that guided the molecules of\nmatter into the special forms of a tree. This force was in the ultimate\nparticles of matter. But when he came to the brain and to consciousness,\nhe said a new product appeared that defies mechanical treatment.\n\nThe attempt of the biological science of our time to wipe out all\ndistinctions between the living and the non-living, solely because\nscientific analysis reveals no difference, is a curious and interesting\nphenomenon.\n\nProfessor Schaefer, in his presidential address before the British\nAssociation in 1912, argued that all the main characteristics of living\nmatter, such as assimilation and disassimilation, growth and\nreproduction, spontaneous and amoeboid movement, osmotic pressure,\nkaryokinesis, etc., were equally apparent in the non-living; therefore\nhe concluded that life is only one of the many chemical reactions, and\nthat it is not improbable that it will yet be produced by chemical\nsynthesis in the laboratory. The logic of the position taken by\nProfessor Schaefer and of the school to which he belongs, demands this\nartificial production of life--an achievement that seems no nearer than\nit did a half-century ago. When it has been attained, the problem will\nbe simplified, but the mystery of life will by no means have been\ncleared up. One follows these later biochemists in working out their\nproblem of the genesis of life with keen interest, but always with a\nfeeling that there is more in their conclusions than is justified by\ntheir premises. For my own part, I am convinced that whatever is, is\nnatural, but to obtain life I feel the need of something of a different\norder from the force that evokes the spark from the flint and the steel,\nor brings about the reaction of chemical compounds. If asked to explain\nwhat this something is that is characteristic of living matter, I should\nsay intelligence.\n\nThe new school of biologists start with matter that possesses\nextraordinary properties--with matter that seems inspired with the\ndesire for life, and behaving in a way that it never will behave in the\nlaboratory. They begin with the earth's surface warm and moist, the\natmosphere saturated with watery vapor and carbon dioxide and many other\ncomplex unstable compounds; then they summon all the material elements\nof life--carbon, oxygen, hydrogen, and nitrogen, with a little sodium,\nchlorine, iron, sulphur, phosphorus, and others--and make these run\ntogether to form a jelly-like body called a colloid; then they endow\nthis jelly mass with the power of growth, and of subdivision when it\ngets too large; they make it able to absorb various unstable compounds\nfrom the air, giving it internal stores of energy, \"the setting free of\nwhich would cause automatic movements in the lump of jelly.\" Thus they\nlay the foundations of life. This carbonaceous material with properties\nof movement and subdivision due to mechanical and physical forces is the\nimmediate ancestor of the first imaginary living being, the _protobion_.\nTo get this _protobion_ the chemists summon a reagent known as a\ncatalyser. The catalyser works its magic on the jelly mass. It sets up a\nwonderful reaction by its mere presence, without parting with any of its\nsubstance. Thus, if a bit of platinum which has this catalytic power is\ndropped into a vessel containing a mixture of oxygen and hydrogen, the\ntwo gases instantly unite and form water. A catalyser introduced in the\nprimordial jelly liberates energy and gives the substance power to break\nup the various complex unstable compounds into food, and promote growth\nand subdivision. In fact, it awakens or imparts a vital force and leads\nto \"indefinite increase, subdivision, and movement.\"\n\nWith Professor Schaefer there is first \"the fortuitous production of life\nupon this globe\"--the chance meeting or jostling of the elements that\nresulted in a bit of living protoplasm, \"or a mass of colloid slime\" in\nthe old seas, or on their shores, \"possessing the property of\nassimilation and therefore of growth.\" Here the whole mystery is\nswallowed at one gulp. \"Reproduction would follow as a matter of\ncourse,\" because all material of this physical nature--fluid or\nsemi-fluid in character--\"has a tendency to undergo subdivision when its\nbulk exceeds a certain size.\"\n\n\"A mass of colloidal slime\" that has the power of assimilation and of\ngrowth and reproduction, is certainly a new thing in the world, and no\nchemical analysis of it can clear up the mystery. It is easy enough to\nproduce colloidal slime, but to endow it with these wonderful powers so\nthat \"the promise and the potency of all terrestrial life\" slumbers in\nit is a staggering proposition.\n\nWhatever the character of this subdivision, whether into equal parts or\nin the form of buds, \"every separate part would resemble the parent in\nchemical and physical properties, and would equally possess the property\nof taking in and assimilating suitable material from its liquid\nenvironment, growing in bulk and reproducing its like by subdivision.\nIn this way from any beginning of living material a primitive form of\nlife would spread and would gradually people the globe. The\nestablishment of life being once effected, all forms of organization\nfollow under the inevitable laws of evolution.\" Why all forms of\norganization--why the body and brain of man--must inevitably follow from\nthe primitive bit of living matter, is just the question upon which we\nwant light. The proposition begs the question. Certainly when you have\ngot the evolutionary process once started in matter which has these\nwonderful powers, all is easy. The professor simply describes what has\ntaken place and seems to think that the mystery is thereby cleared up,\nas if by naming all the parts of a machine and their relation to one\nanother, the machine is accounted for. What caused the iron and steel\nand wood of the machine to take this special form, while in other cases\nthe iron and steel and wood took other radically different forms, and\nvast quantities of these substances took no form at all?\n\nIn working out the evolution of living forms by the aid of the blind\nphysical and chemical agents alone, Professor Schaefer unconsciously\nascribes the power of choice and purpose to the individual cells, as\nwhen he says that the cells of the external layer sink below the surface\nfor better protection and better nutrition. It seems to have been a\nmatter of choice or will that the cells developed a nervous system in\nthe animal and not in the vegetable. Man came because a few cells in\nsome early form of life acquired a slightly greater tendency to react to\nan external stimulus. In this way they were brought into closer touch\nwith the outer world and thereby gained the lead of their duller\nneighbor cells, and became the real rulers of the body, and developed\nthe mind.\n\nIt is bewildering to be told by so competent a person as Professor\nSchaefer that at bottom there is no fundamental difference between the\nliving and non-living. We need not urge the existence of a peculiar\nvital force, as distinct from all other forces, but all distinctions\nbetween things are useless if we cannot say that a new behavior is set\nup in matter which we describe by the word \"vital,\" and that a new\nprinciple is operative in organized matter which we must call\n\"intelligence.\" Of course all movements and processes of living beings\nare in conformity with the general laws of matter, but does such a\nstatement necessarily rule out all idea of the operation of an\norganizing and directing principle that is not operative in the world of\ninanimate things?\n\nIn Schaefer's philosophy evolution is purely a mechanical process--there\nis no inborn tendency, no inherent push, no organizing effort, but all\nresults from the blind groping and chance jostling of the inorganic\nelements; from the molecules of undifferentiated protoplasm to the\nbrain of a Christ or a Plato, is just one series of unintelligent\nphysical and chemical activities in matter.\n\nMay we not say that all the marks or characteristics of a living body\nwhich distinguish it in our experience from an inanimate body, are of a\nnon-scientific character, or outside the sphere of experimental science?\nWe recognize them as readily as we distinguish day from night, but we\ncannot describe them in the fixed terms of science. When we say growth,\nmetabolism, osmosis, the colloidal state, science points out that all\nthis may be affirmed of inorganic bodies. When we say a life principle,\na vital force or soul or spirit or intelligence, science turns a deaf\near.\n\nThe difference between the living and the non-living is not so much a\nphysical difference as a metaphysical difference. Living matter is\nactuated by intelligence. Its activities are spontaneous and\nself-directing. The rock, and the tree that grows beside it, and the\ninsects and rodents that burrow under it, may all be made of one stuff,\nbut their difference to the beholder is fundamental; there is an\nintelligent activity in the one that is not in the other. Now no\nscientific analysis of a body will reveal the secret of this activity.\nAs well might your analysis of a phonographic record hope to disclose a\nsonata of Beethoven latent in the waving lines. No power of chemistry\ncould reveal any difference between the gray matter of Plato's brain\nand that of the humblest citizen of Athens. All the difference between\nman, all that makes a man a man, and an ox an ox, is beyond the reach of\nany of your physico-chemical tests. By the same token the gulf that\nseparates the organic from the inorganic is not within the power of\nscience to disclose. The biochemist is bound to put life in the category\nof the material forces because his science can deal with no other. To\nhim the word \"vital\" is a word merely, it stands for no reality, and the\nsecret of life is merely a chemical reaction. A living body awakens a\ntrain of ideas in our minds that a non-living fails to awaken--a train\nof ideas that belong to another order from that awakened by scientific\ndemonstration. We cannot blame science for ruling out that which it\ncannot touch with its analysis, or repeat with its synthesis. The\nphenomena of life are as obvious to us as anything in the world; we know\ntheir signs and ways, and witness their power, yet in the alembic of our\nscience they turn out to be only physico-chemical processes; hence that\nis all there is of them. Vitality, says Huxley, has no more reality than\nthe horology of a clock. Yet Huxley sees three equal realities in the\nuniverse--matter, energy, and consciousness. But consciousness is the\ncrown of a vital process. Hence it would seem as if there must be\nsomething more real in vitality than Huxley is willing to admit.\n\n\nII\n\nNearly all the later biologists or biological philosophers are as shy of\nthe term \"vital force,\" and even of the word \"vitality,\" as they are of\nthe words \"soul,\" \"spirit,\" \"intelligence,\" when discussing natural\nphenomena. To experimental science such words have no meaning because\nthe supposed realities for which they stand are quite beyond the reach\nof scientific analysis. Ray Lankester, in his \"Science from an Easy\nChair,\" following Huxley, compares vitality with aquosity, and says that\nto have recourse to a vital principle or force to explain a living body\nis no better philosophy than to appeal to a principle of aquosity to\nexplain water. Of course words are words, and they have such weight with\nus that when we have got a name for a thing it is very easy to persuade\nourselves that the thing exists. The terms \"vitality,\" \"vital force,\"\nhave long been in use, and it is not easy to convince one's self that\nthey stand for no reality. Certain it is that living and non-living\nmatter are sharply separated, though when reduced to their chemical\nconstituents in the laboratory they are found to be identical. The\ncarbon, the hydrogen, the nitrogen, the oxygen, and the lime, sulphur,\niron, etc., in a living body are in no way peculiar, but are the same as\nthese elements in the rocks and the soil. We are all made of one stuff;\na man and his dog are made of one stuff; an oak and a pine are made of\none stuff; Jew and Gentile are made of one stuff. Should we be\njustified, then, in saying that there is no difference between them?\nThere is certainly a moral and an intellectual difference between a man\nand his dog, if there is no chemical and mechanical difference. And\nthere is as certainly as wide or a wider difference between living and\nnon-living matter, though it be beyond the reach of science to detect.\nFor this difference we have to have a name, and we use the words\n\"vital,\" \"vitality,\" which seem to me to stand for as undeniable\nrealities as the words heat, light, chemical affinity, gravitation.\nThere is not a principle of roundness, though \"nature centres into\nballs,\" nor of squareness, though crystallization is in right lines, nor\nof aquosity, though two thirds of the surface of the earth is covered\nwith water. Can we on any better philosophical grounds say that there is\na principle of vitality, though the earth swarms with living beings? Yet\nthe word vitality stands for a reality, it stands for a peculiar\nactivity in matter--for certain movements and characteristics for which\nwe have no other term. I fail to see any analogy between aquosity and\nthat condition of matter we call vital or living. Aquosity is not an\nactivity, it is a property, the property of wetness; viscosity is a term\nto describe other conditions of matter; solidity, to describe still\nanother condition; and opacity and transparency, to describe still\nothers--as they affect another of our senses. But the vital activity in\nmatter is a concrete reality. With it there goes the organizing tendency\nor impulse, and upon it hinges the whole evolutionary movement of the\nbiological history of the globe. We can do all sorts of things with\nwater and still keep its aquosity. If we resolve it into its constituent\ngases we destroy its aquosity, but by uniting these gases chemically we\nhave the wetness back again. But if a body loses its vitality, its life,\ncan we by the power of chemistry, or any other power within our reach,\nbring the vitality back to it? Can we make the dead live? You may bray\nyour living body in a mortar, destroy every one of its myriad cells, and\nyet you may not extinguish the last spark of life; the protoplasm is\nstill living. But boil it or bake it and the vitality is gone, and all\nthe art and science of mankind cannot bring it back again. The physical\nand chemical activities remain after the vital activities have ceased.\nDo we not then have to supply a non-chemical, a non-physical force or\nfactor to account for the living body? Is there no difference between\nthe growth of a plant or an animal, and the increase in size of a\nsand-bank or a snow-bank, or a river delta? or between the wear and\nrepair of a working-man's body and the wear and repair of the machine he\ndrives? Excretion and secretion are not in the same categories. The\nliving and the non-living mark off the two grand divisions of matter in\nthe world in which we live, as no two terms merely descriptive of\nchemical and physical phenomena ever can. Life is a motion in matter,\nbut of another order from that of the physico-chemical, though\ninseparable from it. We may forego the convenient term \"vital force.\"\nModern science shies at the term \"force.\" We must have force or energy\nor pressure of some kind to lift dead matter up into the myriad forms of\nlife, though in the last analysis of it it may all date from the sun.\nWhen it builds a living body, we call it a vital force; when it builds a\ngravel-bank, or moves a glacier, we call it a mechanical force; when it\nwrites a poem or composes a symphony, we call it a psychic force--all\ndistinctions which we cannot well dispense with, though of the ultimate\nreality for which these terms stand we can know little. In the latest\nscience heat and light are not substances, though electricity is. They\nare peculiar motions in matter which give rise to sensations in certain\nliving bodies that we name light and heat, as another peculiar motion in\nmatter gives rise to a sensation we call sound. Life is another kind of\nmotion in certain aggregates of matter--more mysterious or inexplicable\nthan all others because it cannot be described in terms of the others,\nand because it defies the art and science of man to reproduce.\n\nThough the concepts \"vital force\" and \"life principle\" have no standing\nin the court of modern biological science, it is interesting to observe\nhow often recourse is had by biological writers to terms that embody\nthe same idea. Thus the German physiologist Verworn, the determined\nenemy of the old conception of life, in his great work on\n\"Irritability,\" has recourse to \"the specific energy of living\nsubstances.\" One is forced to believe that without this \"specific\nenergy\" his \"living substances\" would never have arisen out of the\nnon-living.\n\nProfessor Moore, of Liverpool University, as I have already pointed out\nwhile discussing the term \"vital force,\" invents a new phrase, \"biotic\nenergy,\" to explain the same phenomena. Surely a force by any other name\nis no more and no less potent. Both Verworn and Moore feel the need, as\nwe all do, of some term, or terms, by which to explain that activity in\nmatter which we call vital. Other writers have referred to \"a peculiar\npower of synthesis\" in plants and animals, which the inanimate forms do\nnot possess.\n\nRay Lankester, to whom I have already referred in discussing this\nsubject, helps himself out by inventing, not a new force, but a new\nsubstance in which he fancies \"resides the peculiar property of living\nmatter.\" He calls this hypothetical substance \"plasmogen,\" and thinks of\nit as an ultimate chemical compound hidden in protoplasm. Has this\n\"ultimate molecule of life\" any more scientific or philosophical\nvalidity than the old conception of a vital force? It looks very much\nlike another name for the same thing--an attempt to give the mind\nsomething to take hold of in dealing with the mystery of living things.\nThis imaginary \"life-stuff\" of the British scientist is entirely beyond\nthe reach of chemical analysis; no man has ever seen it or proved its\nexistence. In fact it is simply an invention of Ray Lankester to fill a\nbreak in the sequence of observed phenomena. Something seems to possess\nthe power of starting or kindling that organizing activity in a living\nbody, and it seems to me it matters little whether we call it\n\"plasmogen,\" or a \"life principle,\" or \"biotic energy,\" or what not; it\nsurely leavens the loaf. Matter takes on new activities under its\ninfluence. Ray Lankester thinks that plasmogen came into being in early\ngeologic ages, and that the conditions which led to its formation have\nprobably never recurred. Whether he thinks its formation was merely a\nchance hit or not, he does not say.\n\nWe see matter all about us, acted upon by the mechanico-chemical forces,\nthat never takes on any of the distinctive phenomena of living bodies.\nYet Verworn is convinced that if we could bring the elements of a living\nbody together as Nature does, in the same order and proportion, and\ncombine them in the selfsame way, or bring about the vital conditions, a\nliving being would result. Undoubtedly. It amounts to saying that if we\nhad Nature's power we could do what she does. _If_ we could marry the\nelements as she does, and bless the banns as she seems to, we could\nbuild a man out of a clay-bank. But clearly physics and chemistry alone,\nas we know and practice them, are not equal to the task.\n\n\nIII\n\nOne of the fundamental characteristics of life is power of adaptation;\nit will adapt itself to almost any condition; it is willing and\naccommodating. It is like a stream that can be turned into various\nchannels; the gall insects turn it into channels to suit their ends when\nthey sting the leaf of a tree or the stalk of a plant, and deposit an\negg in the wound. \"Build me a home and a nursery for my young,\" says the\ninsect. \"With all my heart,\" says the leaf, and forthwith forgets its\nfunction as a leaf, and proceeds to build up a structure, often of great\ndelicacy and complexity, to house and cradle its enemy. The current of\nlife flows on blindly and takes any form imposed upon it. But in the\ncase of the vegetable galls it takes life to control life. Man cannot\nproduce these galls by artificial means. But we can take various\nmechanical and chemical liberties with embryonic animal life in its\nlower sea-forms. Professor Loeb has fertilized the eggs of sea-urchins\nby artificial means. The eggs of certain forms may be made to produce\ntwins by altering the constitution of the sea-water, and the twins can\nbe made to grow together so as to produce monstrosities by another\nchemical change in the sea-water. The eyes of certain fish embryos may\nbe fused into a single cyclopean eye by adding magnesium chloride to the\nwater in which they live. Loeb says, \"It is _a priori_ obvious that an\nunlimited number of pathological variations might be produced by a\nvariation in the concentration and constitution of the sea water, and\nexperience confirms this statement.\" It has been found that when frog's\neggs are turned upside down and compressed between two glass plates for\na number of hours, some of the eggs give rise to twins. Professor Morgan\nfound that if he destroyed half of a frog's egg after the first\nsegmentation, the remaining half gave rise to half an embryo, but that\nif he put the half-egg upside down, and compressed it between two glass\nplates, he got a perfect embryo frog of half the normal size. Such\nthings show how plastic and adaptive life is. Dr. Carrel's experiments\nwith living animal tissue immersed in a proper mother-liquid illustrate\nhow the vital process--cell-multiplication--may be induced to go on and\non, blindly, aimlessly, for an almost indefinite time. The cells\nmultiply, but they do not organize themselves into a constructive\ncommunity and build an organ or any purposeful part. They may be likened\nto a lot of blind masons piling up brick and mortar without any\narchitect to direct their work or furnish them a plan. A living body of\nthe higher type is not merely an association of cells; it is an\nassociation and cooeperation of communities of cells, each community\nworking to a definite end and building an harmonious whole. The\nbiochemist who would produce life in the laboratory has before him the\nproblem of compounding matter charged with this organizing tendency or\npower, and doubtless if he ever should evoke this mysterious process\nthrough his chemical reactions, it would possess this power, as this is\nwhat distinguishes the organic from the inorganic.\n\nI do not see mind or intelligence in the inorganic world in the sense in\nwhich I see it in the organic. In the heavens one sees power, vastness,\nsublimity, unspeakable, but one sees only the physical laws working on a\ngrander scale than on the earth. Celestial mechanics do not differ from\nterrestrial mechanics, however tremendous and imposing the result of\ntheir activities. But in the humblest living thing--in a spear of grass\nby the roadside, in a gnat, in a flea--there lurks a greater mystery. In\nan animate body, however small, there abides something of which we get\nno trace in the vast reaches of astronomy, a kind of activity that is\nincalculable, indeterminate, and super-mechanical, not lawless, but\nmaking its own laws, and escaping from the iron necessity that rules in\nthe inorganic world.\n\nOur mathematics and our science can break into the circle of the\ncelestial and the terrestrial forces, and weigh and measure and separate\nthem, and in a degree understand them; but the forces of life defy our\nanalysis as well as our synthesis.\n\nKnowing as we do all the elements that make up the body and brain of a\nman, all the physiological processes, and all the relations and\ninterdependence of his various organs, if, in addition, we knew all his\ninheritances, his whole ancestry back to the primordial cells from which\nhe sprang, and if we also knew that of every person with whom he comes\nin contact and who influences his life, could we forecast his future,\npredict the orbit in which his life would revolve, indicate its\neclipses, its perturbations, and the like, as we do that of an\nastronomic body? or could we foresee his affinities and combinations as\nwe do that of a chemical body? Had we known any of the animal forms in\nhis line of ascent, could we have foretold man as we know him to-day?\nCould we have foretold the future of any form of life from its remote\nbeginnings? Would our mathematics and our chemistry have been of any\navail in our dealing with such a problem? Biology is not in the same\ncategory with geology and astronomy. In the inorganic world, chemical\naffinity builds up and pulls down. It integrates the rocks and, under\nchanged conditions, it disintegrates them. In the organic world chemical\naffinity is equally active, but it plays a subordinate part. It neither\nbuilds up nor pulls down. Vital activities, if we must shun the term\n\"vital force,\" do both. Barring accidents, the life of all organisms is\nterminated by other organisms. In the order of nature, life destroys\nlife, and compounds destroy compounds. When the air and soil and water\nhold no invisible living germs, organic bodies never decay. It is not\nthe heat that begets putrefaction, but germs in the air. Sufficient heat\nkills the germs, but what disintegrates the germs and reduces them to\ndust? Other still smaller organisms? and so on _ad infinitum_? Does the\nsequence of life have no end? The destruction of one chemical compound\nmeans the formation of other chemical compounds; chemical affinity\ncannot be annulled, but the activity we call vital is easily arrested. A\nliving body can be killed, but a chemical body can only be changed into\nanother chemical body.\n\nThe least of living things, I repeat, holds a more profound mystery than\nall our astronomy and our geology hold. It introduces us to activities\nwhich our mathematics do not help us to deal with. Our science can\ndescribe the processes of a living body, and name all the material\nelements that enter into it, but it cannot tell us in what the peculiar\nactivity consists, or just what it is that differentiates living matter\nfrom non-living. Its analysis reveals no difference. But this difference\nconsists in something beyond the reach of chemistry and of physics; it\nis active intelligence, the power of self-direction, of self-adjustment,\nof self-maintenance, of adapting means to an end. It is notorious that\nthe hand cannot always cover the flea; this atom has will, and knows\nthe road to safety. Behold what our bodies know over and above what we\nknow! Professor Czapek reveals to us a chemist at work in the body who\nproceeds precisely like the chemist in his laboratory; they might both\nhave graduated at the same school. Thus the chemist in the laboratory is\naccustomed to dissolve the substance which is to be used in an\nexperiment to react on other substances. The chemical course in living\ncells is the same. All substances destined for reactions are first\ndissolved. No compound is taken up in living cells before it is\ndissolved. Digestion is essentially identical with dissolving or\nbringing into a liquid state. On the other hand, when the chemist wishes\nto preserve a living substance from chemical change, he transfers it\nfrom a state of solution into a solid state. The chemist in the living\nbody does the same thing. Substances which are to be stored up, such as\nstarch, fat, or protein bodies, are deposited in insoluble form, ready\nto be dissolved and used whenever wanted for the life processes.\nPoisonous substances are eliminated from living bodies by the same\nprocess of precipitation. Oxalic acid is a product of oxidation in\nliving cells, and has strong poisonous properties. To get rid of it, the\nchemist inside the body, by the aid of calcium salts, forms insoluble\ncompounds of it, and thus casts it out. To separate substances from each\nother by filtration, or by shaking with suitable liquids, is one of the\ndaily tasks of the chemist. Analogous processes occur regularly in\nliving cells. Again, when the chemist wishes to finish his filtration\nquickly, he uses filters which have a large surface. \"In living\nprotoplasms, this condition is very well fulfilled by the foam-like\nstructure which affords an immense surface in a very small space.\" In\nthe laboratory the chemist mixes his substances by stirring. The body\nchemist achieves the same result by the streaming of protoplasm. The\ncells know what they want, and how to attain it, as clearly as the\nchemist does. The intelligence of the living body, or what we must call\nsuch for want of a better term, is shown in scores of ways--by the means\nit takes to protect itself against microbes, by the antitoxins that it\nforms. Indeed, if we knew all that our bodies know, what mysteries would\nbe revealed to us!\n\n\nIV\n\nLife goes up-stream--goes against the tendency to a static equilibrium\nin matter; decay and death go down. What is it in the body that\nstruggles against poisons and seeks to neutralize their effects? What is\nit that protects the body against a second attack of certain diseases,\nmaking it immune? Chemical changes, undoubtedly, but what brings about\nthe chemical changes? The body is a _colony_ of living units called\ncells, that behaves much like a colony of insects when it takes measures\nto protect itself against its enemies. The body forms anti-toxins when\nit has to. It knows how to do it as well as bees know how to ventilate\nthe hive, or how to seal up or entomb the grub of an invading moth.\nIndeed, how much the act of the body, in encysting a bullet in its\ntissues, is like the act of the bees in encasing with wax a worm in the\ncombs!\n\nWhat is that in the body which at great altitudes increases the number\nof red corpuscles in the blood, those oxygen-bearers, so as to make up\nfor the lessened amount of oxygen breathed by reason of the rarity of\nthe air? Under such conditions, the amount of haemoglobin is almost\ndoubled. I do not call this thing a force; I call it an\nintelligence--the intelligence that pervades the body and all animate\nnature, and does the right thing at the right time. We, no doubt, speak\ntoo loosely of it when we say that it prompts or causes the body to do\nthis, or to do that; it _is_ the body; the relation of the two has no\nhuman analogy; the two are one.\n\nMan breaks into the circuit of the natural inorganic forces and arrests\nthem and controls them, and makes them do his work--turn his wheels,\ndrive his engines, run his errands, etc.; but he cannot do this in the\nsame sense with the organic forces; he cannot put a spell upon the pine\ntree and cause it to build him a house or a nursery. Only the insects\ncan do a thing like that; only certain insects can break into the\ncircuit of vegetable life and divert its forces to serve their special\nends. One kind of an insect stings a bud or a leaf of the oak, and the\ntree forthwith grows a solid nutlike protuberance the size of a\nchestnut, in which the larvae of the insect live and feed and mature.\nAnother insect stings the same leaf and produces the common oak-apple--a\nsmooth, round, green, shell-like body filled with a network of radiating\nfilaments, with the egg and then the grub of the insect at the centre.\nStill another kind of insect stings the oak bud and deposits its eggs\nthere, and the oak proceeds to grow a large white ball made up of a kind\nof succulent vegetable wool with red spots evenly distributed over its\nsurface, as if it were some kind of spotted fruit or flower. In June, it\nis about the size of a small apple. Cut it in half and you find scores\nof small shell-like growths radiating from the bud-stem, like the seeds\nof the dandelion, each with a kind of vegetable pappus rising from it,\nand together making up the ball as the pappus of the dandelion seeds\nmakes up the seed-globe of this plant. It is one of the most singular\nvegetable products, or vegetable perversions, that I know of. A sham\nfruit filled with sham seeds; each seed-like growth contains a grub,\nwhich later in the season pupates and eats its way out, a winged insect.\nHow foreign to anything we know as mechanical or chemical it all\nis!--the surprising and incalculable tricks of life!\n\nAnother kind of insect stings the oak leaf and there develops a pale,\nsmooth, solid, semi-transparent sphere, the size of a robin's egg, dense\nand succulent like the flesh of an apple, with the larvae of the insect\nsubsisting in its interior. Each of these widely different forms is\nevoked from the oak leaf by the magic of an insect's ovipositor.\nChemically, the constituents of all of them are undoubtedly the same.\n\nIt is one of the most curious and suggestive things in living nature. It\nshows how plastic and versatile life is, and how utterly unmechanical.\nLife plays so many and such various tunes upon the same instruments; or\nrather, the living organism is like many instruments in one; the tones\nof all instruments slumber in it to be awakened when the right performer\nappears. At least four different insects get four different tunes, so to\nspeak, out of the oak leaf.\n\nCertain insects avail themselves of the animal organism also and go\nthrough their cycle of development and metamorphosis within its tissues\nor organs in a similar manner.\n\n\nV\n\nOn the threshold of the world of living organisms stands that wonderful\nminute body, the cell, the unit of life--a piece of self-regulating and\nself-renewing mechanism that holds the key to all the myriads of living\nforms that fill the world, from the amoeba up to man. For chemistry\nto produce the cell is apparently as impossible as for it to produce a\nbird's egg, or a living flower, or the heart and brain of man. The body\nis a communal state made up of myriads of cells that all work together\nto build up and keep going the human personality. There is the same\ncooeperation and division of labor that takes place in the civic state,\nand in certain insect communities. As in the social and political\norganism, thousands of the citizen cells die every day and new cells of\nthe same kind take their place. Or, it is like an army in battle being\nconstantly recruited--as fast as a soldier falls another takes his\nplace, till the whole army is changed, and yet remains the same. The\nwaste is greatest at the surface of the body through the skin, and\nthrough the stomach and lungs. The worker cells, namely, the tissue\ncells, like the worker bees in the hive, pass away the most rapidly;\nthen, according to Haeckel, there are certain constants, certain cells\nthat remain throughout life. \"There is always a solid groundwork of\nconservative cells, the descendants of which secure the further\nregeneration.\" The traditions of the state are kept up by the\ncitizen-cells that remain, so that, though all is changed in time, the\ngenius of the state remains; the individuality of the man is not lost.\n\"The sense of personal identity is maintained across the flight of\nmolecules,\" just as it is maintained in the state or nation, by the\nunits that remain, and by the established order. There is an unwritten\nconstitution, a spirit that governs, like Maeterlinck's \"spirit of the\nhive.\" The traditions of the body are handed down from mother cell to\ndaughter cell, though just what that means in terms of physiology or\nmetabolism I do not know. But this we know--that you are you and I am I,\nand that human life and personality can never be fully explained or\naccounted for in terms of the material forces.\n\n\n\n\nVIII\n\nLIFE AND SCIENCE\n\nI\n\n\nThe limited and peculiar activity which arises in matter and which we\ncall vital; which comes and goes; which will not stay to be analyzed;\nwhich we in vain try to reproduce in our laboratories; which is\ninseparable from chemistry and physics, but which is not summed up by\nthem; which seems to use them and direct them to new ends,--an entity\nwhich seems to have invaded the kingdom of inert matter at some definite\ntime in the earth's history, and to have set up an insurgent movement\nthere; cutting across the circuits of the mechanical and chemical\nforces; turning them about, pitting one against the other; availing\nitself of gravity, of chemical affinity, of fluids and gases, of osmosis\nand exosmosis, of colloids, of oxidation and hydration, and yet\nexplicable by none of these things; clothing itself with garments of\nwarmth and color and perfume woven from the cold, insensate elements;\nsetting up new activities in matter; building up myriads of new unstable\ncompounds; struggling against the tendency of the physical forces to a\ndead equilibrium; indeterminate, intermittent, fugitive; limited in\ntime, limited in space; present in some worlds, absent from others;\nbreaking up the old routine of the material forces, and instituting new\ncurrents, new tendencies; departing from the linear activities of the\ninorganic, and setting up the circular activities of living currents;\nreplacing change by metamorphosis, revolution by evolution, accretion by\nsecretion, crystallization by cell-formation, aggregation by growth;\nand, finally, introducing a new power into the world--the mind and soul\nof man--this wonderful, and apparently transcendental something which we\ncall life--how baffling and yet how fascinating is the inquiry into its\nnature and origin! Are we to regard it as Tyndall did, and as others\nbefore and since his time did and do, as potential in the constitution\nof matter, and self-evolved, like the chemical compounds that are\ninvolved in its processes?\n\nAs mechanical energy is latent in coal, and in all combustible bodies,\nis vital energy latent in carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and so forth,\nneeding only the right conditions to bring it out? Mechanical energy is\nconvertible into electrical energy, and _vice versa_. Indeed, the circle\nof the physical forces is easily traced, easily broken into, but when or\nhow these forces merge into the vital and psychic forces, or support\nthem, or become them--there is the puzzle. If we limit the natural to\nthe inorganic order, then are living bodies supernatural?\nSuper-mechanical and super-chemical certainly, and chemics and\nmechanics and electro-statics include all the material forces. Is life\noutside this circle? It is certain that this circle does not always\ninclude life, but can life exist outside this circle? When it appears it\nis always inside it.\n\nScience can only deal with life as a physical phenomenon; as a psychic\nphenomenon it is beyond its scope, except so far as the psychic is\nmanifested through the physical. Not till it has produced living matter\nfrom dead can it speak with authority upon the question of the origin of\nlife. Its province is limited to the description and analysis of life\nprocesses, but when it essays to name what institutes the processes, or\nto disclose the secret of organization, it becomes philosophy or\ntheology. When Haeckel says that life originated spontaneously, he does\nnot speak with the authority of science, because he cannot prove his\nassertion; it is his opinion, and that is all. When Helmholtz says that\nlife had no beginning, he is in the same case. When our later\nbiophysicists say that life is of physico-chemical origin, they are in\nthe same case; when Tyndall says that there is no energy in the universe\nbut solar energy, he is in the same case; when Sir Oliver Lodge says\nthat life is an entity outside of and independent of matter, he is in\nthe same case. Philosophy and theology can take leaps in the dark, but\nscience must have solid ground to go upon. When it speculates or\ntheorizes, it must make its speculations good. Scientific prophecy is\namenable to the same tests as other prophecy. In the absence of proof by\nexperiment--scientific proof--to get the living out of the non-living we\nhave either got to conceive of matter itself as fundamentally creative,\nas the new materialism assumes, or else we have got to have an external\nCreator, as the old theology assumes. And the difference is more\napparent than real. Tyndall is \"baffled and bewildered\" by the fact that\nout of its molecular vibrations and activities \"things so utterly\nincongruous with them as sensation, thought, and emotion can be\nderived.\" His science is baffled and bewildered because it cannot, bound\nas it is by the iron law of the conservation and correlation of energy,\ntrace the connection between them. But his philosophy or his theology\nwould experience little difficulty. Henri Bergson shows no hesitation in\ndeclaring that the fate of consciousness is not involved in the fate of\nthe brain through which it is manifested, but it is his philosophy and\nnot his science that inspires this faith. Tyndall deifies matter to get\nlife out of it--makes the creative energy potential in it. Bergson\ndeifies or spiritualizes life as a psychic, creative principle, and\nmakes matter its instrument or vehicle.\n\nScience is supreme in its own sphere, the sphere, or hemisphere, of the\nobjective world, but it does not embrace the whole of human life,\nbecause human life is made up of two spheres, or hemispheres, one of\nwhich is the subjective world. There is a world within us also, the\nworld of our memories, thoughts, emotions, aspirations, imaginings,\nwhich overarches the world of our practical lives and material\nexperience, as the sky overarches the earth. It is in the spirit of\nscience that we conquer and use the material world in which we live; it\nis in the spirit of art and literature, philosophy and religion, that we\nexplore and draw upon the immaterial world of our own hearts and souls.\nOf course the man of science is also a philosopher--may I not even say\nhe is also a prophet and poet? Not otherwise could he organize his\nscientific facts and see their due relations, see their drift and the\nsequence of forces that bind the universe into a whole. As a man of\nscience he traces out the causes of the tides and the seasons, the\nnature and origin of disease, and a thousand and one other things; but\nonly as a philosopher can he see the body as a whole and speculate about\nthe mystery of its organization; only as a philosopher can he frame\ntheories and compare values and interpret the phenomena he sees about\nhim.\n\n\nII\n\nWe can only know, in the scientific sense, the physical and chemical\nphenomena of life; its essence, its origin, we can only know as\nphilosophy and idealism know them. We have to turn philosophers when we\nask any ultimate question. The feeling we have that the scientific\nconception of life is inadequate springs from the philosophical habit of\nmind. Yet this habit is quite as legitimate as the scientific habit, and\nis bound to supplement the latter all through life.\n\nThe great men of science, like Darwin and Huxley, are philosophers in\ntheir theories and conclusions, and men of science in their observations\nand experiments. The limitations of science in dealing with such a\nproblem are seen in the fact that science can take no step till it has\nlife to begin with. When it has got the living body, it can analyze its\nphenomena and reduce them to their chemical and physical equivalents,\nand thus persuade itself that the secret of life may yet be hit upon in\nthe laboratory. Professor Czapek, of the University of Prague, in his\nwork on \"The Chemical Phenomena of Life\" speaks for science when he\nsays, \"What we call life is nothing else but a complex of innumerable\nchemical reactions in the living substance which we call protoplasm.\"\nThe \"living substance\" is assumed to begin with, and then we are told\nthat the secret of its living lies in its chemical and physical\nprocesses. This is in one sense true. No doubt at all that if these\nprocesses were arrested, life would speedily end, but do they alone\naccount for its origin? Is it not like accounting for a baby in terms of\nits breathing and eating? It was a baby before it did either, and it\nwould seem as if life must in some way ante-date the physical and\nchemical processes that attend it, or at least be bound up in them in a\nway that no scientific analysis can reveal.\n\nIf life is merely a mode of motion in matter, it is fundamentally unlike\nany and all other modes of motion, because, while we can institute all\nthe others at will, we are powerless to institute this. The mode of\nmotion we call heat is going on in varying degrees of velocity all about\nus at all times and seasons, but the vital motion of matter is limited\nto a comparatively narrow circle. We can end it, but we cannot start it.\n\nThe rigidly scientific type of mind sees no greater mystery in the\ndifference in contour of different animal bodies than a mere difference\nin the density of the germ cells: \"one density results in a sequence of\ncell-densities to form a horse; another a dog; another a cat\"; and avers\nthat if we \"repeat the same complex conditions, the same results are as\ninevitable as the sequences of forces that result in the formation of\nhydrogen monoxide from hydrogen and oxygen.\"\n\nDifferent degrees of density may throw light on the different behavior\nof gases and fluids and solids, but can it throw any light on the\nquestion of why a horse is a horse, and a dog a dog? or why one is an\nherbivorous feeder, and the other a carnivorous?\n\nThe scientific explanation of life phenomena is analogous to reducing a\nliving body to its ashes and pointing to them--the lime, the iron, the\nphosphorus, the hydrogen, the oxygen, the carbon, the nitrogen--as the\nwhole secret.\n\nProfessor Czapek is not entirely consistent. He says that it is his\nconviction that there is something in physiology that transcends the\nchemistry and the physics of inorganic nature. At the same time he\naffirms, \"It becomes more and more improbable that Life develops forces\nwhich are unknown in inanimate Nature.\" But psychic forces are a product\nof life, and they certainly are not found in inanimate nature. But\nwithout laying stress upon this fact, may we not say that if no new\nforce is developed by, or is characteristic of, life, certainly new\neffects, new processes, new compounds of matter are produced by life?\nMatter undergoes some change that chemical analysis does not reveal. The\nmystery of isomeric substances appears, a vast number of new compounds\nof carbon appear, the face of the earth changes. The appearance of life\nin inert matter is a change analogous to the appearance of the mind of\nman in animate nature. The old elements and forces are turned to new and\nhigher uses. Man does not add to the list of forces or elements in the\nearth, but he develops them, and turns them to new purposes; they now\nobey and serve him, just as the old chemistry and physics obey and\nserve life. Czapek tells us of the vast number of what are called\nenzymes, or ferments, that appear in living bodies--\"never found in\ninorganic Nature and not to be gained by chemical synthesis.\" Orders and\nsuborders of enzymes, they play a part in respiration, in digestion, in\nassimilation. Some act on the fats, some on the carbohydrates, some\nproduce inversion, others dissolution and precipitation. These enzymes\nare at once the products and the agents of life. They must exert force,\nchemical force, or, shall we say, they transform chemical force into\nlife force, or, to use Professor Moore's term, into \"biotic energy\"?\n\n\nIII\n\nThe inorganic seems dreaming of the organic. Behold its dreams in the\nfern and tree forms upon the window pane and upon the stone flagging of\na winter morning! In the Brunonian movement of matter in solution, in\ncrystallization, in chemical affinity, in polarity, in osmosis, in the\ngrowth of flint or chert nodules, in limestone formations--like seeking\nlike--in these and in other activities, inert matter seems dreaming of\nlife.\n\nThe chemists have played upon this tendency in the inorganic to parody\nor simulate some of the forms of living matter. A noted European\nchemist, Dr. Leduc, has produced what he calls \"osmotic growths,\" from\npurely unorganized mineral matter--growths in form like seaweed and\npolyps and corals and trees. His seeds are fragments of calcium\nchloride, and his soil is a solution of the alkaline carbonates,\nphosphates, or silicates. When his seeds are sown in these solutions, we\nsee inert matter germinating, \"putting forth bud and stem and root and\nbranch and leaf and fruit,\" precisely as in the living vegetable\nkingdom. It is not a growth by accretion, as in crystallization, but by\nintussusception, as in life. These ghostly things exhibit the phenomena\nof circulation and respiration and nutrition, and a crude sort of\nreproduction by budding; they repair their injuries, and are able to\nperform periodic movements, just as does an animal or a plant; they have\na period of vigorous youthful growth, of old age, of decay, and of\ndeath. In form, in color, in texture, and in cell structure, they\nimitate so closely the cell structures of organic growth as to suggest\nsomething uncanny or diabolical. And yet the author of them does not\nclaim that they are alive. They are not edible, they contain no\nprotoplasm--no starch or sugar or peptone or fats or carbohydrates.\nThese chemical creations by Dr. Leduc are still dead matter--dead\ncolloids--only one remove from crystallization; on the road to life,\nfore-runners of life, but not life. If he could set up the\nchlorophyllian process in his chemical reactions among inorganic\ncompounds, the secret of life would be in his hands. But only the green\nleaf can produce chlorophyll; and yet, which was first, the leaf or the\nchlorophyll?\n\nProfessor Czapek is convinced that \"some substances must exist in\nprotoplasm which are directly responsible for the life processes,\" and\nyet the chemists cannot isolate and identify those substances.\n\nHow utterly unmechanical a living body is, at least how far it\ntranscends mere mechanics is shown by what the chemists call\n\"autolysis.\" Pulverize your watch, and you have completely destroyed\neverything that made it a watch except the dead matter; but pulverize or\nreduce to a pulp a living plant, and though you have destroyed all cell\nstructure, you have not yet destroyed the living substance; you have\nannihilated the mechanism, but you have not killed the something that\nkeeps up the life process. Protoplasm takes time to die, but your\nmachine stops instantly, and its elements are no more potent in a new\nmachine than they were at first. \"In the pulp prepared by grinding down\nliving organisms in a mortar, some vital phenomena continue for a long\ntime.\" The life processes cease, and the substances or elements of the\ndead body remain as before. Their chemical reactions are the same. There\nis no new chemistry, no new mechanics, no new substance in a live body,\nbut there is a new tendency or force or impulse acting in matter,\ninspiring it, so to speak, to new ends. It is here that idealism parts\ncompany with exact science. It is here that the philosophers go one\nway, and the rigid scientists the other. It is from this point of view\nthat the philosophy of Henri Bergson, based so largely as it is upon\nscientific material, has been so bitterly assailed from the scientific\ncamp.\n\nThe living cell is a wonderful machine, but if we ask which is first,\nlife or the cell, where are we? There is the synthetical reaction in the\ncell, and the analytical or splitting reaction--the organizing, and the\ndisorganizing processes--what keeps up this seesaw and preserves the\nequilibrium? A life force, said the older scientists; only chemical\nlaws, say the new. A prodigious change in the behavior of matter is\nwrought by life, and whether we say it is by chemical laws, or by a life\nforce, the mystery remains.\n\nThe whole secret of life centres in the cell, in the plant cell; and\nthis cell does not exceed .005 millimetres in diameter. An enormous\nnumber of chemical reactions take place in this minute space. It is a\nworld in little. Here are bodies of different shapes whose service is to\nabsorb carbon dioxide, and form sugar and carbohydrates. Must we go\noutside of matter itself, and of chemical reactions, to account for it?\nCall this unknown factor \"vital force,\" as has so long been done, or\nname it \"biotic energy,\" as Professor Moore has lately done, and the\nmystery remains the same. It is a new behavior in matter, call it by\nwhat name we will.\n\nInanimate nature seems governed by definite laws; that is, given the\nsame conditions, the same results always follow. The reactions between\ntwo chemical elements under the same conditions are always the same. The\nphysical forces go their unchanging ways, and are variable only as the\nconditions vary. In dealing with them we know exactly what to expect. We\nknow at what degree of temperature, under the same conditions, water\nwill boil, and at what degree of temperature it will freeze. Chance and\nprobability play no part in such matters. But when we reach the world of\nanimate nature, what a contrast we behold! Here, within certain limits,\nall is in perpetual flux and change. Living bodies are never two moments\nthe same. Variability is the rule. We never know just how a living body\nwill behave, under given conditions, till we try it. A late spring frost\nmay kill nearly every bean stalk or potato plant or hill of corn in your\ngarden, or nearly every shoot upon your grapevine. The survivors have\ngreater powers of resistance--a larger measure of that mysterious\nsomething we call vitality. One horse will endure hardships and\nexposures that will kill scores of others. What will agitate one\ncommunity will not in the same measure agitate another. What will break\nor discourage one human heart will sit much more lightly upon another.\nLife introduces an element of uncertainty or indeterminateness that we\ndo not find in the inorganic world. Bodies still have their laws or\nconditions of activity, but they are elastic and variable. Among living\nthings we have in a measure escaped from the iron necessity that holds\nthe world of dead matter in its grip. Dead matter ever tends to a static\nequilibrium; living matter to a dynamic poise, or a balance between the\nintake and the output of energy. Life is a peculiar activity in matter.\nIf the bicyclist stops, his wheel falls down; no mechanical contrivance\ncould be devised that could take his place on the wheel, and no\ncombination of purely chemical and physical forces can alone do with\nmatter what life does with it. The analogy here hinted at is only\ntentative. I would not imply that the relation of life to matter is\nmerely mechanical and external, like that of the rider to his wheel. In\nlife, the rider and his wheel are one, but when life vanishes, the wheel\nfalls down. The chemical and physical activity of matter is perpetual;\nwith a high-power microscope we may see the Brunonian movement in\nliquids and gases any time and at all times, but the movement we call\nvitality dominates these and turns them to new ends. I suppose the\nnature of the activity of the bombarding molecules of gases and liquids\nis the same in our bodies as out; that turmoil of the particles goes on\nforever; it is, in itself, blind, fateful, purposeless; but life\nfurnishes, or _is_, an organizing principle that brings order and\npurpose out of this chaos. It does not annul any of the mechanical or\nchemical principles, but under its tutelage or inspiration they produce\na host of new substances, and a world of new and beautiful and wonderful\nforms.\n\n\nIV\n\nBergson says the intellect is characterized by a natural inability to\nunderstand life. Certain it is, I think, that science alone cannot grasp\nits mystery. We must finally appeal to philosophy; we must have recourse\nto ideal values--to a non-scientific or super-scientific principle. We\ncannot live intellectually or emotionally upon science alone. Science\nreveals to us the relations and inter-dependence of things in the\nphysical world and their relations to our physical well-being;\nphilosophy reveals their relations to our mental and spiritual life,\ntheir meanings and their ideal values. Poor, indeed, is the man who has\nno philosophy, no commanding outlook over the tangles and contradictions\nof the world of sense. There is probably some unknown and unknowable\nfactor involved in the genesis of life, but that that factor or\nprinciple does not belong to the natural, universal order is\nunthinkable. Yet to fail to see that what we must call intelligence\npervades and is active in all organic nature is to be spiritually blind.\nBut to see it as something foreign to or separable from nature is to do\nviolence to our faith in the constancy and sufficiency of the natural\norder. One star differeth from another in glory. There are degrees of\nmystery in the universe. The most mystifying thing in inorganic nature\nis electricity,--that disembodied energy that slumbers in the ultimate\nparticles of matter, unseen, unfelt, unknown, till it suddenly leaps\nforth with such terrible vividness and power on the face of the storm,\nor till we summon it through the transformation of some other form of\nenergy. A still higher and more inscrutable mystery is life, that\nsomething which clothes itself in each infinitely varied and beautiful\nas well as unbeautiful form of matter. We can evoke electricity at will\nfrom many different sources, but we can evoke life only from other life;\nthe biogenetic law is inviolable.\n\nProfessor Soddy says, \"Natural philosophy may explain a rainbow but not\na rabbit.\" There is no secret about a rainbow; we can produce it at will\nout of perfectly colorless beginnings. \"But nothing but rabbits will or\ncan produce a rabbit, a proof again that we cannot say what a rabbit is,\nthough we may have a perfect knowledge of every anatomical and\nmicroscopic detail.\"\n\nTo regard life as of non-natural origin puts it beyond the sphere of\nlegitimate inquiry; to look upon it as of natural origin, or as bound in\na chain of chemical sequences, as so many late biochemists do, is still\nto put it where our science cannot unlock the mystery. If we should ever\nsucceed in producing living matter in our laboratories, it would not\nlessen the mystery any more than the birth of a baby in the household\nlessens the mystery of generation. It only brings it nearer home.\n\n\nV\n\nWhat is peculiar to organic nature is the living cell. Inside the cell,\ndoubtless, the same old chemistry and physics go on--the same universal\nlaw of the transformation of energy is operative. In its minute compass\nthe transmutation of the inorganic into the organic, which constitutes\nwhat Tyndall called \"the miracle and the mystery of vitality,\" is\nperpetually enacted. But what is the secret of the cell itself? Science\nis powerless to tell us. You may point out to your heart's content that\nonly chemical and physical forces are discoverable in living matter;\nthat there is no element or force in a plant that is not in the stone\nbeside which it grew, or in the soil in which it takes root; and yet,\nuntil your chemistry and your physics will enable you to produce the\nliving cell, or account for its mysterious self-directed activities,\nyour science avails not. \"Living cells,\" says a late European authority,\n\"possess most effective means to accelerate reactions and to cause\nsurprising chemical results.\"\n\nBehold the four principal elements forming stones and soils and water\nand air for whole geologic or astronomic ages, and then behold them\nforming plants and animals, and finally forming the brains that give us\nart and literature and philosophy and modern civilization. What prompted\nthe elements to this new and extraordinary behavior? Science is dumb\nbefore such a question.\n\nLiving bodies are immersed in physical conditions as in a sea. External\nagencies--light, moisture, air, gravity, mechanical and chemical\ninfluences--cause great changes in them; but their power to adapt\nthemselves to these changes, and profit by them, remains unexplained.\nAre morphological processes identical with chemical ones?\n\nIn the inorganic world we everywhere see mechanical adjustment, repose,\nstability, equilibrium, through the action and interaction of outward\nphysical forces; a natural bridge is a striking example of the action of\nblind mechanical forces among the rocks. In the organic world we see\nliving adaptation which involves a non-mechanical principle. An\nadjustment is an outward fitting together of parts; an adaptation\nimplies something flowing, unstable, plastic, compromising; it is a\nmoulding process; passivity on one side, and activity on the other.\nLiving things struggle; they struggle up as well as down; they struggle\nall round the circle, while the pull of dead matter is down only.\n\nBehold what a good chemist a plant is! With what skill it analyzes the\ncarbonic acid in the air, retaining the carbon and returning the oxygen\nto the atmosphere! Then the plant can do what no chemist has yet been\nable to do; it can manufacture chlorophyll, a substance which is the\nbasis of all life on the globe. Without chlorophyll (the green substance\nin plants) the solar energy could not be stored up in the vegetable\nworld. Chlorophyll makes the plant, and the plant makes chlorophyll. To\nask which is first is to call up the old puzzle, Which is first, the\negg, or the hen that laid it?\n\nAccording to Professor Soddy, the engineer's unit of power, that of the\nBritish cart-horse, has to be multiplied many times in a machine before\nit can do the work of a horse. He says that a car which two horses used\nto pull, it now takes twelve or fifteen engine-horse to pull. The\nmachine horse belongs to a different order. He does not respond to the\nwhip; he has no nervous system; he has none of the mysterious reserve\npower which a machine built up of living cells seems to possess; he is\ninelastic, non-creative, non-adaptive; he cannot take advantage of the\nground; his pull is a dead, unvarying pull. Living energy is elastic,\nadaptive, self-directive, and suffers little loss through friction, or\nthrough imperfect adjustment of the parts. A live body converts its fuel\ninto energy at a low temperature. One of the great problems of the\nmechanics of the future is to develop electricity or power directly from\nfuel and thus cut out the enormous loss of eighty or ninety per cent\nwhich we now suffer. The growing body does this all the time; life\npossesses this secret; the solar energy stored up in fuel suffers no\nloss in being transformed into work by the animal mechanism.\n\nSoddy asks whether or not the minute cells of the body may not have the\npower of taking advantage of the difference in temperature of the\nmolecules bombarding them, and thus of utilizing energy that is beyond\nthe capacity of the machinery of the motor-car. Man can make no machine\nthat can avail itself of the stores of energy in the uniform temperature\nof the earth or air or water, or that can draw upon the potential energy\nof the atoms, but it may be that the living cell can do this, and thus a\nhorse can pull more than a one-horse-power engine. Soddy makes the\nsuggestive inquiry: \"If life begins in a single cell, does intelligence?\ndoes the physical distinction between living and dead matter begin in\nthe jostling molecular crowd? Inanimate molecules, in all their\nmovements, obey the law of probability, the law which governs the\nsuccessive falls of a true die. In the presence of a rudimentary\nintelligence, do they still follow that law, or do they now obey another\nlaw--the law of a die that is loaded?\" In a machine the energy of fuel\nhas first to be converted into heat before it is available, but in a\nliving machine the chemical energy of food undergoes direct\ntransformation into work, and the wasteful heat-process is cut off.\n\n\nVI\n\nProfessor Soddy, in discussing the relation of life to energy, does not\ncommit himself to the theory of the vitalistic or non-mechanical origin\nof life, but makes the significant statement that there is a consensus\nof opinion that the life processes are not bound by the second law of\nthermo-dynamics, namely, the law of the non-availability of the energy\nlatent in low temperatures, or in the chaotic movements of molecules\neverywhere around us. To get energy, one must have a fall or an incline\nof some sort, as of water from a higher to a lower level, or of\ntemperature from a higher to a lower degree, or of electricity from one\ncondition of high stress to another less so. But the living machine\nseems able to dispense with this break or incline, or else has the\nsecret of creating one for itself.\n\nIn the living body the chemical energy of food is directly transformed\ninto work, without first being converted into heat. Why a horse can do\nmore work than a one-horse-power engine is probably because his living\ncells can and do draw upon this molecular energy. Molecules of matter\noutside the living body all obey the law of probability, or the law of\nchance; but inside the living body they at least seem to obey some other\nlaw--the law of design, or of dice that are loaded, as Soddy says. They\nare more likely always to act in a particular way. Life supplies a\ndirecting agency. Soddy asks if the physical distinction between living\nand dead matter begins in the jostling molecular crowd--begins by the\ncrowd being directed and governed in a particular way. If so, by what?\nAh! that is the question. Science will have none of it, because science\nwould have to go outside of matter for such an agent, and that science\ncannot do. Such a theory implies intelligence apart from matter, or\nworking in matter. Is that a hard proposition? Intelligence clearly\nworks in our bodies and brains, and in those of all the animals--a\ncontrolled and directed activity in matter that seems to be life. The\ncell which builds up all living bodies behaves not like a machine, but\nlike a living being; its activities, so far as we can judge, are\nspontaneous, its motions and all its other processes are self-prompted.\nBut, of course, in it the mechanical, the chemical, and the vital are so\nblended, so interdependent, that we may never hope to separate them; but\nwithout the activity called vital, there would be no cell, and hence no\nbody.\n\nIt were unreasonable to expect that scientific analysis should show that\nthe physics and chemistry of a living body differs from that of the\nnon-living. What is new and beyond the reach of science to explain is\nthe _kind of activity_ of these elements. They enter into new compounds;\nthey build up bodies that have new powers and properties; they people\nthe seas and the air and the earth with living creatures, they build\nthe body and brain of man. The secret of the activity in matter that we\ncall vital is certainly beyond the power of science to tell us. It is\nlike expecting that the paint and oil used in a great picture must\ndiffer from those in a daub. The great artist mixed his paint with\nbrains, and the universal elements in a living body are mixed with\nsomething that science cannot disclose. Organic chemistry does not\ndiffer intrinsically from inorganic; the difference between the two lies\nin the purposive activity of the elements that build up a living body.\n\nOr is life, as a New England college professor claims, \"an _x_-entity,\nadditional to matter and energy, but of the same cosmic rank as they,\"\nand \"manifesting itself to our senses only through its power to keep a\ncertain quantity of matter and energy in the continuous orderly ferment\nwe call life\"?\n\nI recall that Huxley said that there was a third reality in this\nuniverse besides matter and energy, and this third reality was\nconsciousness. But neither the \"_x_-entity\" of Professor Ganong nor the\n\"consciousness\" of Huxley can be said to be of the same cosmic rank as\nmatter and energy, because they do not pervade the universe as matter\nand energy do. These forces abound throughout all space and endure\nthroughout all time, but life and consciousness are flitting and\nuncertain phenomena of matter. A prick of a pin, or a blow from a\nhammer, may destroy both. Unless we consider them as potential in all\nmatter (and who shall say that they are not?) may we look upon them as\nof cosmic rank?\n\nIt is often urged that it is not the eye that sees, or the brain that\nthinks, but something in them. But it is something in them that never\nwent into them; it arose in them. It is the living eye and the living\nbrain that do the seeing and the thinking. When the life activity\nceases, these organs cease to see and to think. Their activity is kept\nup by certain physiological processes in the organs of the body, and to\nask what keeps up these is like the puppy trying to overtake its own\ntail, or to run a race with its own shadow.\n\nThe brain is not merely the organ of the mind in an external and\nmechanical sense; it is the mind. When we come to living things, all\nsuch analogies fail us. Life is not a thing; thought is not a thing; but\nrather the effect of a certain activity in matter, which mind alone can\nrecognize. When we try to explain or account for that which we are, it\nis as if a man were trying to lift himself.\n\nLife seems like something apart. It does not seem to be amenable to the\nlaw of the correlation and conservation of forces. You cannot transform\nit into heat or light or electricity. The force which a man extracts\nfrom the food he eats while he is writing a poem, or doing any other\nmental work, seems lost to the universe. The force which the engine, or\nany machine, uses up, reappears as work done, or as heat or light or\nsome other physical manifestation. But the energy of foodstuffs which a\nman uses up in a mental effort does not appear again in the circuit of\nthe law of the conservation of energy. A man uses up more energy in his\nwaking moments, though his body be passive, than in his sleeping. What\nwe call mental force cannot be accounted for in terms of physical force.\nThe sun's energy goes into our bodies through the food we eat, and so\nruns our mental faculties, but how does it get back again into the\nphysical realm? Science does not know.\n\nIt must be some sort of energy that lights the lamps of the firefly and\nthe glow-worm, and it must be some sort or degree of energy that keeps\nconsciousness going. The brain of a Newton, or of a Plato, must make a\nlarger draft on the solar energy latent in food-stuffs than the brain of\na day laborer, and his body less. The same amount of food-consumption,\nor of oxidation, results in physical force in the one case, and mental\nforce in the other, but the mental force escapes the great law of the\nequivalence of the material forces.\n\nJohn Fiske solves the problem when he drops his physical science and\ntakes up his philosophy, declaring that the relation of the mind to the\nbody is that of a musician to his instrument, and this is practically\nthe position of Sir Oliver Lodge.\n\nInheritance and adaptation, says Haeckel, are sufficient to account for\nall the variety of animal and vegetable forms on the earth. But is there\nnot a previous question? Do we not want inheritance and adaptation\naccounted for? What mysteries they hold! Does the river-bed account for\nthe river? How can a body adapt itself to its environment unless it\npossess an inherent, plastic, changing, and adaptive principle? A stone\ndoes not adapt itself to its surroundings; its change is external and\nnot internal. There is mechanical adjustment between inert bodies, but\nthere is no adaptation without the push of life. A response to new\nconditions by change of form implies something actively\nresponsive--something that profits by the change.\n\n\nVII\n\nIf we could tell what determines the division of labor in the hive of\nbees or a colony of ants, we could tell what determines the division of\nlabor among the cells in the body. A hive of bees and a colony of ants\nis a unit--a single organism. The spirit of the body, that which\nregulates all its economies, which directs all its functions, which\ncooerdinates its powers, which brings about all its adaptations, which\nadjusts it to its environment, which sees to its repairs, heals its\nwounds, meets its demands, provides more force when more is needed,\nwhich makes one organ help do the work of another, which wages war on\ndisease germs by specific ferments, which renders us immune to this or\nthat disease; in fact, which carries on all the processes of our\nphysical life without asking leave or seeking counsel of us,--all this\nis on another plane from the mechanical or chemical--super-mechanical.\n\nThe human spirit, the brute spirit, the vegetable spirit--all are mere\nnames to fill a void. The spirit of the oak, the beech, the pine, the\npalm--how different! how different the plan or idea or interior\neconomies of each, though the chemical and mechanical processes are the\nsame, the same mineral and gaseous elements build them up, the same sun\nis their architect! But what physical principle can account for the\ndifference between a pine and an oak, or, for that matter, between a man\nand his dog, or a bird and a fish, or a crow and a lark? What play and\naction or interaction and reaction of purely chemical and mechanical\nforces can throw any light on the course evolution has taken in the\nanimal life of the globe--why the camel is the camel, and the horse the\nhorse? or in the development of the nervous system, or the circulatory\nsystem, or the digestive system, or of the eye, or of the ear?\n\nA living body is never in a state of chemical repose, but inorganic\nbodies usually are. Take away the organism and the environment remains\nessentially the same; take away the environment and the organism changes\nrapidly and perishes--it goes back to the inorganic. Now, what keeps up\nthe constant interchange--this seesaw? The environment is permanent; the\norganism is transient. The spray of the falls is permanent; the bow\ncomes and goes. Life struggles to appropriate the environment; a rock,\nfor example, does not, in the same sense, struggle with its\nsurroundings, it weathers passively, but a tree struggles with the\nwinds, and to appropriate minerals and water from the soil, and the\nleaves struggle to store up the sun's energy. The body struggles to\neliminate poisons or to neutralize them; it becomes immune to certain\ndiseases, learns to resist them; the thing is _alive_. Organisms\nstruggle with one another; inert bodies clash and pulverize one another,\nbut do not devour one another.\n\nLife is a struggle between two forces, a force within and a force\nwithout, but the force within does all the struggling. The air does not\nstruggle to get into the lungs, nor the lime and iron to get into our\nblood. The body struggles to digest and assimilate the food; the\nchlorophyll in the leaf struggles to store up the solar energy. The\nenvironment is unaware of the organism; the light is indifferent to the\nsensitized plate of the photographer. Something in the seed we plant\navails itself of the heat and the moisture. The relation is not that of\na thermometer or hygrometer to the warmth and moisture of the air; it is\na vital relation.\n\nLife may be called an aquatic phenomenon, because there can be no life\nwithout water. It may be called a thermal phenomenon, because there can\nbe no life below or above a certain degree of temperature. It may be\ncalled a chemical phenomenon, because there can be no life without\nchemical reactions. Yet none of these things define life. We may discuss\nbiological facts in terms of chemistry without throwing any light on the\nnature of life itself. If we say the particular essence of life is\nchemical, do we mean any more than that life is inseparable from\nchemical reactions?\n\nAfter we have mastered the chemistry of life, laid bare all its\nprocesses, named all its transformations and transmutations, analyzed\nthe living cell, seen the inorganic pass into the organic, and beheld\nchemical reaction, the chief priestess of this hidden rite, we shall\nhave to ask ourselves, Is chemistry the creator of life, or does life\ncreate or use chemistry? These \"chemical reaction complexes\" in living\ncells, as the biochemists call them, are they the cause of life, or only\nthe effect of life? We shall decide according to our temperaments or our\nhabits of thought.\n\n\n\n\nIX\n\nTHE JOURNEYING ATOMS\n\nI\n\n\nEmerson confessed in his \"Journal\" that he could not read the\nphysicists; their works did not appeal to him. He was probably repelled\nby their formulas and their mathematics. But add a touch of chemistry,\nand he was interested. Chemistry leads up to life. He said he did not\nthink he would feel threatened or insulted if a chemist should take his\nprotoplasm, or mix his hydrogen, oxygen, and carbon, and make an\nanimalcule incontestably swimming and jumping before his eyes. It would\nbe only evidence of a new degree of power over matter which man had\nattained to. It would all finally redound to the glory of matter itself,\nwhich, it appears, \"is impregnated with thought and heaven, and is\nreally of God, and not of the Devil, as we had too hastily believed.\"\nThis conception of matter underlies the new materialism of such men as\nHuxley and Tyndall. But there is much in the new physics apart from its\nchemical aspects that ought to appeal to the Emersonian type of mind.\nDid not Emerson in his first poem, \"The Sphinx,\" sing of\n\n    Journeying atoms,\n    Primordial wholes?\n\nIn those ever-moving and indivisible atoms he touches the very\ncorner-stone of the modern scientific conception of matter. It is hardly\nan exaggeration to say that in this conception we are brought into\ncontact with a kind of transcendental physics. A new world for the\nimagination is open--a world where the laws and necessities of\nponderable bodies do not apply. The world of gross matter disappears,\nand in its place we see matter dematerialized, and escaping from the\nbondage of the world of tangible bodies; we see a world where friction\nis abolished, where perpetual motion is no longer impossible; where two\nbodies may occupy the same space at the same time; where collisions and\ndisruptions take place without loss of energy; where subtraction often\nmeans more--as when the poison of a substance is rendered more virulent\nby the removal of one or more atoms of one of the elements; and where\naddition often means less--as when three parts of the gases of oxygen\nand hydrogen unite and form only two parts of watery vapor; where mass\nand form, centre and circumference, size and structure, exist without\nany of the qualities ordinarily associated with these things through our\nexperience in a three-dimension world. We see, or contemplate, bodies\nwhich are indivisible; if we divide them, their nature changes; if we\ndivide a molecule of water, we get atoms of hydrogen and oxygen gas; if\nwe divide a molecule of salt, we get atoms of chlorine gas and atoms of\nthe metal sodium, which means that we have reached a point where matter\nis no longer divisible in a mechanical sense, but only in a chemical\nsense; which again means that great and small, place and time, inside\nand outside, dimensions and spatial relations, have lost their ordinary\nmeanings. Two bodies get inside of each other. To the physicist, heat\nand motion are one; light is only a mechanical vibration in the ether;\nsound is only a vibration in the air, which the ear interprets as sound.\nThe world is as still as death till the living ear comes to receive the\nvibrations in the air; motion, or the energy which it implies, is the\nlife of the universe.\n\nPhysics proves to us the impossibility of perpetual motion among\nvisible, tangible bodies, at the same time that it reveals to us a world\nwhere perpetual motion is the rule--the world of molecules and atoms. In\nthe world of gross matter, or of ponderable bodies, perpetual motion is\nimpossible because here it takes energy, or its equivalent, to beget\nenergy. Friction very soon turns the kinetic energy of motion into the\npotential energy of heat, which quickly disappears in that great sea of\nenergy, the low uniform temperature of the earth. But when we reach the\ninterior world of matter, the world of molecules, atoms, and electrons,\nwe have reached a world where perpetual motion _is_ the rule; we have\nreached the fountain-head of energy, and the motion of one body is not\nat the expense of the motion of some other body, but is a part of the\nspontaneous struggling and jostling and vibration that go on forever in\nall the matter of the universe. What is called the Brunonian movement\n(first discovered by the botanist Robert Brown in 1827) is within reach\nof the eye armed with a high-power microscope. Look into any liquid that\nholds in suspension very small particles of solid matter, such as dust\nparticles in the air, or the granules of ordinary water-color paints\ndissolved in water: not a single one of the particles is at rest; they\nare all mysteriously agitated; they jump hither and thither; it is a\nwild chaotic whirl and dance of minute particles. Brown at first thought\nthey were alive, but they were only non-living particles dancing to the\nsame tune which probably sets suns and systems whirling in the heavens.\nRamsay says that tobacco smoke confined in the small flat chamber formed\nin the slide of a microscope, shows this movement, in appearance like\nthe flight of minute butterflies. The Brunonian movement is now believed\nto be due to the bombardment of the particles by the molecules of the\nliquid or gas in which they are suspended. The smaller the particles,\nthe livelier they are. These particles themselves are made up of a vast\nnumber of molecules, among which the same movement or agitation, much\nmore intense, is supposed to be taking place; the atoms which compose\nthe molecules are dancing and frisking about like gnats in the air, and\nthe electrons inside the atoms are still more rapidly changing places.\n\nWe meet with the same staggering figures in the science of the\ninfinitely little that we do in the science of the infinitely vast. Thus\nthe physicist deals with a quantity of matter a million million times\nsmaller than can be detected in the most delicate chemical balance.\nMolecules inconceivably small rush about in molecular space\ninconceivably small. Ramsay calculates how many collisions the molecules\nof gas make with other molecules every second, which is four and one\nhalf quintillions. This staggers the mind like the tremendous\nrevelations of astronomy. Mathematics has no trouble to compute the\nfigures, but our slow, clumsy minds feel helpless before them. In every\ndrop of water we drink, and in every mouthful of air we breathe, there\nis a movement and collision of particles so rapid in every second of\ntime that it can only be expressed by four with eighteen naughts. If the\nmovement of these particles were attended by friction, or if the energy\nof their impact were translated into heat, what hot mouthfuls we should\nhave! But the heat, as well as the particles, is infinitesimal, and is\nnot perceptible.\n\n\nII\n\nThe molecules and atoms and electrons into which science resolves matter\nare hypothetical bodies which no human eye has ever seen, or ever can\nsee, but they build up the solid frame of the universe. The air and the\nrocks are not so far apart in their constituents as they might seem to\nour senses. The invisible and indivisible molecules of oxygen which we\nbreathe, and which keep our life-currents going, form about half the\ncrust of the earth. The soft breeze that fans and refreshes us, and the\nrocks that crush us, are at least half-brothers. And herein we get a\nglimpse of the magic of chemical combinations. That mysterious property\nin matter which we call chemical affinity, a property beside which human\naffinities and passions are tame and inconstant affairs, is the\narchitect of the universe. Certain elements attract certain other\nelements with a fierce and unalterable attraction, and when they unite,\nthe resultant compound is a body totally unlike either of the\nconstituents. Both substances have disappeared, and a new one has taken\ntheir place. This is the magic of chemical change. A physical change, as\nof water into ice, or into steam, is a simple matter; it is merely a\nmatter of more or less heat; but the change of oxygen and hydrogen into\nwater, or of chlorine gas and the mineral sodium into common salt, is a\nchemical change. In nature, chlorine and sodium are not found in a free\nor separate state; they hunted each other up long ago, and united to\nproduce the enormous quantities of rock salt that the earth holds. One\ncan give his imagination free range in trying to picture what takes\nplace when two or more elements unite chemically, but probably there is\nno physical image that can afford even a hint of it. A snake trying to\nswallow himself, or two fishes swallowing each other, or two bullets\nmeeting in the air and each going through the centre of the other, or\nthe fourth dimension, or almost any other impossible thing, from the\npoint of view of tangible bodies, will serve as well as anything. The\natoms seem to get inside of one another, to jump down one another's\nthroats, and to suffer a complete transformation. Yet we know that they\ndo not; oxygen is still oxygen, and carbon still carbon, amid all the\nstrange partnerships entered into, and all the disguises assumed. We can\neasily evoke hydrogen and oxygen from water, but just how their\nmolecules unite, how they interpenetrate and are lost in one another, it\nis impossible for us to conceive.\n\nWe cannot visualize a chemical combination because we have no experience\nupon which to found it. It is so fundamentally unlike a mechanical\nmixture that even our imagination can give us no clew to it. It is\nthinkable that the particles of two or more substances however fine,\nmechanically mixed, could be seen and recognized if sufficiently\nmagnified; but in a chemical combination, say like iron sulphide, no\namount of magnification could reveal the two elements of iron and\nsulphur. They no longer exist. A third substance unlike either has taken\ntheir place.\n\nWe extract aluminum from clay, but no conceivable power of vision could\nreveal to us that metal in the clay. It is there only potentially. In a\nchemical combination the different substances interpenetrate and are\nlost in one another: they are not mechanically separable nor\nindividually distinguishable. The iron in the red corpuscles of the\nblood is not the metal we know, but one of its many chemical disguises.\nIndeed it seems as if what we call the ultimate particles of matter did\nnot belong to the visible order and hence were incapable of\nmagnification.\n\nThat mysterious force, chemical affinity, is the true and original\nmagic. That two substances should cleave to each other and absorb each\nother and produce a third totally unlike either is one of the profound\nmysteries of science. Of the nature of the change that takes place, I\nsay, we can form no image. Chemical force is selective; it is not\npromiscuous and indiscriminate like gravity, but specific and\nindividual. Nearly all the elements have their preferences and they will\nchoose no other. Oxygen comes the nearest to being a free lover among\nthe elements, but its power of choice is limited.\n\nScience conceives of all matter as grained or discrete, like a bag of\nshot, or a pile of sand. Matter does not occupy space continuously, not\neven in the hardest substances, such as the diamond; there is space,\nmolecular space, between the particles. A rifle bullet whizzing past is\nno more a continuous body than is a flock of birds wheeling and swooping\nin the air. Air spaces separate the birds, and molecular spaces separate\nthe molecules of the bullet. Of course it is unthinkable that\nindivisible particles of matter can occupy space and have dimensions.\nBut science goes upon this hypothesis, and the hypothesis proves itself.\n\nAfter we have reached the point of the utmost divisibility of matter in\nthe atom, we are called upon to go still further and divide the\nindivisible. The electrons, of which the atom is composed, are one\nhundred thousand times smaller, and two thousand times lighter than the\nsmallest particle hitherto recognized, namely, the hydrogen atom. A\nFrench physicist conceives of the electrons as rushing about in the\ninterior of the atom like swarms of gnats whirling about in the dome of\na cathedral. The smallest particle of dust that we can recognize in the\nair is millions of times larger than the atom, and millions of millions\nof times larger than the electron. Yet science avers that the\nmanifestations of energy which we call light, radiant heat, magnetism,\nand electricity, all come from the activities of the electrons. Sir J.\nJ. Thomson conceives of a free electron as dashing about from one atom\nto another at a speed so great as to change its location forty million\ntimes a second. In the electron we have matter dematerialized; the\nelectron is not a material particle. Hence the step to the electric\nconstitution of matter is an easy one. In the last analysis we have pure\ndisembodied energy. \"With many of the feelings of an air-man,\" says\nSoddy, \"who has left behind for the first time the solid ground beneath\nhim,\" we make this plunge into the demonstrable verities of the newest\nphysics; matter in the old sense--gross matter--fades away. To the three\nstates in which we have always known it, the solid, the liquid, and the\ngaseous, we must add a fourth, the ethereal--the state of matter which\nSir Oliver Lodge thinks borders on, or is identical with, what we call\nthe spiritual, and which affords the key to all the occult phenomena of\nlife and mind.\n\nAs we have said, no human eye has ever seen, or will see, an atom; only\nthe mind's eye, or the imagination, sees atoms and molecules, yet the\natomic theory of matter rests upon the sure foundation of experimental\nscience. Both the chemist and the physicist are as convinced of the\nexistence of these atoms as they are of the objects we see and touch.\nThe theory \"is a necessity to explain the experimental facts of chemical\ncomposition.\" \"Through metaphysics first,\" says Soddy, \"then through\nalchemy and chemistry, through physical and astronomical spectroscopy,\nlastly through radio-activity, science has slowly groped its way to the\natom.\" The physicists make definite statements about these hypothetical\nbodies all based upon definite chemical phenomena. Thus Clerk Maxwell\nassumes that they are spherical, that the spheres are hard and elastic\nlike billiard-balls, that they collide and glance off from one another\nin the same way, that is, that they collide at their surfaces and not at\ntheir centres.\n\nOnly two of our senses make us acquainted with matter in a state which\nmay be said to approach the atomic--smell and taste. Odors are material\nemanations, and represent a division of matter into inconceivably small\nparticles. What are the perfumes we smell but emanations, flying atoms\nor electrons, radiating in all directions, and continuing for a shorter\nor longer time without any appreciable diminution in bulk or weight of\nthe substances that give them off? How many millions or trillions of\ntimes does the rose divide its heart in the perfume it sheds so freely\nupon the air? The odor of the musk of certain animals lingers under\ncertain conditions for years. The imagination is baffled in trying to\nconceive of the number and minuteness of the particles which the fox\nleaves of itself in the snow where its foot was imprinted--so palpable\nthat the scent of a hound can seize upon them hours after the fox has\npassed! The all but infinite divisibility of matter is proved by every\nodor that the breeze brings us from field and wood, and by the delicate\nflavors that the tongue detects in the food we eat and drink. But these\nemanations and solutions that affect our senses probably do not\nrepresent a chemical division of matter; when we smell an apple or a\nflower, we probably get a real fragment of the apple, or of the flower,\nand not one or more of its chemical constituents represented by atoms or\nelectrons. A chemical analysis of odors, if it were possible, would\nprobably show the elements in the same state of combination as the\nsubstances from which the odors emanated.\n\nThe physicists herd these ultimate particles of matter about; they have\na regular circus with them; they make them go through films and screens;\nthey guide them through openings; they count them as their tiny flash is\nseen on a sensitized plate; they weigh them; they reckon their velocity.\nThe alpha-rays from radio-active substances are swarms of tiny meteors\nflying at the incredible speed of twelve thousand miles a second, while\nthe meteors of the midnight sky fly at the speed of only forty miles a\nsecond. Those alpha particles are helium atoms. They are much larger\nthan beta particles, and have less penetrative power. Sir J. J. Thomson\nhas devised a method by which he has been able to photograph the atoms.\nThe photographic plate upon which their flight is recorded suggests a\nshower of shooting stars. Oxygen is found to be made up of atoms of\nseveral different forms.\n\n\nIII\n\nThe \"free path\" of molecules, both in liquids and in gases, is so minute\nas to be beyond the reach of the most powerful microscope. This free\npath in liquids is a zigzag course, owing to the perpetual collisions\nwith other molecules. The molecular behavior of liquids differs from\nthat of gases only in what is called surface tension. Liquids have a\nskin, a peculiar stress of the surface molecules; gases do not, but tend\nto dissipate and fill all space. A drop of water remains intact till\nvaporization sets in; then it too becomes more and more diffused.\n\nWhen two substances combine chemically, more or less heat is evolved.\nWhen the combination is effected slowly, as in an animal's body, heat is\nslowly evolved. When the combustion is rapid, as in actual fire, heat is\nrapidly evolved. The same phenomenon may reach the eye as light, and the\nhand as heat, though different senses get two different impressions of\nthe same thing. So a mechanical disturbance may reach the ear as sound,\nand be so interpreted, and reach the hand as motion in matter. In\ncombustion, the oxygen combines rapidly with the carbon, giving out heat\nand light and carbon dioxide, but why it does so admits of no\nexplanation. Herein again is where life differs from fire; we can\ndescribe combustion in terms of chemistry, but after we have described\nlife in the same terms something--and this something is the main\nthing--remains untouched.\n\nThe facts of radio-activity alone demonstrate the truth of the atomic\ntheory. The beta rays, or emanations from radium, penetrating one foot\nof solid iron are very convincing. And this may go on for hundreds of\nyears without any appreciable diminution of size or weight of the\nradio-active substance. \"A gram of such substance,\" says Sir Oliver\nLodge, \"might lose a few thousand of atoms a second, and yet we could\nnot detect the loss if we continued to weigh it for a century.\" The\nvolatile essences of organic bodies which we detect in odors and\nflavors, are not potent like the radium emanations. We can confine them\nand control them, but we cannot control the rays of radio-active matter\nany more than we can confine a spirit. We can separate the three\ndifferent kinds of rays--the alpha, the beta, and the gamma--by magnetic\ndevices, but we cannot cork them up and isolate them, as we can musk and\nthe attar of roses.\n\nAnd these emanations are taking place more or less continuously all\nabout us and we know it not. In fact, we are at all times subjected to a\nmolecular bombardment of which we never dream; minute projectiles,\nindivisible points of matter, are shot out at us in the form of\nelectrons from glowing metals, from lighted candles, and from other\nnoiseless and unsuspected batteries at a speed of tens of thousands of\nmiles a second, and we are none the wiser for it. Indeed, if we could\nsee or feel or be made aware of it, in what a different world we should\nfind ourselves! How many million-or billion-fold our sense of sight and\ntouch would have to be increased to bring this about! We live in a world\nof collisions, disruptions, and hurtling missiles of which our senses\ngive us not the slightest evidence, and it is well that they do not.\nThere is a tremendous activity in the air we breathe, in the water we\ndrink, in the food we eat, and in the soil we walk upon, which, if\nmagnified till our senses could take it in, would probably drive us mad.\nIt is in this interior world of molecular activity, this world of\nelectric vibrations and oscillations, that the many transformations of\nenergy take place. This is the hiding-place of the lightning, of the\nelectrons which moulded together make the thunderbolt. What an\nunderworld of mystery and power it is! In it slumbers all the might and\nmenace of the storm, the power that rends the earth and shakes the\nheavens. With the mind's eye one can see the indivisible atoms giving up\ntheir electrons, see the invisible hosts, in numbers beyond the power of\nmathematics to compute, being summoned and marshalled by some mysterious\ncommander and hurled in terrible fiery phalanxes across the battlefield\nof the storm.\n\nThe physicist describes the atom and talks about it as if it were \"a\ntangible body which one could hold in his hand like a baseball.\" \"An\natom,\" Sir Oliver Lodge says, \"consists of a globular mass of positive\nelectricity with minute negative electrons embedded in it.\" He speaks of\nthe spherical form of the atom, and of its outer surface, of its centre,\nand of its passing through other atoms, and of the electrons that\nrevolve around its centre as planets around a sun. The electron, one\nhundred thousand times smaller than an atom, yet has surface, and that\nsurface is a dimpled and corrugated sheet--like the cover of a mattress.\nWhat a flight of the scientific imagination is that!\n\nThe disproportion between the size of an atom and the size of an\nelectron is vastly greater than that between the sun and the earth.\nRepresent an atom, says Sir Oliver Lodge, by a church one hundred and\nsixty feet long, eighty feet broad, and forty feet high; the electrons\nare like gnats inside it. Yet on the electric theory of matter,\nelectrons are all of the atom there is; there is no church, but only the\ngnats rushing about. We know of nothing so empty and hollow, so near a\nvacuum, as matter in this conception of it. Indeed, in the new physics,\nmatter is only a hole in the ether. Hence the newspaper joke about the\nbank sliding down and leaving the woodchuck-hole sticking out, looks\nlike pretty good physics. The electrons give matter its inertia, and\ngive it the force we call cohesion, give it its toughness, its strength,\nand all its other properties. They make water wet, and the diamond hard.\nThey are the fountain-head of the immense stores of the inter-atomic\nenergy, which, if it could be tapped and controlled, would so easily do\nall the work of the world. But this we cannot do. \"We are no more\ncompetent,\" says Professor Soddy, \"to make use of these supplies of\natomic energy than a savage, ignorant of how to kindle a fire, could\nmake use of a steam-engine.\" The natural rate of flow of this energy\nfrom its atomic sources we get as heat, and it suffices to keep life\ngoing upon this planet. It is the source of all the activity we see upon\nthe globe. Its results, in the geologic ages, are stored up for us in\ncoal and oil and natural gas, and, in our day, are available in the\nwinds, the tides, and the waterfalls, and in electricity.\n\n\nIV\n\nThe electric constitution of matter is quite beyond anything we can\nimagine. The atoms are little worlds by themselves, and the whole\nmystery of life and death is in their keeping. The whole difference in\nthe types of mind and character among men is supposed to be in their\nkeeping. The different qualities and properties of bodies are in their\nkeeping. Whether an object is hot or cold to our senses, depends upon\nthe character of their vibrations; whether it be sweet or sour,\npoisonous or innocuous to us, depends upon how the atoms select their\npartners in the whirl and dance of their activities. The hardness and\nbrilliancy of the diamond is supposed to depend upon how the atoms of\ncarbon unite and join hands.\n\nI have heard the view expressed that all matter, as such, is dead\nmatter, that the molecules of hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, iron,\nphosphorus, calcium, and so on, in a living body, are themselves no more\nalive than the same molecules in inorganic matter. Nearly nine tenths of\na living body is water; is not this water the same as the water we get\nat the spring or the brook? is it any more alive? does water undergo any\nchemical change in the body? is it anything more than a solvent, than a\ncurrent that carries the other elements to all parts of the body? There\nare any number of chemical changes or reactions in a living body, but\nare the atoms and molecules that are involved in such changes radically\nchanged? Can oxygen be anything but oxygen, or carbon anything but\ncarbon? Is what we call life the result of their various new\ncombinations? Many modern biologists hold to this view. In this\nconception merely a change in the order of arrangement of the molecules\nof a substance--which follows which or which is joined to which--is\nfraught with consequences as great as the order in which the letters of\nthe alphabet are arranged in words, or the words themselves are arranged\nin sentences. The change of one letter in a word often utterly changes\nthe meaning of that word, and the changing of a word in the sentence may\ngive expression to an entirely different idea. Reverse the letters in\nthe word \"God,\" and you get the name of our faithful friend the dog.\nHuxley and Tyndall both taught that it was the way that the ultimate\nparticles of matter are compounded that makes the whole difference\nbetween a cabbage and an oak, or between a frog and a man. It is a hard\nproposition. We know with scientific certainty that the difference\nbetween a diamond and a piece of charcoal, or between a pearl and an\noyster-shell, is the way that the particles of carbon in the one case,\nand of calcium carbide in the other, are arranged. We know with equal\ncertainty that the difference between certain chemical bodies, like\nalcohol and ether, is the arrangement of their ultimate particles, since\nboth have the same chemical formula. We do not spell acetic acid,\nalcohol, sugar, starch, animal fat, vegetable oils, glycerine, and the\nlike, with the same letters; yet nature compounds them all of the same\natoms of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, but in different proportions and\nin different orders.\n\nChemistry is all-potent. A mechanical mixture of two or more elements\nis a simple affair, but a chemical mixture introduces an element of\nmagic. No conjurer's trick can approach such a transformation as that of\noxygen and hydrogen gases into water. The miracle of turning water into\nwine is tame by comparison. Dip plain cotton into a mixture of nitric\nand sulphuric acids and let it dry, and we have that terrible explosive,\nguncotton. Or, take the cellulose of which cotton is composed, and add\ntwo atoms of hydrogen and one of oxygen, and we have sugar. But we are\nto remember that the difference here indicated is not a quantitative,\nbut a qualitative one, not one affecting bulk, but affecting structure.\nTruly chemistry works wonders. Take ethyl alcohol, or ordinary spirits\nof wine, and add four more atoms of carbon to the carbon molecule, and\nwe have the poison carbolic acid. Pure alcohol can be turned into a\ndeadly poison, not by adding to, but simply by taking from it; take out\none atom of carbon and two of hydrogen from the alcohol molecule, and we\nhave the poison methyl alcohol. But we are to remember that the\ndifference here indicated is not a quantitative, but a qualitative one,\nnot one affecting bulk, but affecting structure.\n\nIn our atmosphere we have a mechanical mixture of nitrogen and oxygen,\nfour parts of nitrogen to one of oxygen. By uniting the nitrogen and\noxygen chemically (N_{2}O) we have nitrous oxide, laughing-gas. Ordinary\nstarch is made up of three different elements--six parts of carbon, ten\nparts of hydrogen, and five parts of oxygen (C_{6}H_{10}O_{5}). Now if\nwe add water to this compound, we have a simple mixture of starch and\nwater, but if we bring about a chemical union with the elements of water\n(hydrogen and oxygen), we have grape sugar. This sugar is formed in\ngreen leaves by the agency of sunlight, and is the basis of all plant\nand animal food, and hence one of the most important things in nature.\n\nCarbon is a solid, and is seen in its pure state in the diamond, the\nhardest body in nature and the most valued of all precious stones, but\nit enters largely into all living bodies and is an important constituent\nof all the food we eat. As a gas, united with the oxygen of the air,\nforming carbon dioxide, it was present at the beginning of life, and\nprobably helped kindle the first vital spark. In the shape of wood and\ncoal, it now warms us and makes the wheels of our material civilization\ngo round. Diamond stuff, through the magic of chemistry, plays one of\nthe principle roles in our physical life; we eat it, and are warmed and\npropelled by it, and cheered by it. Taken as carbonic acid gas into our\nlungs, it poisons us; taken into our stomachs, it stimulates us;\ndissolved in water, it disintegrates the rocks, eating out the carbonate\nof lime which they contain. It is one of the principal actors in the\ndrama of organized matter.\n\n\nV\n\nWe have a good illustration of the power of chemistry, and how closely\nit is dogging the footsteps of life, in the many organic compounds it\nhas built up out of the elements, such as sugar, starch, indigo,\ncamphor, rubber, and so forth, all of which used to be looked upon as\nimpossible aside from life-processes. It is such progress as this that\nleads some men of science to believe that the creation of life itself is\nwithin the reach of chemistry. I do not believe that any occult or\ntranscendental principle bars the way, but that some unknown and perhaps\nunknowable condition does, as mysterious and unrepeatable as that which\nseparates our mental life from our physical. The transmutation of the\nphysical into the psychical takes place, but the secret of it we do not\nknow. It does not seem to fall within the law of the correlation and the\nconservation of energy.\n\nFree or single atoms are very rare; they all quickly find their mates or\npartners. This eagerness of the elements to combine is one of the\nmysteries. If the world of visible matter were at one stroke resolved\ninto its constituent atoms, it would practically disappear; we might\nsmell it, or taste it, if we were left, but we could not see it, or feel\nit; the water would vanish, the solid ground would vanish--more than\nhalf of it into oxygen atoms, and the rest mainly into silicon atoms.\n\nThe atoms of different bodies are all alike, and presumably each holds\nthe same amount of electric energy. One wonders, then, how the order in\nwhich they are arranged can affect them so widely as to produce bodies\nso unlike as, say, alcohol and ether. This brings before us again the\nmystery of chemical arrangement or combination, so different from\nanything we know among tangible bodies. It seems to imply that each atom\nhas its own individuality. Mix up a lot of pebbles together, and the\nresult would be hardly affected by the order of the arrangement, but mix\nup a lot of people, and the result would be greatly affected by the fact\nof who is elbowing who. It seems the same among the mysterious atoms, as\nif some complemented or stimulated those next them, or had an opposite\neffect. But can we think of the atoms in a chemical compound as being\nnext one another, or merely in juxtaposition? Do we not rather have to\nthink of them as identified with one another to an extent that has no\nparallel in the world of ponderable bodies? A kind of sympathy or\naffinity makes them one in a sense that we only see realized among\nliving beings.\n\nChemical activity is the first step from physical activity to vital\nactivity, but the last step is taken rarely--the other two are\nuniversal. Chemical changes involve the atom. What do vital changes\ninvolve? We do not know. We can easily bring about the chemical\nchanges, but not so the vital changes. A chemical change destroys one or\nmore substances and produces others totally unlike them; a vital change\nbreaks up substances and builds up other bodies out of them; it results\nin new compounds that finally cover the earth with myriads of new and\nstrange forms.\n\n\n\n\nX\n\nTHE VITAL ORDER\n\nI\n\n\nThe mechanistic theory of life--the theory that all living things can be\nexplained and fully accounted for on purely physico-chemical\nprinciples--has many defenders in our day. The main aim of the foregoing\nchapters is to point out the inadequacy of this view. At the risk of\nwearying my reader I am going to collect under the above heading a few\nmore considerations bearing on this point.\n\nA thing that grows, that develops, cannot, except by very free use of\nlanguage, be called a machine. We speak of the body as a machine, but we\nhave to qualify it by prefixing the adjective living--the living\nmachine, which takes it out of the mechanical order of things\nfabricated, contrived, built up from without, and puts it in the order\nwe call vital, the order of things self-developed from within, the order\nof things autonomous, as contrasted with things automatic. All the\nmechanical principles are operative in the life processes, but they have\nbeen vitalized, not changed in any way but in the service of a new order\nof reality. The heart with its chambers and valves is a pump that\nforces the blood through the system, but a pump that works itself and\ndoes not depend upon pneumatic pressure--a pump in which vital energy\ntakes the place of gravitational energy. The peristaltic movement in the\nintestines involves a mechanical principle, but it is set up by an\ninward stimulus, and not by outward force. It is these inward stimuli,\nwhich of course involve chemical reactions, that afford the motive power\nfor all living bodies and that put the living in another order from the\nmechanical. The eye is an optical instrument,--a rather crude one, it is\nsaid,--but it cannot be separated from its function, as can a mere\ninstrument--the eye sees as literally as the brain thinks. In breathing\nwe unconsciously apply the principle of the bellows; it is a bellows\nagain which works itself, but the function of which, in a very limited\nsense, we can inhibit and control. An artificial, or man-made, machine\nalways implies an artificer, but the living machine is not made in any\nsuch sense; it grows, it arises out of the organizing principle that\nbecomes active in matter under conditions that we only dimly understand,\nand that we cannot reproduce.\n\nThe vital and the mechanical cooeperate in all our bodily functions.\nSwallowing our food is a mechanical process, the digestion of it is a\nchemical process and the assimilation and elimination of it a vital\nprocess. Inhaling and exhaling the air is a mechanical process, the\noxidation of the blood is a chemical process, and the renewal of the\ncorpuscles is a vital process. Growth, assimilation, elimination,\nreproduction, metabolism, and secretion, are all vital processes which\ncannot be described in terms of physics and chemistry. All our bodily\nmovements--lifting, striking, walking, running--are mechanical, but\nseeing, hearing, and tasting, are of another order. And that which\ncontrols, directs, cooerdinates, and inhibits our activities belongs to a\nstill higher order, the psychic. The world of thoughts and emotions\nwithin us, while dependent upon and interacting with the physical world\nwithout us, cannot be accounted for in terms of the physical world. A\nliving thing is more than a machine, more than a chemical laboratory.\n\nWe can analyze the processes of a tree into their mechanical and\nchemical elements, but there is besides a kind of force there which we\nmust call vital. The whole growth and development of the tree, its\nmanner of branching and gripping the soil, its fixity of species, its\nindividuality--all imply something that does not belong to the order of\nthe inorganic, automatic forces. In the living animal how the psychic\nstands related to the physical or physiological and arises out of it,\nscience cannot tell us, but the relation must be real; only philosophy\ncan grapple with that question. To resolve the psychic and the vital\ninto the mechanical and chemical and refuse to see any other factors at\nwork is the essence of materialism.\n\n\nII\n\nAny contrivance which shows an interdependence of parts, that results in\nunity of action, is super-mechanical. The solar system may be regarded\nas a unit, but it has not the purposive unity of a living body. It is\none only in the sense that its separate bodies are all made of one\nstuff, and obey the same laws and move together in the same direction,\nbut a living body is a unit because all its parts are in the service of\none purposive end. An army is a unit, a flock of gregarious birds, a\ncolony of ants or bees, is a unit because the spirit and purpose of one\nis the spirit and purpose of all; the unity is psychological.\n\nOnly living bodies are adaptive. Adaptation, of course, has its physics\nor its chemistry, because it is a physical phenomenon; but there is no\nadaptation of a rock or a clay-bank to its environment; there is only\nmechanical and chemical adjustment. The influence of the environment may\nbring about chemical and physical changes in a non-living body, but they\nare not purposive as in a living body. The fat in the seeds of plants in\nnorthern countries is liquid and solid at a lower temperature than in\ntropical climates. Living organisms alone react in a formative or\ndeformative way to external stimuli. In warm climates the fur of\nanimals and the wool of sheep become thin and light. The colder the\nclimate, the thicker these coverings. Such facts only show that in the\nmatter of adaptation among living organisms, there is a factor at work\nother than chemistry and physics--not independent of them, but making a\npurposive use of them. Cut off the central shoot that leads the young\nspruce tree upwards, and one of the shoots from the whirl of lateral\nbranches below it slowly rises up and takes the place of the lost\nleader. Here is an action not prompted by the environment, but by the\nmorphological needs of the tree, and it illustrates how different is its\nunity from the unity of a mere machine. I am only aiming to point out\nthat in all living things the material forces behave in a purposive way\nto a degree that cannot be affirmed of them in non-living, and that,\ntherefore, they imply intelligence.\n\nEvidently the cells in the body do not all have the same degree of\nlife,--that is, the same degree of irritability. The bone cells and the\nhair cells, for instance, can hardly be so much alive--or so\nirritable--as the muscle cells; nor these as intensely alive as the\nnerve and brain cells. Does not a bird possess a higher degree of life\nthan a mollusk, or a turtle? Is not a brook trout more alive than a\nmud-sucker? You can freeze the latter as stiff as an icicle and\nresuscitate it, but not the former. There is a scale of degrees in life\nas clearly as there is a scale of degrees in temperature. There is an\nendless gradation of sensibilities of the living cells, dependent\nprobably upon the degree of differentiation of function. Anaesthetics\ndull or suspend this irritability. The more highly developed and complex\nthe nervous system, the higher the degree of life, till we pass from\nmere physical life to psychic life. Science might trace this difference\nto cell structure, but what brings about the change in the character of\nthe cell, or starts the cells to building a complex nervous system, is a\nquestion unanswerable to science. The biologist imagines this and that\nabout the invisible or hypothetical molecular structure; he assigns\ndifferent functions to the atoms; some are for endosmosis, others for\ncontraction, others for conduction of stimuli. Intramolecular oxygen\nplays a part. Other names are given to the mystery--the micellar strings\nof Naegeli, the biophores of Weismann, the plastidules of Haeckel; they\nall presuppose millions of molecules peculiarly arranged in the\nprotoplasm.\n\nOn purely mechanical and chemical principles Tyndall accounts for the\ngrowth from the germ of a tree. The germ would be quiet, but the solar\nlight and heat disturb its dreams, break up its atomic equilibrium. The\ngerm makes an \"effort\" to restore it (why does it make an effort?),\nwhich effort is necessarily defeated and incessantly renewed, and in\nthe turmoil or \"scrapping\" between the germ and the solar forces, matter\nis gathered from the soil and from the air and built into the special\nform of a tree. Why not in the form of a cabbage, or a donkey, or a\nclam? If the forces are purely automatic, why not? Why should matter be\ngathered in at all in a mechanical struggle between inorganic elements?\nBut these are not all inorganic; the seed is organic. Ah! that makes the\ndifference! That accounts for the \"effort.\" So we have to have the\norganic to start with, then the rest is easy. No doubt the molecules of\nthe seed would remain in a quiescent state, if they were not disturbed\nby external influences, chemical and mechanical. But there is something\nlatent or potential in that seed that is the opposite of the mechanical,\nnamely, the vital, and in what that consists, and where it came from, is\nthe mystery.\n\n\nIII\n\nI fancy that the difficulty which an increasing number of persons find\nin accepting the mechanistic view of life, or evolution,--the view which\nHerbert Spencer built into such a ponderous system of philosophy, and\nwhich such men as Huxley, Tyndall, Gifford, Haeckel, Verworn, and\nothers, have upheld and illustrated,--is temperamental rather than\nlogical. The view is distasteful to a certain type of mind--the\nflexible, imaginative, artistic, and literary type--the type that loves\nto see itself reflected in nature or that reads its own thoughts and\nemotions into nature. In a few eminent examples the two types of mind to\nwhich I refer seem more or less blended. Sir Oliver Lodge is a case in\npoint. Sir Oliver is an eminent physicist who in his conception of the\ntotality of things is yet a thoroughgoing idealist and mystic. His\nsolution of the problem of living things is extra-scientific. He sees in\nlife a distinct transcendental principle, not involved in the\nconstitution of matter, but independent of it, entering into it and\nusing it for its own purposes.\n\nTyndall was another great scientist with an inborn idealistic strain in\nhim. His famous, and to many minds disquieting, declaration, made in his\nBelfast address over thirty years ago, that in matter itself he saw the\npromise and the potency of all terrestrial life, stamps him as a\nscientific materialist. But his conception of matter, as \"at bottom\nessentially mystical and transcendental,\" stamps him as also an\nidealist. The idealist in him speaks very eloquently in the passage\nwhich, in the same address, he puts into the mouth of Bishop Butler, in\nthe latter's imaginary debate with Lucretius: \"Your atoms,\" says the\nBishop, \"are individually without sensation, much more are they without\nintelligence. May I ask you, then, to try your hand upon this problem.\nTake your dead hydrogen atoms, your dead oxygen atoms, your dead carbon\natoms, your dead nitrogen atoms, your dead phosphorus atoms, and all\nthe other atoms, dead as grains of shot, of which the brain is formed.\nImagine them separate and sensationless, observe them running together\nand forming all imaginable combinations. This, as a purely mechanical\nprocess, is _seeable_ by the mind. But can you see or dream, or in any\nway imagine, how out of that mechanical art, and from these individually\ndead atoms, sensation, thought, and emotion are to arise? Are you likely\nto extract Homer out of the rattling of dice, or the Differential\nCalculus out of the clash of billiard balls?\" Could any vitalist, or\nBergsonian idealist have stated his case better?\n\nNow the Bishop Butler type of mind--the visualizing, idealizing,\nanalogy-loving, literary, and philosophical mind--is shared by a good\nmany people; it is shared by or is characteristic of all the great\npoets, artists, seers, idealists of the world; it is the humanistic type\nthat sees man everywhere reflected in nature; and is radically different\nfrom the strictly scientific type which dehumanizes nature and reduces\nit to impersonal laws and forces, which distrusts analogy and sentiment\nand poetry, and clings to a rigid logical method.\n\nThis type of mind is bound to have trouble in accepting the\nphysico-chemical theory of the nature and origin of life. It visualizes\nlife, sees it as a distinct force or principle working in and through\nmatter but not of it, super-physical in its origin and psychological in\nits nature. This is the view Henri Bergson exploits in his \"Creative\nEvolution.\" This is the view Kant took when he said, \"It is quite\ncertain that we cannot even satisfactorily understand, much less\nexplain, the nature of an organism and its internal forces on purely\nmechanical principles.\" It is the view Goethe took when he said, \"Matter\ncan never exist without spirit, nor spirit without matter.\"\n\nTyndall says Goethe was helped by his poetic training in the field of\nnatural history, but hindered as regards the physical and mechanical\nsciences. \"He could not formulate distinct mechanical conceptions; he\ncould not see the force of mechanical reasoning.\" His literary culture\nhelped him to a literary interpretation of living nature, but not to a\nscientific explanation of it; it helped put him in sympathy with living\nthings, and just to that extent barred him from the mechanistic\nconception of those of pure science. Goethe, like every great poet, saw\nthe universe through the colored medium of his imagination, his\nemotional and aesthetic nature; in short, through his humanism, and not\nin the white light of the scientific reason. His contributions to\nliterature were of the first order, but his contributions to science\nhave not taken high rank. He was a \"prophet of the soul,\" and not a\ndisciple of the scientific understanding.\n\nIf we look upon life as inherent or potential in the constitution of\nmatter, dependent upon outward physical and chemical conditions for its\ndevelopment, we are accounting for life in terms of matter and motion,\nand are in the ranks of the materialists. But if we find ourselves\nunable to set the ultimate particles of matter in action, or so working\nas to produce the reaction which results in life, without conceiving of\nsome new force or principle operating upon them, then we are in the\nranks of the vitalists or idealists. The idealists see the original\natoms slumbering there in rock and sea and soil for untold ages, till,\nmoved upon by some unknown factor, they draw together in certain fixed\norder and numbers, and life is the result. Something seems to put a\nspell upon them and cause them to behave so differently from the way\nthey behaved before they were drawn into the life circuit.\n\nWhen we think of life, as the materialists do, as of mechanico-chemical\norigin, or explicable in terms of the natural universal order, we think\nof the play of material forces amid which we live, we think of their\nsubtle action and interaction all about us--of osmosis, capillarity,\nradio-activity, electricity, thermism, and the like; we think of the\nfour states of matter,--solid, fluid, gaseous, and ethereal,--of how\nlittle our senses take in of their total activities, and we do not feel\nthe need of invoking a transcendental principle to account for it.\n\nYet to fail to see that what we must call intelligence pervades and is\nactive in all organic nature is to be spiritually blind. But to see it\nas something foreign to, or separable from, nature is to do violence to\nour faith in the constancy and sufficiency of the natural order. One\nstar differeth from another star in glory. There are degrees of mystery\nin the universe. The most mysterious thing in inorganic nature is\nelectricity--that disembodied energy that slumbers in the ultimate\nparticles of matter--unseen, unfelt, unknown, till it suddenly leaps\nforth with such terrible vividness and power on the face of the storm,\nor till we summon it through the transformation of some other form of\nenergy. A still higher and more inscrutable mystery is life--that\nsomething which clothes itself in such infinitely varied and beautiful\nas well as unbeautiful forms of matter. We can evoke electricity at will\nfrom many different sources, but we can evoke life only from other life;\nthe biogenetic law is inviolable.\n\n\nIV\n\nIt takes some of the cold iron out of the mechanistic theory of life if\nwe divest it of all our associations with the machine-mad and\nmachine-ridden world in which we live and out of which our material\ncivilization came. The mechanical, the automatic, is the antithesis of\nthe spontaneous and the poetic, and it repels us on that account. We are\nso made that the artificial systems please us far less than the natural\nsystems. A sailing-ship takes us more than a steamship. It is nearer\nlife, nearer the winged creatures. There is determinism in nature,\nmechanical forces are everywhere operative, but there are no machines in\nthe proper sense of the word. When we call an organism a living machine\nwe at once take it out of the categories of the merely mechanical and\nautomatic and lift it into a higher order--the vital order.\n\nProfessor Le Dantec says we are mechanisms in the third degree, a\nmechanism of a mechanism of a mechanism. The body is a mechanism by\nvirtue of its anatomy--its framework, its levers, its hinges; it is a\nmechanism by virtue of its chemical activities; and it is a mechanism by\nvirtue of its colloid states--three kinds of mechanisms in one, and all\nacting together harmoniously and as a unit--in other words, a\nsuper-mechanical combination of activities.\n\nThe mechanical conception of life repels us because of its association\nin our minds with the fabrications of our own hands--the dead metal and\nwood and the noise and dust of our machine-ridden and machine-produced\ncivilization.\n\nBut Nature makes no machines like our own. She uses mechanical\nprinciples everywhere, in inert matter and in living bodies, but she\ndoes not use them in the bald and literal way we do. We must divest her\nmechanisms of the rigidity and angularity that pertain to the works of\nour own hands. Her hooks and hinges and springs and sails and coils and\naeroplanes, all involve mechanical contrivances, but how differently\nthey impress us from our own application of the same principles! Even in\ninert matter--in the dews, the rains, the winds, the tides, the snows,\nthe streams,--her mechanics and her chemistry and her hydrostatics and\npneumatics, seem much nearer akin to life than our own. We must remember\nthat Nature's machines are not human machines. When we place our machine\nso that it is driven by the great universal currents,--the wheel in the\nstream, the sail on the water,--the result is much more pleasing and\npoetic than when propelled by artificial power. The more machinery we\nget between ourselves and Nature, the farther off Nature seems. The\nmarvels of crystallization, the beautiful vegetable forms which the\nfrost etches upon the stone flagging of the sidewalk, and upon the\nwindow-pane, delight us and we do not reason why. A natural bridge\npleases more than one which is the work of an engineer, yet the natural\nbridge can only stand when it is based upon good engineering principles.\nI found at the great Colorado Canon, that the more the monuments of\nerosion were suggestive of human structures, or engineering and\narchitectural works, the more I was impressed by them. We are pleased\nwhen Nature imitates man, and we are pleased when man imitates Nature,\nand yet we recoil from the thought that life is only applied mechanics\nand chemistry. But the thought that it is mechanics and chemistry\napplied by something of which they as such, form no part, some agent or\nprinciple which we call vitality, is welcome to us. No machine we have\never made or seen can wind itself up, or has life, no chemical compound\nfrom the laboratories ever develops a bit of organic matter, and\ntherefore we are disbelievers in the powers of these things.\n\n\nV\n\nIs gravity or chemical affinity any more real to the mind than vitality?\nBoth are names for mysteries. Something which we call life lifts matter\nup, in opposition to gravity, into thousands of living forms. The tree\nlifts potash, silica, and lime up one or two hundred feet into the air;\nit elbows the soil away from its hole where it enters the ground; its\nroots split rocks. A giant sequoia lifts tons of solid matter and water\nup hundreds of feet. So will an explosion of powder or dynamite, but the\ntree does it slowly and silently by the organizing power of life. The\nvital is as inscrutably identified with the mechanical and chemical as\nthe soul is identified with the body. They are one while yet they are\ntwo.\n\nFor purely mechanical things we can find equivalents. Arrest a purely\nmechanical process, and the machine only rests or rusts; arrest a vital\nprocess, and the machine evaporates, disintegrates, myriads of other\nmachines reduce it to its original mineral and gaseous elements. In the\norganic world we strike a principle that is incalculable in its\noperation and incommensurable in its results. The physico-chemical\nforces we can bring to book; we know their orbits, their attractions and\nrepulsions, and just what they will and will not do; we can forecast\ntheir movements and foresee their effects. But the vital forces\ntranscend all our mathematics; we cannot anticipate their behavior.\nStart inert matter in motion and we know pretty nearly what will happen\nto it; mix the chemical elements together and we can foresee the\nresults; but start processes or reactions we call life, and who can\nforesee the end? We know the sap will mount in the tree and the tree\nwill be true to its type, but what do we or can we know of what it is\nthat determines its kind and size? We know that in certain plants the\nleaves will always be opposite each other on the stalk, and that in\nother plants the leaves will alternate; that certain plants will have\nconspicuous and others inconspicuous flowers; but how can we know what\nit is in the cells of the plants that determines these things? We can\ngraft the scion of a sour apple tree upon a sweet, and _vice versa_, and\nthe fruit of the scion will be true to its kind, but no analysis of the\nscion or of the stock will reveal the secret, as it would in the case of\nchemical compounds. In inorganic nature we meet with concretions, but\nnot secretions; with crystallization, but not with assimilation and\ngrowth from within. Chemistry tells us that the composition of animal\nbodies is identical with that of vegetable; that there is nothing in one\nthat is not in the other; and yet, behold the difference! a difference\nbeyond the reach of chemistry to explain. Biology can tell us all about\nthese differences and many other things, but it cannot tell us the\nsecret we are looking for,--what it is that fashions from the same\nelements two bodies so unlike as a tree and a man.\n\nDecay and disintegration in the inorganic world often lead to the\nproduction of beautiful forms. In life the reverse is true; the vital\nforces build up varied and picturesque forms which when pulled down are\nshapeless and displeasing. The immense layers of sandstone and limestone\nout of which the wonderful forms that fill the Grand Canon of the\nColorado are carved were laid down in wide uniform sheets; if the waters\nhad deposited their material in the forms which we now see, it would\nhave been a miracle. We marvel and admire as we gaze upon them now; we\ndo more, we have to speculate as to how it was all done by the blind,\nunintelligent forces. Giant stairways, enormous alcoves, dizzy, highly\nwrought balustrades, massive vertical walls standing four-square like\nhuge foundations--how did all the unguided erosive forces do it? The\nsecret is in the structure of the rock, in the lines of cleavage, in the\nunequal hardness, and in the impulsive, irregular, and unequal action of\nthe eroding agents. These agents follow the lines of least resistance;\nthey are active at different times and seasons, and from different\ndirections; they work with infinite slowness; they undermine, they\ndisintegrate, they dislodge, they transport; the hard streaks resist\nthem, the soft streaks invite them; water charged with sand and gravel\nsaws down; the wind, armed with fine sand, rounds off and hollows out;\nand thus the sculpturing goes on. But after you have reasoned out all\nthese things, you still marvel at the symmetry and the structural beauty\nof the forms. They look like the handiwork of barbarian gods. They are\nthe handiwork of physical forces which we can see and measure and in a\ndegree control. But what a gulf separates them from the handiwork of the\norganic forces!\n\n\nVI\n\nSome things come and some things arise; things that already exist may\ncome, but potential things arise; my friend comes to visit me, the tide\ncomes up the river, the cold or hot wave comes from the west; but the\nseasons, night and morning, health and disease, and the like, do not\ncome in this sense; they arise. Life does not come to dead matter in\nthis sense; it arises. Day and night are not traveling round the earth,\nthough we view them that way; they arise from the turning of the earth\nupon its axis. If we could keep up with the flying moments,--that is,\nwith the revolution of the earth,--we could live always at sunrise, or\nsunset, or at noon, or at any other moment we cared to elect. Love or\nhate does not come to our hearts; it is born there; the breath does not\ncome to the newborn infant; respiration arises there automatically. See\nhow the life of the infant is involved in that first breath, yet it is\nnot its life; the infant must first be alive before it can breathe. If\nit is still-born, the respiratory reaction does not take place. We can\nsay, then, that the breath means life, and the life means breath; only\nwe must say the latter first. We can say in the same way that\norganization means life, and life means organization. Something sets up\nthe organizing process in matter. We may take all the physical elements\nof life known to us and jumble them together and shake them up to all\neternity, and life will not result. A little friction between solid\nbodies begets heat, a little more and we get fire. But no amount of\nfriction begets life. Heat and life go together, but heat is the\nsecondary factor.\n\nLife is always a vanishing-point, a constant becoming--an unstable\nsomething that escapes us while we seem to analyze it. In its nature or\nessence, it is a metaphysical problem, and not one of physical science.\nScience cannot grasp it; it evaporates in its crucibles. And science is\ncompelled finally to drive it into an imaginary region--I had almost\nsaid, metaphysical region, the region of the invisible, hypothetical\natoms of matter. Here in the mysteries of molecular attraction and\nrepulsion, it conceives the secret of life to lie.\n\n\"Life is a wave,\" says Tyndall, but does not one conceive of something,\nsome force or impulse in the wave that is not of the wave? What is it\nthat travels along lifting new water each moment up into waves? It is a\nphysical force communicated usually by the winds. When the wave dies\nupon the shore, this force is dissipated, not lost, or is turned into\nheat. Why may we not think of life as a vital force traveling through\nmatter and lifting up into organic life waves in the same way? But not\ntranslatable into any other form of energy because not derivable from\nany other form.\n\nEvery species of animal has something about it that is unique and\nindividual and that no chemical or physiological analysis of it will\nshow--probably some mode of motion among its ultimate particles that is\npeculiar to itself. This prevents cross-breeding among different species\nand avoids a chaos of animal and vegetable forms. Living tissues and\nliving organs from one species cannot be grafted upon the individuals\nof another species; the kidney of a cat, for instance, cannot be\nsubstituted for that of a dog, although the functions and the anatomy of\nthe two are identical. It is suggested that an element of felineness and\nan element of canineness adhere in the cells of each, and the two are\nantagonistic. This specific quality, or selfness, of an animal pervades\nevery drop of its blood, so that the blood relationship of the different\nforms may be thus tested, where chemistry is incompetent to show\nagreement or antagonism. The reactions of life are surer and more subtle\nthan those of chemistry. Thus the blood relationship between birds and\nreptiles is clearly shown, as is the relationship of man and the\nchimpanzee and the orang-outang. The same general fact holds true in the\nvegetable world. You cannot graft the apple upon the oak, or the plum\nupon the elm. It seems as if there were the quality of oakness and the\nquality of appleness, and they would not mix.\n\nThe same thing holds among different chemical compounds. Substances\nwhich have precisely the same chemical formulae (called isomers) have\nproperties as widely apart as alcohol and ether.\n\nIf chemistry is powerless to trace the relationship between different\nforms of life, is it not highly improbable that the secret of life\nitself is in the keeping of chemistry?\n\nAnalytical science has reached the end of its tether when it has\nresolved a body into its constituent elements. Why or how these elements\nbuild up a man in the one case, and a monkey in another, is beyond its\nprovince to say. It can deal with all the elements of the living body,\nvegetable and animal; it can take them apart and isolate them in\ndifferent bottles; but it cannot put them together again as they were in\nlife. It knows that the human body is built up of a vast multitude of\nminute cells, that these cells build tissues, that the tissues build\norgans, that the organs build the body; but the secret of the man, or\nthe dog, or even the flea, is beyond its reach. The secret of biology,\nthat which makes its laws and processes differ so widely from those of\ngeology or astronomy, is a profound mystery. Science can take living\ntissue and make it grow outside of the body from which it came, but it\nwill only repeat endlessly the first step of life--that of\ncell-multiplication; it is like a fire that will burn as long as fuel is\ngiven it and the ashes are removed; but it is entirely purposeless; it\nwill not build up the organ of which it once formed a part, much less\nthe whole organized body.\n\nThe difference between one man and another does not reside in his\nanatomy or physiology, or in the elements of which the brains and bodies\nare composed, but in something entirely beyond the reach of experimental\nscience to disclose. The difference is psychological, or, we may say,\nphilosophical, and science is none the wiser for it. The mechanics and\nthe chemistry of a machine are quite sufficient to account for it, plus\nthe man behind it. To the physics and chemistry of a living body, we are\ncompelled to add some intangible, unknowable principle or tendency that\nphysics and chemistry cannot disclose or define. One hesitates to make\nsuch a statement lest he do violence to that oneness, that sameness,\nthat pervades the universe.\n\nAll trees go to the same soil for their ponderable elements, their\nashes, and to the air and the light for their imponderable,--their\ncarbon and their energy,--but what makes the tree, and makes one tree\ndiffer from another? Has the career of life upon this globe, the\nunfolding of the evolutionary process, been accounted for when you have\nnamed all the physical and material elements and processes which it\ninvolves? We take refuge in the phrase \"the nature of things,\" but the\nnature of things evidently embraces something not dreamed of in our\nscience.\n\n\nVII\n\nIt is reported that a French scientist has discovered the secret of the\nglow-worm's light. Of course it is a chemical reaction,--what else could\nit be?--but it is a chemical reaction in a vital process. Our mental and\nspiritual life--our emotions of art, poetry, religion--are inseparable\nfrom physical processes in the brain and the nervous system; but is\nthat their final explanation? The sunlight has little effect on a\nwithered leaf, but see what effect it has upon the green leaf upon the\ntree! The sunlight is the same, but it falls upon a new force or potency\nin the chlorophyll of the leaf,--a bit of chemistry there inspired by\nlife,--and the heat of the sun is stored up in the carbon or woody\ntissues of the plant or tree, to be given out again in our stoves or\nfireplaces. And behold how much more of the solar heat is stored up in\none kind of a tree than in certain other kinds,--how much in the\nhickory, oak, maple, and how little comparatively in the pine, spruce,\nlinden,--all through the magic of something in the leaf, or shall we say\nof the spirit of the tree? If the laws of matter and force alone account\nfor the living organism, if we do not have to think of something that\norganizes, then how do we account for the marvelous diversity of living\nforms, and their still more marvelous power of adaptation to changed\nconditions, since the laws of matter and force are the same everywhere?\nScience can deal only with the mechanism and chemistry of life, not with\nits essence; that which sets up the new activity in matter that we call\nvital is beyond its analysis. It is hard to believe that we have told\nthe whole truth about a living body when we have enumerated all its\nchemical and mechanical activities. It is by such enumeration that we\ndescribe a watch, or a steam-engine, or any other piece of machinery.\nDescribe I say, but such description does not account for the watch or\ntell us its full significance. To do this, we must include the\nwatchmaker, and the world of mind and ideas amid which he lives. Now, in\na living machine, the machine and the maker are one. The watch is\nperpetually self-wound and self-regulated and self-repaired. It is made\nup of millions of other little watches, the cells, all working together\nfor one common end and ticking out the seconds and minutes of life with\nunfailing regularity. Unlike the watch we carry in our pockets, if we\ntake it apart so as to stop its ticking, it can never be put together\nagain. It has not merely stopped; it is dead.\n\nThe late William Keith Brooks, of Johns Hopkins University, said in\nopposition to Huxley that he held to the \"old-fashioned conviction that\nliving things do in some way, and in some degree, control or condition\ninorganic nature; that they hold their own by setting the mechanical\nproperties of matter in opposition to each other, and that this is their\nmost notable and distinctive characteristic.\" And yet, he said, to think\nof the living world as \"anything but natural\" is impossible.\n\n\nVIII\n\nLife seems to beget a new kind of chemistry, the same elements behave so\ndifferently when they are drawn into the life circuit from what they\ndid before. Carbon, for instance, enters into hundreds of new compounds\nin the organic world that are unknown in the inorganic world. I am thus\nspeaking of life as if it were something, some force or agent, that\nantedates its material manifestations, whereas in the eyes of science\nthere is no separation of the one from the other. In an explosion there\nis usually something anterior to, or apart from, the explosive compound,\nthat pulls the trigger, or touches the match, or completes the circuit,\nbut in the slow and gentle explosions that keep the life machinery\ngoing, we cannot make such a distinction. The spark and the powder are\none; the gun primes and fires itself; the battery is perpetually\nself-charged; the lamp is self-trimmed and self-lit.\n\nSir Oliver Lodge is apparently so impressed with some such\nconsiderations that he spiritualizes life, and makes it some mysterious\nentity in itself, existing apart from the matter which it animates and\nuses; not a source of energy but a timer and releaser of energy. Henri\nBergson, in his \"Creative Evolution,\" expounds a similar philosophy of\nlife. Life is a current in opposition to matter which it enters into,\nand organizes into the myriads of living forms.\n\nI confess that it is easier for me to think of life in these terms than\nin terms of physical science. The view falls in better with our\nanthropomorphic tendencies. It appeals to the imagination and to our\nmyth-making aptitudes. It gives a dramatic interest to the question.\nWith Bergson we see life struggling with matter, seeking to overcome its\nobduracy, compromising with it, taking a half-loaf when it cannot get a\nwhole one; we see evolution as the unfolding of a vast drama acted upon\nthe stage of geologic time. Creation becomes a perpetual process, the\ncreative energy an ever-present and familiar fact. Bergson's book is a\nwonderful addition to the literature of science and of philosophy. The\npoet, the dreamer, the mystic, in each of us takes heart at Bergson's\nbeautiful philosophy; it seems like a part of life; it goes so well with\nliving things. As James said, it is like the light of the morning and\nthe singing of birds; we glory in seeing the intellect humbled as he\nhumbles it. The concepts of science try our mettle. They do not appeal\nto our humanity, or to our myth-making tendencies; they appeal to the\npurely intellectual, impersonal force within us. Though all our gods\ntotter and fall, science goes its way; though our hearts are chilled and\nour lives are orphaned, science cannot turn aside, or veil its light. It\ndoes not temper the wind to the shorn lamb.\n\nHence the scientific conception of the universe repels many people. They\nare not equal to it. To think of life as involved in the very\nconstitution of matter itself is a much harder proposition than to\nconceive of it as Bergson and Sir Oliver Lodge do, as an independent\nreality. The latter view gives the mind something more tangible to lay\nhold of. Indeed, science gives the mind nothing to take hold of. Does\nany chemical process give the mind any separate reality to take hold of?\nIs there a spirit of fire, or of decay, or of disease, or of health?\n\n\nIX\n\nBehold a man with his wonderful body, and still more wonderful mind; try\nto think of him as being fathered and mothered by the mere mechanical\nand chemical forces that we see at work in the rocks and soil underfoot,\nbegotten by chemical affinity or the solar energy working as molecular\nphysic, and mothered by the warmth and moisture, by osmosis and the\ncolloid state--and all through the chance clashings and groupings of the\nirrational physical forces. Nothing is added to them, nothing guides or\ninspires them, nothing moves upon the face of the waters, nothing\nbreathes upon the insensate clay. The molecules or corpuscles of the\nfour principal elements--carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, and oxygen--just\nhappened to come together in certain definite numbers, and in a certain\ndefinite order, and invented or built up that most marvelous thing in\nthe universe, the cell. The cells put their heads, or bodies, together,\nand built the tissues, the tissues formed the organs, the organs in\nconvention assembled organized themselves into the body, and behold! a\nman, a bird, or a tree!--as chance a happening as the juxtaposition of\nthe grains of sand upon the shore, or the shape of the summer clouds in\nthe sky.\n\nAristotle dwells upon the internal necessity. The teeth of an animal\narise from necessity, he says; the animal must have them in order to\nlive. Yet it must have lived before it had them, else how would the\nnecessity arise? If the horns of an animal arise from the same\nnecessity, the changing conditions of its life begat the necessity; its\nlife problem became more and more complicated, till new tools arose to\nmeet new wants. But without some indwelling principle of development and\nprogress, how could the new wants arise? Spencer says this progress is\nthe result of the action and reaction between organisms and their\nchanging environment. But you must first get your organism before the\nenvironment can work its effects, and you must have something in the\norganism that organizes and reacts from the environment. We see the\nagents he names astronomic, geologic, meteorologic, having their effects\nupon inanimate objects as well, but they do not start the process of\ndevelopment in them; they change a stone, but do not transform it into\nan organism. The chemist can take the living body apart as surely as the\nwatchmaker can take a watch apart, but he cannot put the parts together\nagain so that life will reappear, as the watchmaker can restore the\ntime-keeping power of the watch. The watch is a mere mechanical\ncontrivance with parts fitted to parts externally, while the living body\nis a mechanical and chemical contrivance, with parts blended with parts\ninternally, so to speak, and acting together through sympathy, and not\nmerely by mechanical adjustment. Do we not have to think of some\norganizing agent embracing and controlling all the parts, and integral\nin each of them, making a vital bond instead of a mechanical one?\n\nThere are degrees of vitality in living things, whereas there are only\ndegrees of complexity and delicacy and efficiency in mechanical\ncontrivances. One watch differs from another in the perfection of its\nworks, but not as two living bodies with precisely similar structure\ndiffer from each other in their hold upon life, or in their measure of\nvitality. No analysis possible to science could show any difference in\nthe chemistry and physics of two persons of whom one would withstand\nhardships and diseases that would kill the other, or with whom one would\nhave the gift of long life and the other not. Machines differ from one\nanother quantitatively--more or less efficiency; a living body differs\nfrom a machine qualitatively--its efficiency is of a different order;\nits unity is of a different order; its complexity is of a different\norder; the interdependence of its parts is of a different order. Yet\nwhat a parallel there is between a machine and a living body! Both are\nrun by external forces or agents, solar energy in one applied\nmechanically from without; in the other applied vitally from within;\nboth suffer from the wear and tear of time and from abuse, but one is\nself-repaired and the other powerless in this respect--two machines with\nthe same treatment running the same number of years, but two men with\nthe same treatment running a very unequal number of years. Machines of\nthe same kind differ in durability, men differ in powers of endurance; a\nman can \"screw up his courage,\" but a machine has no courage to screw\nup. Science may be unable to see any difference between vital mechanics,\nvital chemistry, and the chemics and mechanics of inorganic bodies--its\nanalysis reveals no difference; but that there is a difference as\nbetween two different orders, all men see and feel.\n\nScience cannot deal with fundamental questions. Only philosophy can do\nthis. Science is only a tool or a key, and it can unlock only certain\nmaterial problems. It cannot appraise itself. It is not a judge but a\nwitness. Problems of mind, of character, moral, aesthetic, literary,\nartistic problems, are not its sphere. It counts and weighs and measures\nand analyzes, it traces relations, but it cannot appraise its own\nresults. Science and religion come in conflict only when the latter\nseeks to deal with objective facts, and the former seeks to deal with\nsubjective ideas and emotions. On the question of miracle they clash,\nbecause religion is then dealing with natural phenomena and challenges\nscience. Philosophy offends science when it puts its own interpretation\nupon scientific facts. Science displeases literature when it dehumanizes\nnature and shows us irrefragable laws when we had looked for humanistic\ndivinities.\n\n\n\n\nXI\n\nTHE ARRIVAL OF THE FIT\n\n\nIn my youth I once heard the then well-known lecturer Starr King speak\non \"The Law of Disorder.\" I have no recollection of the main thought of\nhis discourse, but can see that it might have been upon the order and\nharmony that finally come out of the disharmonies of nature and of man.\nThe whole universe goes blundering on, but surely arrives. Collisions\nand dispersions in the heavens above, and failure and destruction among\nliving things on the earth below, yet here we all are in a world good to\nbe in! The proof that it is good to be in is that we are actually here.\nIt is as if the Creator played his right hand against his left--what one\nloses the other gains.\n\nIt has been aptly said that while Darwin's theory of natural selection\nmay account for the survival of the fittest, it does not account for the\narrival of the fittest. The arrival of the fittest, sooner or later,\nseems in some way guaranteed by tendencies that are beyond the\nhit-and-miss method of natural selection.\n\nWhen we look back over the course of organic evolution, we see the\nunfolding of a great drama, or tragedy, in which, for millions upon\nmillions of years the sole actors are low and all but brainless forms\nof life, devouring and devoured, in the old seas. We see, during other\nmillions upon millions of years, a savage carnival of huge bestial forms\nupon the land, amphibian monsters and dragons of the land and air,\ndevouring and being devoured, a riot of blood and carnage. We see the\nshifting of land and sea, the folding and crumpling of the earth's\ncrust, the rise of mountains, the engulfing of forests, a vast\ndestruction of life, immense numbers of animal forms becoming extinct\nthrough inability to adapt themselves to new conditions, or from other\ncauses. We see creatures, half beast, half bird, or half dragon, half\nfish; we see the evolutionary process thwarted or delayed apparently by\nthe hardening or fixing of its own forms. We see it groping its way like\na blind man, and experimenting with this device and with that, fumbling,\nawkward, ineffectual, trying magnitude of body and physical strength\nfirst, and then shifting the emphasis to size of brain and delicacy and\ncomplexity of nerve-organization, pushing on but gropingly, learning\nonly by experience, regardless of pain and waste and suffering; whole\nraces of sentient beings swept away by some terrestrial cataclysm, as at\nthe end of Palaeozoic and Mesozoic times; prodigal, inhuman, riotous,\narming some vegetable growths with spurs and thorns that tear and stab,\nsome insects with stings, some serpents with deadly fangs, the\nproduction of pain as much a part of the scheme of things as the\nproduction of pleasure; the creative impulse feeling its way through the\nmollusk to the fish, and through the fish to the amphibian and the\nreptile, through the reptile to the mammal, and through the mammal to\nthe anthropoid apes, and through the apes to man, then through the rude\nand savage races of man, the long-jawed, small-brained, Pliocene man,\nhairy and savage, to the cave-dwellers and stone-implement man of\nPleistocene times, and so on to our rude ancestors whom we see dimly at\nthe dawn of history, and thus rapidly upward to the European man of our\nown era. What a record! What savagery, what thwartings and delays, what\ncarnage and suffering, what an absence of all that we mean by\nintelligent planning and oversight, of love, of fatherhood! Just a clash\nof forces, the battle to the strong and the race to the fleet.\n\nIt is hard to believe that the course of organic evolution would have\neventuated in man and the other higher forms of life without some\nguiding principle; yet it is equally difficult to believe that the\ncourse of any guiding intelligence down the ages would have been strewn\nwith so many failures and monstrosities, so much waste and suffering and\ndelay. Man has not been specially favored by one force or element in\nnature. Behold the enemies that beset him without and within, and that\nare armed for his destruction! The intelligence that appears to pervade\nthe organic world, and that reaches its conscious expression in the\nbrain of man, is just as manifest in all the forms of animals and plants\nthat are inimical to him, in all his natural enemies,--venomous snakes\nand beasts of prey, and insect pests,--as in anything else. Nature is as\nwise and solicitous for rats and mice as for men. In fact, she has\nendowed many of the lower creatures with physical powers that she has\ndenied him. Evidently man is only one of the cards in her pack;\ndoubtless the highest one, but the game is not played for him alone.\n\nThere is no economy of effort or of material in nature as a whole,\nwhatever there may be in special parts. The universe is not run on\nmodern business-efficiency principles. There is no question of time, or\nof profit, of solvency or insolvency. The profit-and-loss account in the\nlong run always balances. In our astronomic age there are probably\nvastly more dead suns and planets strewing the depths of sidereal space\nthan there are living suns and planets. But in some earlier period in\nthe cycle of time the reverse may have been true, or it may be true in\nsome future period.\n\nThere is economy of effort in the individual organism, but not in the\norganic series, at least from the human point of view. During the\nbiologic ages there have been a vast number of animal forms, great and\nsmall, and are still, that had no relation to man, that were not in his\nline of descent, and played no part in his evolution. During that\ncarnival of monstrous and gigantic forms in Mesozoic time the ancestor\nof man was probably some small and insignificant creature whose life was\nconstantly imperiled by the huge beasts about it. That it survived at\nall in the clash of forces, bestial and elemental, during those early\nages, is one of the wonders of time. The drama or tragedy of evolution\nhas had many actors, some of them fearful and terrible to look upon, who\nhave played their parts and passed off the stage, as if the sole purpose\nwas the entertainment of some unseen spectator. When we reach human\nhistory, what wasted effort, what failures, what blind groping, what\nfutile undertakings!--war, famine, pestilence, delaying progress or\nbringing to naught the wisdom of generations of men! Those who live in\nthis age are witnessing in the terrible European war something analogous\nto the blind, wasteful fury of the elemental forces; millions of men who\nnever saw one another, and who have not the shadow of a quarrel, engage\nin a life-and-death struggle, armed with all the aids that centuries of\nscience and civilization can give them--a tragedy that darkens the very\nheavens and makes a mockery of all our age-old gospel of peace and good\nwill to men. It is a catastrophe on a scale with the cataclysms of\ngeologic time when whole races disappeared and the face of continents\nwas changed. It seems that men in the aggregate, with all their science\nand religion, are no more exempt from the operation of cosmic laws than\nare the stocks and stones. Each party to this gigantic struggle declares\nthat he is in it against his will; the fate that rules in the solar\nsystem seems to have them all in its grip; the working of forces and\ntendencies for which no man was responsible seems to have brought it\nabout. Social communities grow in grace and good-fellowship, but\ngovernments in their relations to one another, and often in relation to\ntheir own subjects, are still barbarous. Men become christianized, but\nman is still a heathen, the victim of savage instincts. In this struggle\none of the most admirable and efficient of nations, and one of the most\nsolicitous for the lives and well-being of its citizens, is suddenly\nseized with a fury of destruction, hurling its soldiers to death as if\nthey were only the waste of the fields, and trampling down other peoples\nwhose geographic position placed them in their way as if they were\nmerely vermin, throwing international morality to the winds, looking\nupon treaties as \"scraps of paper,\" regarding themselves as the salt of\nthe earth, the chosen of the Lord, appropriating the Supreme Being as\ndid the colossal egotism of old Israel, and quickly getting down to the\nbasic principle of savage life--that might makes right.\n\nLittle wonder that the good people are asking, Have we lost faith? We\nmay or we may not have lost faith, but can we not see that our faith\ndoes not give us a key to the problem? Our faith is founded on the old\nprescientific conception of a universe in which good and evil are\nstruggling with each other, with a Supreme Being aiding and abetting the\ngood. We fail to appreciate that the cosmic laws are no respecters of\npersons. Emerson says there is no god dare wrong a worm, but worms dare\nwrong one another, and there is no god dare take sides with either. The\ntides in the affairs of men are as little subject to human control as\nthe tides of the sea and the air. We may fix the blame of the European\nwar upon this government or upon that, but race antagonisms and\ngeographical position are not matters of choice. An island empire, like\nEngland, is bound to be jealous of all rivals upon the sea, because her\nvery life, when nations clash, depends upon her control of it; and an\ninland empire, like Germany, is bound to grow restless under the\npressure of contiguous states of other races. A vast empire, like\nRussia, is always in danger of falling apart by its own weight. It is\nfused and consolidated by a turn of events that arouse the patriotic\nemotions of the whole people and unite them in a common enthusiasm.\n\nThe evolution of nations is attended by the same contingencies, the same\nlaw of probability, the same law of the survival of the fit, as are\norganic bodies. I say the survival of the fit; there are degrees of\nfitness in the scale of life; the fit survive, and the fittest lead and\ndominate, as did the reptiles in Mesozoic time, and the mammals in\nTertiary time. Among the mammals man is dominant because he is the\nfittest. Nations break up or become extinct when they are no longer fit,\nor equal to the exigencies of the struggles of life. The Roman Empire\nwould still exist if it had been entirely fit. The causes of its\nunfitness form a long and intricate problem. Germany of to-day evidently\nlooks upon herself as the dominant nation, the one fittest to survive,\nand she has committed herself to the desperate struggle of justifying\nher self-estimate. She tramples down weaker nations as we do the stubble\nof the fields. She would plough and harrow the world to plant her\nPrussian _Kultur_. This _Kultur_ is a mighty good product, but we\noutside of its pale think that French _Kultur_, and English _Kultur_,\nand American _Kultur_ are good products also, and equally fit to\nsurvive. We naturally object to being ploughed under. That Russian\n_Kultur_ has so far proved itself a vastly inferior product cannot be\ndoubted, but the evolutionary processes will in time bring a finer and\nhigher Russia out of this vast weltering and fermenting mass of\nhumanity. In all these things impersonal laws and forces are at work,\nand the balance of power, if temporarily disturbed, is bound, sooner or\nlater, to be restored just as it is in the inorganic realm.\n\nEvolution is creative, as Bergson contends. The wonder is that,\nnotwithstanding the indifference of the elemental forces and the blind\nclashing of opposing tendencies among living forms,--a universe that\nseems run entirely on the trial-and-error principle,--evolution has gone\nsteadily forward, a certain order and stability has been reached in the\nworld of inert bodies and forces, and myriads of forms of wonderful\nfitness and beauty have been reached in the organic realm. Just as the\nwater-system and the weather-system of the globe have worked themselves\nout on the hit-and-miss plan, but not without serious defects,--much too\nmuch water and heat at a few places, and much too little at a few\nothers,--so the organic impulse, warred upon by the blind inorganic\nelements and preyed upon by the forms it gave rise to, has worked itself\nout and peopled the world as we see it peopled to-day--not with forms\naltogether admirable and lovely from our point of view, but so from the\npoint of view of the whole. The forests get themselves planted by the\ngo-as-you-please winds and currents, the pines in one place, the spruce,\nthe oaks, the elms, the beeches, in another, all with a certain fitness\nand system. The waters gather themselves together in great bodies and\nbreathe salubrity and fertility upon the land.\n\nA certain order and reasonableness emerges from the chaos and\ncross-purposes. There are harmony and cooeperation among the elemental\nforces, as well as strife and antagonism. Life gets on, for all groping\nand blundering. There is the inherent variability of living forms to\nbegin with--the primordial push toward the development from within\nwhich, so far as we can see, is not fortuitous, but predestined; and\nthere is the stream of influences from without, constantly playing upon\nand modifying the organism and taken advantage of by it.\n\nThe essence of life is in adaptability; it goes into partnership with\nthe forces and conditions that surround it. It is this trait which leads\nthe teleological philosopher to celebrate the fitness of the environment\nwhen its fitness is a foregone conclusion. Shall we praise the fitness\nof the air for breathing, or of the water for drinking, or of the winds\nfor filling our sails? If we cannot say explicitly, without speaking\nfrom our anthropomorphism, that there is a guiding intelligence in the\nevolution of living forms, we can at least say, I think, that the\nstruggle for life is favored by the very constitution of the universe\nand that man in some inscrutable way was potential in the fiery nebula\nitself.\n\n\n\n\nXII\n\nTHE NATURALIST'S VIEW OF LIFE\n\n\nI\n\nWilliam James said that one of the privileges of a philosopher was to\ncontradict other philosophers. I may add in the same spirit that one of\nthe fatalities of many philosophers is, sooner or later, to contradict\nthemselves. I do not know that James ever contradicted himself, but I\nhave little doubt that a critical examination of his works would show\nthat he sometimes did so; I remember that he said he often had trouble\nto make both ends of his philosophy meet. Any man who seeks to compass\nany of the fundamental problems with the little span of his finite mind,\nis bound at times to have trouble to make both ends meet. The man of\nscience seldom has any such trouble with his problems; he usually knows\nwhat is the matter and forthwith seeks to remedy it. But the philosopher\nworks with a much more intangible and elusive material, and is lucky if\nhe is ever aware when both ends fail to meet.\n\nI have often wondered if Darwin, who was a great philosopher as well as\na great man of science, saw or felt the contradiction between his theory\nof the origin of species through natural selection working upon\nfortuitous variations, and his statement, made in his old age, that he\ncould not look upon man, with all his wonderful powers, as the result of\nmere chance. The result of chance man certainly is--is he not?--as are\nall other forms of life, if evolution is a mere mechanical process set\ngoing and kept going by the hit-and-miss action of the environment upon\nthe organism, or by the struggle for existence. If evolution involves no\nintelligence in nature, no guiding or animating principle, then is not\nman an accidental outcome of the blind clashing and jolting of the\nmaterial forces, as much so as the great stone face in the rocks which\nHawthorne used so suggestively in one of his stories?\n\nI have wondered if Huxley was aware that both ends of his argument did\nnot quite meet when he contended for the truth of determinism--that\nthere is and can be no free or spontaneous volition; and at the same\ntime set man apart from the cosmic order, and represented him as working\nhis will upon it, crossing and reversing its processes. In one of his\nearlier essays, Huxley said that to the student of living things, as\ncontrasted with the student of inert matter, the aspect of nature is\nreversed. \"In living matter, incessant, and so far as we know,\nspontaneous, change is the rule, rest the exception, the anomaly, to be\naccounted for. Living things have no inertia, and tend to no\nequilibrium,\" except the equilibrium of death. This is good vitalistic\ndoctrine, as far as it goes, yet Huxley saw no difference between the\nmatter of life and other matter, except in the manner in which the atoms\nare aggregated. Probably the only difference between a diamond and a\npiece of charcoal, or between a pearl and an oyster-shell, is the manner\nin which the atoms are aggregated; but that the secret of life is in the\npeculiar compounding of the atoms or molecules--a spatial arrangement of\nthem--is a harder proposition. It seems to me also that Haeckel involves\nhimself in obvious contradictions when he ascribes will, sensation,\ninclination, dislike, though of a low order, to the atoms of matter; in\nfact, sees them as living beings with souls, and then denies soul, will,\npower of choice, and the like to their collective unity in the brain of\nman.\n\nA philosopher cannot well afford to assume the air of lofty indifference\nthat the poet Whitman does when he asks, \"Do I contradict myself? Very\nwell, then, I contradict myself\"; but he may take comfort in the thought\nthat contradictions are often only apparent, and not real, as when two\nmen standing on opposite sides of the earth seem to oppose each other,\nand yet their heads point to the same heavens, and their feet to the\nsame terrestrial centre. The logic of the earth completely contradicts\nthe ideas we draw from our experience with other globes, both our\nartificial globes and the globes in the forms of the sun and the moon\nthat we see in the heavens. The earth has only one side, the outside,\nwhich is always the upper side; at the South Pole, as at the North, we\nare on the top side. I fancy the whole truth of any of the great\nproblems, if we could see it, would reconcile all our half-truths, all\nthe contradictions in our philosophy.\n\nIn considering this problem of the mystery of living things, I have had\na good deal of trouble in trying to make my inborn idealism go hand in\nhand with my inborn naturalism; but I am not certain that there is any\nreal break or contradiction between them, only a surface one, and that\ndeeper down the strata still unite them. Life seems beyond the capacity\nof inorganic nature to produce; and yet here is life in its myriad\nforms, here is the body and mind of man, and here is the world of\ninanimate matter out of which all living beings arise, and into which\nthey sooner or later return; and we must either introduce a new\nprinciple to account for it all, or else hold to the idea that what is\nis natural--a legitimate outcome of the universal laws and processes\nthat have been operating through all time. This last is the point of\nview of the present chapter,--the point of view of naturalism; not\nstrictly the scientific view which aims to explain all life phenomena in\nterms of exact experimental science, but the larger, freer view of the\nopen-air naturalist and literary philosopher. I cannot get rid of, or\nhold in abeyance, my inevitable idealism, if I would; neither can I do\nviolence to my equally inevitable naturalism, but may I not hope to make\nthe face of my naturalism beam with the light of the ideal--the light\nthat never was in the physico-chemical order, and never can be there?\n\n\nII\n\nThe naturalist cannot get away from the natural order, and he sees man,\nand all other forms of life, as an integral part of it--the order, which\nin inert matter is automatic and fateful, and which in living matter is\nprophetic and indeterminate; the course of one down the geologic ages,\nseeking only a mechanical repose, being marked by collisions and\ndisruptions; the other in its course down the biologic ages seeking a\nvital and unstable repose, being marked by pain, failure, carnage,\nextinction, and ceaseless struggle with the physical order upon which it\ndepends. Man has taken his chances in the clash of blind matter, and in\nthe warfare of living forms. He has been the pet of no god, the favorite\nof no power on earth or in heaven. He is one of the fruits of the great\ncosmic tree, and is subject to the same hazards and failures as the\nfruit of all other trees. The frosts may nip him in the bud, the storms\nbeat him down, foes of earth and air prey upon him, and hostile\ninfluences from all sides impede or mar him. The very forces that\nuphold him and furnish him his armory of tools and of power, will\ndestroy him the moment he is off his guard. He is like the trainer of\nwild beasts who, at his peril, for one instant relaxes his mastery over\nthem. Gravity, electricity, fire, flood, hurricane, will crush or\nconsume him if his hand is unsteady or his wits tardy. Nature has dealt\nwith him upon the same terms as with all other forms of life. She has\nshown him no favor. The same elements--the same water, air, lime, iron,\nsulphur, oxygen, carbon, and so on--make up his body and his brain as\nmake up theirs, and the same make up theirs as are the constituents of\nthe insensate rocks, soils, and clouds. The same elements, the same\natoms and molecules, but a different order; the same solar energy, but\nworking to other ends; the same life principle but lifted to a higher\nplane. How can we separate man from the total system of things, setting\nhim upon one side and them upon another, making the relation of the two\nmechanical or accidental? It is only in thought, or in obedience to some\ncreed or philosophy, that we do it. In life, in action, we unconsciously\nrecognize ourselves as a part of Nature. Our success and well-being\ndepend upon the closeness and spontaneousness of the relation.\n\nIf all this is interpreted to mean that life, that the mind and soul of\nman, are of material origin, science does not shrink from the inference.\nOnly the inference demands a newer and higher conception of matter--the\nconception that Tyndall expressed when he wrote the word with a capital\nM, and declared that Matter was \"at bottom essentially mystical and\ntranscendental\"; that Goethe expressed when he called matter \"the living\ngarment of God\"; and that Whitman expressed when he said that the soul\nand the body were one. The materialism of the great seers and prophets\nof science who penetrate into the true inwardness of matter, who see\nthrough the veil of its gross obstructive forms and behold it translated\ninto pure energy, need disturb no one.\n\nIn our religious culture we have beggared matter that we might exalt\nspirit; we have bankrupted earth that we might enrich heaven; we have\ndebased the body that we might glorify the soul. But science has changed\nall this. Mankind can never again rest in the old crude dualism. The\nDevil has had his day, and the terrible Hebrew Jehovah has had his day;\nthe divinities of this world are now having their day.\n\nThe puzzle or the contradiction in the naturalistic view of life appears\nwhen we try to think of a being as a part of Nature, having his genesis\nin her material forces, who is yet able to master and direct Nature,\nreversing her processes and defeating her ends, opposing his will to her\nfatalism, his mercy to her cruelty--in short, a being who thinks,\ndreams, aspires, loves truth, justice, goodness, and sits in judgment\nupon the very gods he worships. Must he not bring a new force, an alien\npower? Can a part be greater than the whole? Can the psychic dominate\nthe physical out of which it came? Again we have only to enlarge our\nconception of the physical--the natural--or make our faith measure up to\nthe demands of reason. Our reason demands that the natural order be\nall-inclusive. Can our faith in the divinity of matter measure up to\nthis standard? Not till we free ourselves from the inherited prejudices\nwhich have grown up from our everyday struggles with gross matter. We\nmust follow the guidance of science till we penetrate this husk and see\nits real mystical and transcendental character, as Tyndall did.\n\nWhen we have followed matter from mass to molecule, from molecule to\natom, from atom to electron, and seen it in effect dematerialized,--seen\nit in its fourth or ethereal, I had almost said spiritual, state,--when\nwe have grasped the wonder of radio-activity, and the atomic\ntransformations that attend it, we shall have a conception of the\npotencies and possibilities of matter that robs scientific materialism\nof most of its ugliness. Of course, no deductions of science can satisfy\nour longings for something kindred to our own spirits in the universe.\nBut neither our telescopes nor our microscopes reveal such a reality. Is\nthis longing only the result of our inevitable anthropomorphism, or is\nit the evidence of things unseen, the substance of things hoped for, the\nprophecy of our kinship with the farthest star? Can soul arise out of a\nsoulless universe?\n\nThough the secret of life is under our feet, yet how strange and\nmysterious it seems! It draws our attention away from matter. It arises\namong the inorganic elements like a visitant from another sphere. It is\na new thing in the world. Consciousness is a new thing, yet Huxley makes\nit one of his trinity of realities--matter, energy, and consciousness.\nWe are so immersed in these realities that we do not see the divinity\nthey embody. We call that sacred and divine which is far off and\nunattainable. Life and mind are so impossible of explanation in terms of\nmatter and energy, that it is not to be wondered at that mankind has so\nlong looked upon their appearance upon this earth as a miraculous event.\nBut until science opened our eyes we did not know that the celestial and\nthe terrestrial are one, and that we are already in the heavens among\nthe stars. When we emancipate ourselves from the bondage of wont and\nuse, and see with clear vision our relations to the Cosmos, all our\nideas of materialism and spiritualism are made over, and we see how the\ntwo are one; how life and death play into each other's hands, and how\nthe whole truth of things cannot be compassed by any number of finite\nminds.\n\n\nIII\n\nWhen we are bold enough to ask the question, Is life an addition to\nmatter or an evolution from matter? how all these extra-scientific\ntheories about life as a separate entity wilt and fade away! If we know\nanything about the ways of creative energy, we know that they are not as\nour ways; we know its processes bear no analogy to the linear and\nexternal doings of man. Creative energy works from within; it identifies\nitself with, and is inseparable from, the element in which it works. I\nknow that in this very statement I am idealizing the creative energy,\nbut my reader will, I trust, excuse this inevitable anthropomorphism.\nThe way of the creative energy is the way of evolution. When we begin to\nintroduce things, when we begin to separate the two orders, the vital\nand the material, or, as Bergson says, when we begin to think of things\ncreated, and of a thing that creates, we are not far from the state of\nmind of our childhood, and of the childhood of the race. We are not far\nfrom the Mosaic account of creation. Life appears as an introduction,\nman and his soul as introductions.\n\nOur reason, our knowledge of the method of Nature, declare for\nevolution; because here we are, here is this amazing world of life about\nus, and here it goes on through the action and interaction of purely\nphysical and chemical forces. Life seems as natural as day and night,\nas the dews and the rain. Our studies of the past history of the globe\nreveal the fact that life appeared upon a cooling planet when the\ntemperature was suitable, and when its basic elements, water and carbon\ndioxide, were at hand. How it began, whether through insensible changes\nin the activities of inert matter, lasting whole geologic ages, or by a\nsudden transformation at many points on the earth's surface, we can\nnever know. But science can see no reason for believing that its\nbeginning was other than natural; it was inevitable from the\nconstitution of matter itself. Moreover, since the law of evolution\nseems of universal application, and affords the key to more great\nproblems than any other generalization of the human mind, one would say\non _a priori_ grounds that life is an evolution, that its genesis is to\nbe sought in the inherent capacities and potentialities of matter\nitself. How else could it come? Science cannot go outside of matter and\nits laws for an explanation of any phenomena that appear in matter. It\ngoes inside of matter instead, and in its mysterious molecular\nattractions and repulsions, in the whirl and dance of the atoms and\nelectrons, in their emanations and transformations, in their amazing\npotencies and activities, sees, or seems to see, the secret of the\norigin of life itself. But this view is distasteful to a large number of\nthinking persons. Many would call it frank materialism, and declare\nthat it is utterly inadequate to supply the spiritual and ideal\nbackground which is the strength and solace of our human life.\n\n\nIV\n\nThe lay mind can hardly appreciate the necessity under which the man of\nscience feels to account for all the phenomena of life in terms of the\nnatural order. To the scientist the universe is complete in itself. He\ncan admit of no break or discontinuity anywhere. Threads of relation,\nvisible and invisible,--chemical, mechanical, electric, magnetic, solar,\nlunar, stellar, geologic, biologic,--forming an intricate web of subtle\nforces and influences, bind all things, living and dead, into a cosmic\nunity. Creation is one, and that one is symbolized by the sphere which\nrests forever on itself, which is whole at every point, which holds all\nforms, which reconciles all contradictions, which has no beginning and\nno ending, which has no upper and no under, and all of whose lines are\nfluid and continuous. The disruptions and antagonisms which we fancy we\nsee are only the result of our limited vision; nature is not at war with\nitself; there is no room or need for miracle; there is no outside to the\nuniverse, because there are no bounds to matter or spirit; all is\ninside; deep beneath deep, height above height, and this mystery and\nmiracle that we call life must arise out of the natural order in the\ncourse of time as inevitably as the dew forms and the rain falls. When\nthe rains and the dews and the snows cease to fall,--a time which\nscience predicts,--then life, as we know it, must inevitably vanish from\nthe earth. Human life is a physical phenomenon, and though it involves,\nas we believe, a psychic or non-physical principle, it is still not\nexempt from the operation of the universal physical laws. It came by\nthem or through them, and it must go by them or through them.\n\nThe rigidly scientific mind, impressed with all these things as the lay\nmind cannot be, used to the searching laboratory methods, and familiar\nwith the phenomenon of life in its very roots, as it were, dealing with\nthe wonders of chemical compounds, and the forces that lurk in molecules\nand atoms, seeing in the cosmic universe, and in the evolution of the\nearth, only the operation of mechanical and chemical principles; seeing\nthe irrefragable law of the correlation and the conservation of forces;\ntracing consciousness and all our changes in mental states to changes in\nthe brain substance; drilled in methods of proof by experimentation;\nknowing that the same number of ultimate atoms may be so combined or\nmarried as to produce compounds that differ as radically as alcohol and\nether,--conversant with all these things, and more, I say,--the strictly\nscientific mind falls naturally and inevitably into the mechanistic\nconception of all life phenomena.\n\nScience traces the chain of cause and effect everywhere and finds no\nbreak. It follows down animal life till it merges in the vegetable,\nthough it cannot put its finger or its microscope on the point where one\nends and the other begins. It finds forms that partake of the\ncharacteristics of both. It is reasonable to expect that the vegetable\nmerges into the mineral by the same insensible degrees, and that the one\nbecomes the other without any real discontinuity. The change, if we may\ncall it such, probably takes place in the interior world of matter among\nthe primordial atoms, where only the imagination can penetrate. In that\nsleep of the ultimate corpuscle, what dreams may come, what miracles may\nbe wrought, what transformations take place! When I try to think of life\nas a mode of motion in matter, I seem to see the particles in a mystic\ndance, a whirling maze of motions, the infinitely little people taking\nhold of hands, changing partners, facing this way and that, doing all\nsorts of impossible things, like jumping down one another's throats, or\noccupying one another's bodies, thrilled and vibrating at an\ninconceivable rate.\n\nThe theological solution of this problem of life fails more and more to\nsatisfy thinking men of to-day. Living things are natural phenomena, and\nwe feel that they must in some way be an outcome of the natural order.\nScience is more and more familiarizing our minds with the idea that the\nuniverse is a universe, a oneness; that its laws are continuous. We\nfollow the chemistry of it to the farthest stars and there is no serious\nbreak or exception; it is all of one stuff. We follow the mechanics of\nit into the same abysmal depths, and there are no breaks or exceptions.\nThe biology of it we cannot follow beyond our own little corner of the\nuniverse; indeed, we have no proof that there is any biology anywhere\nelse. But if there is, it must be similar to our own. There is only one\nkind of electricity (though two phases of it), only one kind of light\nand heat, one kind of chemical affinity, in the universe; and hence only\none kind of life. Looked at in its relation to the whole, life appears\nlike a transient phenomenon of matter. I will not say accidental; it\nseems inseparably bound up with the cosmic processes, but, I may say,\nfugitive, superficial, circumscribed. Life comes and goes; it penetrates\nbut a little way into the earth; it is confined to a certain range of\ntemperature. Beyond a certain degree of cold, on the one hand, it does\nnot appear; and beyond a certain degree of heat, on the other, it is cut\noff. Without water or moisture, it ceases; and without air, it is not.\nIt has evidently disappeared from the moon, and probably from the\ninferior planets, and it is doubtful if it has yet appeared on any of\nthe superior planets, save Mars.\n\nLife comes to matter as the flowers come in the spring,--when the time\nis ripe for it,--and it disappears when the time is over-ripe. Man\nappears in due course and has his little day upon the earth, but that\nday must as surely come to an end. Yet can we conceive of the end of the\nphysical order? the end of gravity? or of cohesion? The air may\ndisappear, the water may disappear, combustion may cease; but oxygen,\nhydrogen, nitrogen, and carbon will continue somewhere.\n\n\nV\n\nScience is the redeemer of the physical world. It opens our eyes to its\ntrue inwardness, and purges it of the coarse and brutal qualities with\nwhich, in our practical lives, it is associated. It has its inner world\nof activities and possibilities of which our senses give us no hint.\nThis inner world of molecules and atoms and electrons, thrilled and\nvibrating with energy, the infinitely little, the almost infinitely\nrapid, in the bosom of the infinitely vast and distant and\nautomatic--what a revelation it all is! what a glimpse into \"Nature's\ninfinite book of secrecy\"!\n\nOur senses reveal to us but one kind of motion--mass motion--the change\nof place of visible bodies. But there is another motion in all matter\nwhich our senses do not reveal to us as motion--molecular vibration, or\nthe thrill of the atoms. At the heart of the most massive rock this\nwhirl of the atoms or corpuscles is going on. If our ears were fine\nenough to hear it, probably every rock and granite monument would sing,\nas did Memnon, when the sun shone upon it. This molecular vibration is\nrevealed to us as heat, light, sound, electricity. Heat is only a mode\nof this invisible motion of the particles of matter. Mass motion is\nquickly converted into this molecular motion when two bodies strike each\nother. May not life itself be the outcome of a peculiar whirl of the\nultimate atoms of matter?\n\nSays Professor Gotch, as quoted by J. Arthur Thomson in his\n\"Introduction to Science\": \"To the thought of a scientific mind the\nuniverse with all its suns and worlds is throughout one seething welter\nof modes of motion, playing in space, playing in ether, playing in all\nexisting matter, playing in all living things, playing, therefore, in\nourselves.\" Physical science, as Professor Thomson says, leads us from\nour static way of looking at things to the dynamic way. It teaches us to\nregard the atom, not as a fixed and motionless structure, like the\nbricks in a wall, but as a centre of ever-moving energy; it sees the\nwhole universe is in a state of perpetual flux, a flowing stream of\ncreative energy out of which life arises as one of the manifestations of\nthis energy.\n\nWhen we have learned all that science can tell us about the earth, is it\nnot more rather than less wonderful? When we know all it can tell us\nabout the heavens above, or about the sea, or about our own bodies, or\nabout a flower, or a bird, or a tree, or a cloud, are they less\nbeautiful and wonderful? The mysteries of generation, of inheritance, of\ncell life, are rather enhanced by science.\n\n\nVI\n\nWhen the man of science seeks to understand and explain the world in\nwhich we live, he guards himself against seeing double, or seeing two\nworlds instead of one, as our unscientific fathers did--an immaterial or\nspiritual world surrounding and interpenetrating the physical world, or\nthe supernatural enveloping and directing the natural. He sees but one\nworld, and that a world complete in itself; surrounded, it is true, by\ninvisible forces, and holding immeasured and immeasurable potencies; a\nvastly more complex and wonderful world than our fathers ever dreamed\nof; a fruit, as it were, of the great sidereal tree, bound by natal\nbonds to myriads of other worlds, of one stuff with them, ahead or\nbehind them in its ripening, but still complete in itself, needing no\nmiracle to explain it, no spirits or demons to account for its\nprocesses, not even its vital processes.\n\nIn the light of what he knows of the past history of the earth, the man\nof science sees with his mind's eye the successive changes that have\ntaken place in it; he sees the globe a mass of incandescent matter\nrolling through space; he sees the crust cooling and hardening; he sees\nthe waters appear, the air and the soil appear, he sees the clouds begin\nto form and the rain to fall, he sees living things appear in the\nwaters, then upon the land, and in the air; he sees the two forms of\nlife arise, the vegetable and the animal, the latter standing upon the\nformer; he sees more and more complex forms of both vegetable and animal\narise and cover the earth. They all appear in the course of the geologic\nages on the surface of the earth; they arise out of it; they are a part\nof it; they come naturally; no hand reaches down from heaven and places\nthem there; they are not an addendum; they are not a sudden creation;\nthey are an evolution; they were potential in the earth before they\narose out of it. The earth ripened, her crust mellowed, and thickened,\nher airs softened and cleared, her waters were purified, and in due time\nher finer fruits were evolved, and, last of all, man arose. It was all\none process. There was no miracle, no first day of creation; all were\ndays of creation. Brooded by the sun, the earth hatched her offspring;\nthe promise and the potency of all terrestrial life was in the earth\nherself; her womb was fertile from the first. All that we call the\nspiritual, the divine, the celestial, were hers, because man is hers.\nOur religions and our philosophies and our literatures are hers; man is\na part of the whole system of things; he is not an alien, nor an\naccident, nor an interloper; he is here as the rains, the dews, the\nflowers, the rocks, the soil, the trees, are here. He appeared when the\ntime was ripe, and he will disappear when the time is over-ripe. He is\nof the same stuff as the ground he walks upon; there is no better stuff\nin the heavens above him, nor in the depths below him, than sticks to\nhis own ribs. The celestial and the terrestrial forces unite and work\ntogether in him, as in all other creatures. We cannot magnify man\nwithout magnifying the universe of which he is a part; and we cannot\nbelittle it without belittling him.\n\nNow we can turn all this about and look upon it as mankind looked upon\nit in the prescientific ages, and as so many persons still look upon it,\nand think of it all as the work of external and higher powers. We can\nthink of the earth as the footstool of some god, or the sport of some\ndemon; we can people the earth and the air with innumerable spirits,\nhigh and low; we can think of life as something apart from matter. But\nscience will not, cannot follow us; it cannot discredit the world it has\ndisclosed--I had almost said, the world it has created. Science has made\nus at home in the universe. It has visited the farthest stars with its\ntelescope and spectroscope, and finds we are all akin. It has sounded\nthe depths of matter with its analysis, and it finds nothing alien to\nour own bodies. It sees motion everywhere, motion within motion,\ntransformation, metamorphosis everywhere, energy everywhere, currents\nand counter-currents everywhere, ceaseless change everywhere; it finds\nnothing in the heavens more spiritual, more mysterious, more celestial,\nmore godlike, than it finds upon this earth. This does not imply that\nevolution may not have progressed farther upon other worlds, and given\nrise to a higher order of intelligences than here; it only implies that\ncreation is one, and that the same forces, the same elements and\npossibilities, exist everywhere.\n\n\nVII\n\nGive free rein to our anthropomorphic tendencies, and we fill the world\nwith spirits, good and bad--bad in war, famine, pestilence, disease;\ngood in all the events and fortunes that favor us. Early man did this on\nall occasions; he read his own hopes and fears and passions into all the\noperations of nature. Our fathers did it in many things; good people of\nour own time do it in exceptional instances, and credit any good fortune\nto Providence. Men high in the intellectual and philosophical world,\nstill invoke something antithetical to matter, to account for the\nappearance of life on the planet.\n\nIt may be justly urged that the effect upon our habits of thought of the\nlong ages during which this process has been going on, leading us to\ndifferentiate matter and spirit and look upon them as two opposite\nentities, hindering or contending with each other,--one heavenly, the\nother earthly, one everlasting, the other perishable, one the supreme\ngood, the other the seat and parent of all that is evil,--the cumulative\neffect of this habit of thought in the race-mind is, I say, not easily\nchanged or overcome. We still think, and probably many of us always will\nthink, of spirit as something alien to matter, something mystical,\ntranscendental, and not of this world. We look upon matter as gross,\nobstructive, and the enemy of the spirit. We do not know how we are\ngoing to get along without it, but we solace ourselves with the thought\nthat by and by, in some other, non-material world, we shall get along\nwithout it, and experience a great expansion of life by reason of our\nemancipation from it. Our practical life upon this planet is more or\nless a struggle with gross matter; our senses apprehend it coarsely; of\nits true inwardness they tell us nothing; of the perpetual change and\ntransformation of energy going on in bodies about us they tell us\nnothing; of the wonders and potencies of matter as revealed in\nradio-activity, in the X-ray, in chemical affinity and polarity, they\ntell us nothing; of the all-pervasive ether, without which we could not\nsee or live at all, they tell us nothing. In fact we live and move and\nhave our being in a complex of forces and tendencies of which, even by\nthe aid of science, we but see as through a glass darkly. Of the\neffluence of things, the emanations from the minds and bodies of our\nfriends, and from other living forms about us, from the heavens above\nand from the earth below, our daily lives tell us nothing, any more than\nour eyes tell us of the invisible rays in the sun's spectrum, or than\nour ears tell us of the murmurs of the life-currents in growing things.\nScience alone unveils the hidden wonders and sleepless activities of the\nworld forces that play through us and about us. It alone brings the\nheavens near, and reveals the brotherhood or sisterhood of worlds. It\nalone makes man at home in the universe, and shows us how many friendly\npowers wait upon him day and night. It alone shows him the glories and\nthe wonders of the voyage we are making upon this ship in the stellar\ninfinitude, and that, whatever the port, we shall still be on familiar\nground--we cannot get away from home.\n\nThere is always an activity in inert matter that we little suspect. See\nthe processes going on in the stratified rocks that suggest or parody\nthose of life. See the particles of silica that are diffused through the\nlimestone, hunting out each other and coming together in concretions and\nforming flint or chert nodules; or see them in the process of\npetrifaction slowly building up a tree of chalcedony or onyx in place of\na tree of wood, repeating every cell, every knot, every worm-hole--dead\nmatter copying exactly a form of living matter; or see the phenomenon of\ncrystallization everywhere; see the solution of salt mimicking, as\nTyndall says, the architecture of Egypt, building up miniature\npyramids, terrace upon terrace, from base to apex, forming a series of\nsteps like those up which the traveler in Egypt is dragged by his\nguides! We can fancy, if we like, these infinitesimal structures built\nby an invisible population which swarms among the constituent molecules,\ncontrolled and coerced by some invisible matter, says Tyndall. This\nmight be called literature, or poetry, or religion, but it would not be\nscience; science says that these salt pyramids are the result of the\nplay of attraction and repulsion among the salt molecules themselves;\nthat they are self-poised and self-quarried; it goes further than that\nand says that the quality we call saltness is the result of a certain\ndefinite arrangement of their ultimate atoms of matter; that the\nqualities of things as they affect our senses--hardness, softness,\nsweetness, bitterness--are the result of molecular motion and\ncombination among the ultimate atoms. All these things seem on the\nthreshold of life, waiting in the antechamber, as it were; to-morrow\nthey will be life, or, as Tyndall says, \"Incipient life, as it were,\nmanifests itself throughout the whole of what is called inorganic\nnature.\"\n\n\nVIII\n\nThe question of the nature and origin of life is a kind of perpetual\nmotion question in biology. Life without antecedent life, so far as\nhuman experience goes, is an impossibility, and motion without previous\nmotion, is equally impossible. Yet, while science shows us that this\nlast is true among ponderable bodies where friction occurs, it is not\ntrue among the finer particles of matter, where friction does not exist.\nHere perpetual or spontaneous motion is the rule. The motions of the\nmolecules of gases and liquids, and their vibrations in solids, are\nbeyond the reach of our unaided senses, yet they are unceasing. By\nanalogy we may infer that while living bodies, as we know them, do not\nand cannot originate spontaneously, yet the movement that we call life\nmay and probably does take place spontaneously in the ultimate particles\nof matter. But can atomic energy be translated into the motion of\nponderable bodies, or mass energy? In like manner can, or does, this\npotential life of the world of atoms and electrons give rise to\norganized living beings?\n\nThis distrust of the physical forces, or our disbelief in their ability\nto give rise to life, is like a survival in us of the Calvinistic creed\nof our fathers. The world of inert matter is dead in trespasses and sin\nand must be born again before it can enter the kingdom of the organic.\nWe must supplement the natural forces with the spiritual, or the\nsupernatural, to get life. The common or carnal nature, like the natural\nman, must be converted, breathed upon by the non-natural or divine,\nbefore it can rise to the plane of life--the doctrine of Paul carried\ninto the processes of nature.\n\nThe scientific mind sees in nature an infinitely complex mechanism\ndirected to no special human ends, but working towards universal ends.\nIt sees in the human body an infinite number of cell units building up\ntissues and organs,--muscles, nerves, bones, cartilage,--a living\nmachine of infinite complexity; but what shapes and cooerdinates the\nparts, how the cells arose, how consciousness arose, how the mind is\nrelated to the body, how or why the body acts as a unit--on these\nquestions science can throw no light. With all its mastery of the laws\nof heredity, of cytology, and of embryology, it cannot tell why a man is\na man, and a dog is a dog. No cell-analysis will give the secret; no\nchemical conjuring with the elements will reveal why in the one case\nthey build up a head of cabbage, and in the other a head of Plato.\n\nIt must be admitted that the scientific conception of the universe robs\nus of something--it is hard to say just what--that we do not willingly\npart with; yet who can divest himself of this conception? And the\nscientific conception of the nature of life, hard and unfamiliar as it\nmay seem in its mere terms, is difficult to get away from. Life must\narise through the play and transformations of matter and energy that are\ntaking place all around us; though it seems a long and impossible road\nfrom mere chemistry to the body and soul of man. But if life, with all\nthat has come out of it, did not come by way of matter and energy, by\nwhat way did it come? Must we have recourse to the so-called\nsupernatural?--as Emerson's line puts it,--\n\n    \"When half-gods go, the gods arrive.\"\n\nWhen our traditional conception of matter as essentially vulgar and\nobstructive and the enemy of the spirit gives place to the new\nscientific conception of it as at bottom electrical and all-potent, we\nmay find the poet's great line come true, and that for a thing to be\nnatural, is to be divine. For my own part, I do not see how we can get\nintelligence out of matter unless we postulate intelligence in matter.\nAny system of philosophy that sees in the organic world only a\nfortuitous concourse of chemical atoms, repels me, though the\ncontradiction here implied is not easily cleared up. The theory of life\nas a chemical reaction and nothing more does not interest me, but I am\nattracted by that conception of life which, while binding it to the\nmaterial order, sees in the organic more than the physics and chemistry\nof the inorganic--call it whatever name you will--vitalism, idealism, or\ndualism.\n\nIn our religious moods, we may speak, as Theodore Parker did, of the\nuniverse as a \"handful of dust which God enchants,\" or we may speak of\nit, as Goethe did, as \"the living garment of God\"; but as men of\nscience we can see it only as a vast complex of forces, out of which man\nhas arisen, and of which he forms a part. We are not to forget that we\nare a part of it, and that the more we magnify ourselves, the more we\nmagnify it; that its glory is our glory, and our glory its glory,\nbecause we are its children. In some way utterly beyond the reach of\nscience to explain, or of philosophy to confirm, we have come out of it,\nand all we are or can be, is, or has been, potential in it.\n\n\nIX\n\nThe evolution of life is, of course, bound up with the evolution of the\nworld. As the globe has ripened and matured, life has matured; higher\nand higher forms--forms with larger and larger brains and more and more\ncomplex nerve mechanisms--have appeared.\n\nPhysicists teach us that the evolution of the primary\nelements--hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, carbon, calcium, and the\nlike--takes place in a solar body as the body cools. As temperature\ndecreases, one after another of the chemical elements makes its\nappearance, the simpler elements appearing first, and the more complex\ncompounds appearing last, all apparently having their origin in some\nsimple parent element. It appears as if the evolution of life upon the\nglobe had followed the same law and had waited upon the secular cooling\nof the earth.\n\nDoes not a man imply a cooler planet and a greater depth and refinement\nof soil than a dinosaur? Only after a certain housecleaning and\npurification of the elements do higher forms appear; the vast\naccumulation of Silurian limestone must have hastened the age of fishes.\nThe age of reptiles waited for the clearing of the air of the burden of\ncarbon dioxide. The age of mammals awaited the deepening and the\nenrichment of the soil and the stability of the earth's crust. Who knows\nupon what physical conditions of the earth's elements the brain of man\nwas dependent? Its highest development has certainly taken place in a\ntemperate climate. There can be little doubt that beyond a certain point\nthe running-down of the earth-temperature will result in a running-down\nof life till it finally goes out. Life is confined to a very narrow\nrange of temperature. If we were to translate degrees into miles and\nrepresent the temperature of the hottest stars, which is put at 30,000\ndegrees, by a line 30,000 miles long, then the part of the line marking\nthe limits of life would be approximately three hundred miles.\n\nLife does not appear in a hard, immobile, utterly inert world, but in a\nworld thrilling with energy and activity, a world of ceaseless\ntransformations of energy, of radio-activity, of electro-magnetic\ncurrents, of perpetual motion in its ultimate particles, a world whose\nheavens are at times hung with rainbows, curtained with tremulous\nshifting auroras, and veined and illumined with forked lightnings, a\nworld of rolling rivers and heaving seas, activity, physical and\nchemical, everywhere. On such a world life appeared, bringing no new\nelement or force, but setting up a new activity in matter, an activity\nthat tends to check and control the natural tendency to the dissipation\nand degradation of energy. The question is, Did it arise through some\ntransformation of the existing energy, or out of the preexisting\nconditions, or was it supplementary to them, an addition from some\nunknown source? Was it a miraculous or a natural event? We shall answer\naccording to our temperaments.\n\nOne sees with his mind's eye this stream of energy, which we name the\nmaterial universe, flowing down the endless cycles of time; at a certain\npoint in its course, a change comes over its surface; what we call life\nappears, and assumes many forms; at a point farther along in its course,\nlife disappears, and the eternal river flows on regardless, till, at\nsome other point, the same changes take place again. Life is inseparable\nfrom this river of energy, but it is not coextensive with it, either in\ntime or in space.\n\nIn midsummer what river-men call \"the blossoming of the water\" takes\nplace in the Hudson River; the water is full of minute vegetable\norganisms; they are seasonal and temporary; they are born of the\nmidsummer heats. By and by the water is clear again. Life in the\nuniverse seems as seasonal and fugitive as this blossoming of the\nwater. More and more does science hold us to the view of the unity of\nnature--that the universe of life and matter and force is all natural or\nall supernatural, it matters little which you call it, but it is not\nboth. One need not go away from his own doorstep to find mysteries\nenough to last him a lifetime, but he will find them in his own body, in\nthe ground upon which he stands, not less than in his mind, and in the\ninvisible forces that play around him. We may marvel how the delicate\ncolor and perfume of the flower could come by way of the root and stalk\nof the plant, or how the crude mussel could give birth to the\nrainbow-tinted pearl, or how the precious metals and stones arise from\nthe flux of the baser elements, or how the ugly worm wakes up and finds\nitself a winged creature of the air; yet we do not invoke the\nsupernatural to account for these things.\n\nIt is certain that in the human scale of values the spirituality of man\nfar transcends anything in the animal or physical world, but that even\nthat came by the road of evolution, is, indeed, the flowering of ruder\nand cruder powers and attributes of the life below us, I cannot for a\nmoment doubt. Call it a transmutation or a metamorphosis, if you will;\nit is still within the domain of the natural. The spiritual always has\nits root and genesis in the physical. We do not degrade the spiritual in\nsuch a conception; we open our eyes to the spirituality of the\nphysical. And this is what science has always been doing and is doing\nmore and more--making us familiar with marvelous and transcendent powers\nthat hedge us about and enter into every act of our lives. The more we\nknow matter, the more we know mind; the more we know nature, the more we\nknow God; the more familiar we are with the earth forces, the more\nintimate will be our acquaintance with the celestial forces.\n\n\nX\n\nWhen we speak of the gulf that separates the living from the non-living,\nare we not thinking of the higher forms of life only? Are we not\nthinking of the far cry it is from man to inorganic nature? When we get\ndown to the lowest organism, is the gulf so impressive? Under the\nscrutiny of biologic science the gulf that separates the animal from the\nvegetable all but vanishes, and the two seem to run together. The chasm\nbetween the lowest vegetable forms and unorganized matter is evidently a\nslight affair. The state of unorganized protoplasm which Haeckel named\nthe Monera, that precedes the development of that architect of life, the\ncell, can hardly be more than one remove from inert matter. By\ninsensible molecular changes and transformations of energy, the miracle\nof living matter takes place. We can conceive of life arising only\nthrough these minute avenues, or in the invisible, molecular\nconstitution of matter itself. What part the atoms and electrons, and\nthe energy they bear, play in it we shall never know. Even if we ever\nsucceed in bringing the elements together in our laboratories so that\nthere living matter appears, shall we then know the secret of life?\n\nAfter we have got the spark of life kindled, how are we going to get all\nthe myriad forms of life that swarm upon the earth? How are we going to\nget man with physics and chemistry alone? How are we going to get this\ntremendous drama of evolution out of mere protoplasm from the bottom of\nthe old geologic seas? Of course, only by making protoplasm creative,\nonly by conceiving as potential in it all that we behold coming out of\nit. We imagine it equal to the task we set before it; the task is\naccomplished; therefore protoplasm was all-sufficient. I am not\npostulating any extra-mundane power or influence; I am only stating the\ndifficulties which the idealist experiences when he tries to see life in\nits nature and origin as the scientific mind sees it. Animal life and\nvegetable life have a common physical basis in protoplasm, and all their\ndifferent forms are mere aggregations of cells which are constituted\nalike and behave alike in each, and yet in the one case they give rise\nto trees, and in the other they give rise to man. Science is powerless\nto penetrate this mystery, and philosophy can only give its own elastic\ninterpretation. Why consciousness should be born of cell structure in\none form of life and not in another, who shall tell us? Why matter in\nthe brain should think, and in the cabbage only grow, is a question.\n\nThe naturalist has not the slightest doubt that the mind of man was\nevolved from some order of animals below him that had less mind, and\nthat the mind of this order was evolved from that of a still lower\norder, and so on down the scale till we reach a point where the animal\nand vegetable meet and blend, and the vegetable mind, if we may call it\nsuch, passed into the animal, and still downward till the vegetable is\nevolved from the mineral. If to believe this is to be a monist, then\nscience is monistic; it accepts the transformation or metamorphosis of\nthe lower into the higher from the bottom of creation to the top, and\nwithout any break of the causal sequence. There has been no miracle,\nexcept in the sense that all life is a miracle. Of how the organic rose\nout of the inorganic, we can form no mental image; the intellect cannot\nbridge the chasm; but that such is the fact, there can be no doubt.\nThere is no solution except that life is latent or potential in matter,\nbut these again are only words that cover a mystery.\n\nI do not see why there may not be some force latent in matter that we\nmay call the vital force, physical force transformed and heightened, as\njustifiably as we can postulate a chemical force latent in matter. The\nchemical force underlies and is the basis of the vital force. There is\nno life without chemism, but there is chemism without life.\n\nWe have to have a name for the action and reaction of the primary\nelements upon one another and we call it chemical affinity; we have to\nhave a name for their behavior in building up organic bodies, and we\ncall it vitality or vitalism.\n\nThe rigidly scientific man sees no need of the conception of a new form\nor kind of force; the physico-chemical forces as we see them in action\nall about us are adequate to do the work, so that it seems like a\ndispute about names. But my mind has to form a new conception of these\nforces to bridge the chasm between the organic and the inorganic; not a\nquantitative but a qualitative change is demanded, like the change in\nthe animal mind to make it the human mind, an unfolding into a higher\nplane.\n\nWhether the evolution of the human mind from the animal was by\ninsensible gradations, or by a few sudden leaps, who knows? The animal\nbrain began to increase in size in Tertiary times, and seems to have\ndone so suddenly, but the geologic ages were so long that a change in\none hundred thousand years would seem sudden. \"The brains of some\nspecies increase one hundred per cent.\" The mammal brain greatly\noutstripped the reptile brain. Was Nature getting ready for man?\n\nThe air begins at once to act chemically upon the blood in the lungs of\nthe newly born, and the gastric juices to act chemically upon the food\nas soon as there is any in the stomach of the newly born, and breathing\nand swallowing are both mechanical acts; but what is it that breathes\nand swallows, and profits by it? a machine?\n\nMaybe the development of life, and its upward tendency toward higher and\nhigher forms, is in some way the result of the ripening of the earth,\nits long steeping in the sea of sidereal influences. The earth is not\nalone, it is not like a single apple on a tree; there are many apples on\nthe tree, and there are many trees in the orchard.\n\n\nTHE END\n\n\n\n\nINDEX\n\n\nAdaptation, 184, 215, 216.\n\nAlpha rays, 60, 199.\n\nAquosity, 127, 128, 141-143.\n\nAristotle, 240.\n\nAsphalt lake, 123.\n\nAtoms, different groupings of, 56-60;\n  weighed and counted, 60, 61;\n  indivisibility, 61;\n  the hydrogen atom, 65;\n  chemical affinity, 193-195;\n  photography of, 199, 200;\n  form, 203;\n  atomic energy, 204;\n  qualities and properties of bodies in their keeping, 204;\n  unchanging character, 205, 206;\n  rarity of free atoms, 209;\n  mystery of combination, 210.\n\nAutolysis, 169.\n\n\nBalfour, Arthur James, on Bergson's \"Evolution Creatrice,\" 15.\n\nBees, the spirit of the hive, 82.\n\nBenton, Joel, quoted, 70.\n\nBergson, Henri, 129, 173, 263;\n  on light and the eye, 5;\n  his view of life, 14-16, 27-29, 221, 237, 238;\n  on the need of philosophy, 85, 86;\n  on life on other planets, 87;\n  his method, 109, 110;\n  the key to his \"Creative Evolution,\" 132;\n  on life as a psychic principle, 162;\n  his book as literature, 238.\n\nBeta rays, 61, 199, 201.\n\nBiogenesis, 25. _See also_ Life.\n\nBiophores, 217.\n\nBody, the, elements of, 38, 39;\n  the chemist in, 152, 153;\n  intelligence of, 153, 154;\n  a community of cells, 157, 158;\n  viewed as a machine, 212-214, 224.\n\nBrain, evolution of, 288.\n\nBreathing, mechanics and chemistry of, 50-54, 213.\n\nBrooks, William Keith, quoted, 128, 236.\n\nBrown, Robert, 191;\n  the Brunonian movement, 167, 172, 191.\n\nBrunonian movement, 167, 172, 191.\n\nButler, Bishop, imaginary debate with Lucretius, 219, 220.\n\n\nCarbon, 38, 56, 59;\n  importance, 208.\n\nCarbonic-acid gas, 52, 53.\n\nCarrel, Dr. Alexis, 98, 148.\n\nCatalysers, 135, 136.\n\nCell, the, 83-85, 90, 96, 97, 180;\n  Wilson on, 95;\n  living after the death of the body, 98;\n  Prof. Benjamin Moore on, 107;\n  nature of, 113;\n  aimless multiplication, 148, 233;\n  the unit of life, 156;\n  communistic activity, 157, 158, 184;\n  a world in little, 170;\n  mystery of, 175;\n  different degrees of irritability, 216, 217.\n\nChanges in matter, 131, 133.\n\nChemist, in the body, 152, 153.\n\nChemistry, the silent world of, 49-54;\n  wonders worked by varying arrangement of atoms, 56-60;\n  leads up to life, 188;\n  a new world for the imagination, 189-192;\n  chemical affinity, 193-195;\n  various combinations of elements, 205-208;\n  organic compounds, 209;\n  mystery of chemical combinations, 210;\n  chemical changes, 210, 211;\n  powerless to trace relationships between different forms\n          of life, 231, 232;\n  cannot account for differences in organisms, 233, 234.\n\nChlorophyll, 77, 113, 168, 169, 177, 235.\n\nColloids, 76, 108, 135, 136.\n\nConn, H. W., on mechanism, 91-94.\n\nConsciousness, Huxley on, 95, 181, 262.\n\nCorpuscles, speed in the ether, 65.\n\nCreative energy, immanent in matter, 9, 21;\n  its methods, 263.\n\nCrystallization, 276, 277.\n\nCzapek, Frederick, on vital forces, 133, 152;\n  on life, 164, 166, 169;\n  on enzymes in living bodies, 167.\n\nDarwin, Charles, quoted, 9;\n  on force of growing radicles, 19;\n  a contradiction in his philosophy, 254, 255.\n\nElectricity, in the constitution of matter, 46-49;\n  a state of the ether, 63;\n  power from, 67, 68;\n  the most mysterious thing in inorganic nature, 223.\n\nElectrons, knots in the ether, 63;\n  size and weight, 196;\n  speed, 197;\n  matter dematerialized, 197;\n  bombardment from, 201, 202;\n  revolving in the atom, 203;\n  surface, 203;\n  compared with atoms, 203;\n  properties of matter supplied by, 204.\n\nElements, of living bodies, 38, 39, 77, 78;\n  analogy with the alphabet, 57-59, 206;\n  undergoing spontaneous change, 67;\n  various combinations, 205-208;\n  eagerness to combine, 209.\n  _See also_ Atoms.\n\nEliot, George, on the development theory, 103.\n\nElliot, Hugh S. R., on mechanism, 16.\n\nEmerson, Ralph Waldo, 250;\n  on physics and chemistry, 188;\n  quoted, 280.\n\nEnergy, relation of life to, 177-183;\n  atomic, 204.\n  _See also_ Creative energy _and_ Force.\n\nEnergy, biotic, 106-111, 145, 146.\n\nEngland, 250.\n\nEntities, 99, 100.\n\nEnvironment, 86-88.\n\nEnzymes, 167.\n\nEther, the, omnipresent and all-powerful, 61, 62;\n  its nature, 62, 63;\n  its finite character, 65, 66;\n  paradoxes of, 66.\n\nEthics, and the mechanistic conception, 12.\n\nEvolution, creative impulse in, 6, 111;\n  progression in, 13, 14;\n  and the arrival of the fit, 244-253;\n  creative, 251-253;\n  evolution of life bound up with the evolution of the world, 281-283;\n  creative protoplasm in, 286;\n  a cosmic view of, 289.\n\nExplosives, 43.\n\n\nFire, chemistry of, 54.\n\nFiske, John, on the soul and immortality, 4;\n  on the physical and the psychical, 75, 183.\n\nFittest, arrival and survival of the, 244-253.\n\nForce, physical and mental, 3-5;\n  and life, 17-23;\n  dissymmetric force, 22;\n  the origin of matter, 43, 44.\n  _See also_ Energy.\n\n\nGalls, 147, 154-156.\n\nGanong, William Francis, on life, 181.\n\nGermany, in the War of 1914, 249-251.\n\nGlaser, Otto C., quoted, 98.\n\nGoethe, quoted, 111, 221, 260, 280;\n  as a scientific man, 221.\n\nGotch, Prof., quoted, 270.\n\nGrafting, 40, 41.\n\nGrand Canon of the Colorado, 225, 228, 229.\n\nGrape sugar, 208.\n\nGrowth, of a germ, 217, 218.\n\n\nHaeckel, Ernst, 3, 285;\n  on physical activity in the atom, 25, 26;\n  his \"living inorganics,\" 91;\n  on the origin of life, 161;\n  on inheritance and adaptation, 184;\n  his \"plastidules,\" 217;\n  a contradiction in his philosophy, 256.\n\nHartog, Marcus, 129.\n\nHeat, changes wrought by, 55, 56;\n  detection of, at a distance, 60.\n\nHelmholtz, Hermann von, on life, 25, 161.\n\nHenderson, Lawrence J., his \"Fitness of the Environment,\" 73;\n  his concession to the vitalists, 83, 85;\n  on the environment, 86-88;\n  a thorough mechanist, 88, 89.\n\nHorse-power, 177, 178.\n\nHudson River, \"blossoming of the water,\" 283.\n\nHuxley, Thomas Henry, on the\n  properties of protoplasm, 31, 126, 127;\n  on consciousness, 95, 181, 262;\n  on the vital principle, 101, 126, 127, 140;\n  his three realities, 140;\n  a contradiction in his philosophy, 255, 256.\n\nHydrogen, the atom of, 65.\n\n\nIdealist, view of life, 218-222.\n\nInorganic world, beauty in decay in, 228, 229.\n\nIntelligence, characteristic of living matter, 134, 139, 151-154;\n  pervading organic nature, 223.\n\nIrritability, degrees of, 216, 217.\n\n\nJames, William, 254.\n\n\nKant, Immanuel, quoted, 221.\n\nKelvin, Lord, 83.\n\nKing, Starr, 244.\n\n\nLankester, Sir Edwin Ray, quoted, 128, 141;\n  his \"plasmogen,\" 145, 146.\n\nLe Dantec, Felix Alexandre, his \"Nature and Origin of Life,\" 73, 79, 80;\n  on consciousness, 80;\n  on the artificial production of the cell, 83;\n  on the mechanism of the body, 224.\n\nLeduc, Stephane, his \"osmotic growths,\" 167, 168.\n\nLiebig, Baron Justus von, quoted, 83.\n\nLife, may be a mode of motion, 5;\n  evolution of, 6;\n  its action on matter, 8, 9;\n  its physico-chemical origin, 9;\n  its appearance viewed as accidental, 10-14;\n  Bergson's view, 14-17, 27-29;\n  Sir Oliver Lodge's view, 17, 18;\n  and energy, 17-23;\n  theories as to its origin, 24-27;\n  Tyndall's view, 28-30;\n  Verworn's view, 30, 31;\n  the vitalistic view, 32-38;\n  matter as affected by, 39;\n  not to be treated mathematically, 40;\n  a slow explosion, 41, 42;\n  an insoluble mystery, 43, 44;\n  relations with the psychic and the inorganic, 44, 45;\n  compared with fire, 54, 55;\n  the final mystery of, 69, 70;\n  vitalistic and mechanistic views, 71-114;\n  Benjamin Moore's view, 106-113;\n  the theory of derivation from other spheres, 104;\n  spontaneous generation, 105;\n  plays a small part in the cosmic scheme, 115-119;\n  mystery of, 120;\n  nature merciless towards, 120-124;\n  as an entity, 124-130;\n  evanescent character, 131, 132;\n  Prof. Schaefer's view, 133-138;\n  intelligence the characteristic of, 134, 139, 151-154;\n  power of adaptation, 147-149;\n  versatility, 155, 156;\n  the fields of science and philosophy in dealing with, 161-166, 173-176;\n  simulation of, 167, 168;\n  and protoplasm, 169;\n  and the cell, 170;\n  variability, 171, 172;\n  the biogenetic law, 174;\n  relation to energy, 177-183;\n  an _x_-entity, 181, 182;\n  struggle with environment, 185, 186;\n  as a chemical phenomenon, 187;\n  inadequacy of the mechanistic view, 212-243;\n  degrees of, 216, 217;\n  arises, not comes, 230;\n  a metaphysical problem, 231;\n  as a wave, 231;\n  its adaptability, 253;\n  a vitalistic view, 254-289;\n  naturalness of, 263-268;\n  advent and disappearance, 268, 269;\n  the unscientific view, 274, 275;\n  analogy with the question of perpetual motion, 277, 278;\n  no great gulf between animate and inanimate, 285;\n  a cosmic view, 289.\n  _See also_ Living thing, Vital force, Vitalism, Vitality.\n\nLight, measuring its speed, 60.\n\nLiquids, molecular behavior, 200.\n\nLiving thing, not a machine, 1-3, 212-214;\n  viewed as a machine, 34-37, 224-228;\n  a unit, 215;\n  adaptation, 215, 216;\n  contrasted and compared with a machine, 241, 242.\n\nLodge, Sir Oliver, 183, 197;\n  his view of life, 17, 18, 34, 132, 161, 219, 237;\n  his vein of mysticism, 34;\n  on the ether, 62, 63, 66;\n  on molecular spaces, 65;\n  on radium, 201;\n  on the atom, 203;\n  on electrons, 203.\n\nLoeb, Jacques, on mechanism, 10-13, 73;\n  his experiments, 74, 76, 79, 147;\n  on variations, 148.\n\n\nMachines, Nature's and man's, 224-226;\n   contrasted and compared with living bodies, 241, 242.\n\nMaeterlinck, Maurice, on the Spirit of the Hive, 82.\n\nMan, evolution of, 246-251;\n  as the result of chance, 255;\n  as a part of the natural order, 258, 259;\n  his little day, 269.\n\nMatter, as acted upon by life, 8, 9;\n  creative energy immanent in, 9;\n  change upon entry of life, 39;\n  constitution of, 43, 44, 46-48;\n  a state of the ether, 63;\n  changes in, 131, 133;\n  Emerson on, 188;\n  discrete, 196;\n  emanations detected by smell and taste, 198, 199;\n  a hole in the ether, 203;\n  origin of its properties, 204-206;\n  a higher conception of, 259-261;\n  common view of grossness of, 274, 275.\n\nMaxwell, James Clerk, on the ether, 63;\n  on atoms, 198.\n\nMechanism, the scientific explanation of mind, 5;\n  and ethics, 12;\n  reaction against, 32;\n  definition, 72;\n  Prof. Henderson's view, 88, 89;\n  _vs._ vitalism, 212-243.\n  _See also_ Life.\n\nMetaphysics, necessity of, 101.\n\nMicellar strings, 217.\n\nMicrobalance, 60.\n\nMind, evolution of, 287, 288.\n  _See also_ Intelligence.\n\nMolecules, spaces between, 65, 196;\n  speed, 192;\n  unchanging character, 205, 206.\n\nMonera, 285.\n\nMoore, Benjamin, a scientific vitalist, 106;\n  his \"biotic energy,\" 106-113, 145, 146.\n\nMorgan, Thomas Hunt, 148.\n\nMotion, perpetual, 190, 191, 278;\n  mass and molecular, 269, 270.\n\n\nNaegeli, Karl Wilhelm von, 217.\n\nNitrogen, 51.\n\nNonentities, 99, 100.\n\n\nOdors, 198, 199.\n\nOsmotic growths, 167, 168.\n\nOxygen, activities of, 51, 52, 59;\n  in the crust of the earth, 193;\n  chemical affinities, 193-195;\n  different forms of atoms, 200.\n\n\nParker, Theodore, on the universe, 280.\n\nParthenogenesis, artificial, 11, 74.\n\nPasteur, Louis, his \"dissymmetric force,\" 22, 32.\n\nPhilosophy, supplements science, 94-96, 104, 109, 163, 164;\n  deals with fundamental problems, 242, 243;\n  contradictions in, 254-258.\n\nPhosphorus, 59, 60.\n\nPhysics, staggering figures in, 192.\n\nPitch lake, 123.\n\nPlants, force exerted by growing, 17-20.\n\nPlasmogen, 145, 146.\n\nPlastidules, 217.\n\nProtobion, 135.\n\nProtoplasm, vitality of, 169;\n  creative, 286.\n\n\nRadio-activity, 66-70, 132.\n\nRadium, 61, 201.\n  _See also_ Beta rays.\n\nRainbow, 70.\n\nRamsay, Sir William, 191, 192.\n\nRand, Herbert W., on the mechanistic view of life, 89, 90.\n\nRussia, 250, 251.\n\n\nSalt, crystallization, 276, 277.\n\nSchaefer, Sir Edward Albert, 73;\n  his mechanistic view of life, 133-138.\n\nScience, delicacy of its methods and implements, 60, 61;\n  limitations of its field, 94-100, 104;\n  cannot deal with life except as a physical phenomenon, 161, 162;\n  does not embrace the whole of human life, 162, 163;\n  inadequacy, 163-166;\n  cannot grasp the mystery of life, 173, 175, 176, 234-236;\n  cannot deal with fundamental problems, 242, 243;\n  concerns itself with matter only, 264;\n  inevitably mechanistic, 265, 266;\n  views the universe as one, 267, 268, 271-274;\n  the redeemer of the physical world, 269-271, 276;\n  spiritual insight gained through, 278.\n\nSea-urchins, Loeb's experiments, 147.\n\nSeed, growth of, 217, 218.\n\nSoddy, Frederick, 46, 66;\n  on vital force, 133;\n  on rainbows and rabbits, 174;\n  on the relation of life to energy, 177-180;\n  on the atom, 197, 198;\n  on atomic energy, 204.\n\nSpencer, Herbert, 218, 240;\n  quoted, 15, 16;\n  on the origin of life, 26;\n  on vital capital, 34, 35.\n\nSpirit, common view of, 274, 275.\n\nSpirituality, evolution of, 284.\n\nSugar, grape, 208.\n\nSunflower, wild, force exerted by, 19.\n\n\nThomson, J. Arthur, 270.\n\nThomson, Sir J. J., on electrons, 197;\n  photographing atoms, 199, 200.\n\nTropisms, 11.\n\nTyndall, John, his view of life, 28-30, 160, 162, 231;\n  his \"molecular force,\" 42, 133;\n  his Belfast Address, 64, 219;\n  and the \"miracle of vitality,\" 105;\n  on energy, 161;\n  on growth from the germ, 217;\n  an idealist, 219, 220;\n  on Goethe, 221;\n  on matter, 260;\n  on crystallisation of salt, 276, 277;\n  on incipient life in inorganic nature, 277.\n\n\nUniverse, the, oneness of, 267, 268;\n  a view of, 289.\n\nUranium, 67.\n\n\nVerworn, Max, 25, 79, 146;\n  his view of life, 30, 31, 73;\n  his term for vital force, 145.\n\nVital force, constructive, 7, 38;\n  inventive and creative, 7;\n  resisting repose, 40;\n  as a postulate, 99-103;\n  its existence denied by science, 133;\n  convenience of the term, 144;\n  other names, 144-146.\n  _See also_ Life.\n\nVitalism, making headway, 32;\n  reason for, 71, 72;\n  Moore's scientific vitalism, 106-112;\n  type of mind believing in, 218-223.\n  _See also_ Life.\n\nVitality, the question of its reality, 140-143;\n  degrees of, 241, 242.\n  _See also_ Life.\n\n\nWar of 1914, 248-251.\n\nWater-power, and electricity, 67, 68.\n\nWeismann, August, 217.\n\nWhitman, Walt, quoted, 14, 48, 110, 256, 260.\n\nWilson, Edmund Beecher, on the cell, 95.\n\n\n\n[Transcriber's Notes:\n\n1. The phrase 'To resolve the pyschic and the vital' was changed to\n'To resolve the psychic and the vital'.]","title":"The Breath of Life","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":72966}