Nor have we to determine whether or not, in the indefinite past, the not-vital elements on the earth, at some point of their highest activity, were endowed with, or became possessed of, the properties of life.

Fig. 1

On that subject there is no doubt. The elements that compose protoplasm - the physical basis of all living things - are the familiar elements of the world without life. The mystery of life is not in the elements that compose the vital stuff. We know them all, we know their properties. The mystery consists solely in how these elements can be so combined as to acquire the transcendent properties of life. Moreover, to the investigator it is not a question of by what means matter dead - without the shimmer of a vital quality - became either slowly or suddenly possessed of the properties of life. Enough for us to know that whatever the power that wrought the change, that power was competent, as the issue proves. But that which calm and patient research has to determine is whether matter demonstrably not living can be, without the aid of organisms already living, endowed with the properties of life. Judged of hastily, and apart from the facts, it may appear to some minds that an origin of life from not-life, by sheer physical law, would be a great philosophical gain, an indefinitely strong support of the doctrine of evolution. If this were so, and, indeed, so far as it is believed to be so, it would speak and does speak volumes in favor of the spirit of science pervading our age.

For although the vast majority of biologists in Europe and America accept the doctrine of evolution, they are almost unanimous in their refusal to accept as in any sense competent the reputed evidence of "spontaneous generation;" which demonstrates, at least, that what is sought by our leaders in science is not the mere support of hypotheses, cherished though they may be, but the truth, the uncolored truth, from nature. But it must be remembered that the present existence of what has been called "spontaneous generation," the origin of life de novo to-day, by physical law, is by no means required by the doctrine of evolution. Prof. Huxley, for example, says: "If all living beings have been evolved from pre-existing forms of life, it is enough that a single particle of protoplasm should once have appeared upon the globe, as the result of no matter what agency; any further independent formation of protoplasm would be sheer waste." And why? we may ask. Because one of the most marvelous and unique properties of protoplasm, and the living forms built out of it, is the power to multiply indefinitely and for ever! What need, then, of spontaneous generation? It is certainly true that evidence has been adduced purporting to support, if not establish, the origin in dead matter of the least and lowest forms of life.

But it evinces no prejudice to say that it is inefficient. For a moment study the facts. The organisms which were used to test the point at issue were those known as septic. The vast majority of these are inexpressibly minute. The smallest of them, indeed, is so small that, as I have said, fifty millions of them, if laid in order, would only fill the one-hundredth part of a cubic inch. Many are relatively larger, but all are supremely minute. Now, these organisms are universally present in enormous numbers, and ever rapidly increasing in all moist putrefactions over the surface of the globe.

Take an illustration prepared for the purpose, and taken direct from nature. A vessel of pure drinking water was taken during the month of July at a temperature of 65 deg. F., and into it was dropped a few shreds of fish muscle and brain. It was left uncovered for twelve hours; at the end of that time a small blunt rod was inserted in the now somewhat opalescent water, and a minute drop taken out and properly placed on the microscope, and, with a lens just competent to reveal the minutest objects, examined. The field of view presented is seen in Fig. 1, A. But - with the exception of the dense masses which are known as zoogloea or bacteria, fused together in living glue - the whole field was teeming with action; each minute organism gyrating in its own path, and darting at every visible point. The same fluid was now left for sixteen hours, and once more a minute drop was taken and examined with the same lens as before. The field presented to the eye is depicted in Fig. 1, B, where it is visible that while the original organism persists yet a new organism has arisen in and invaded the fluid. It is a relatively long and beautiful spiral form, and now the movement in the field is entrancing. The original organism darts with its vigor and grace, and rebounds in all directions.

But the spiral forms revolving on their axes glide like a flight of swallows over the ample area of their little sea. Ten hours more elapsed and, without change of circumstances, another drop was taken from the now palpably putrescent fluid. The result of examination is given in Fig. 1, C, where it will be seen that the first organism is still abundant, the spiral organism is still present and active, but a new and oval form, not a bacterium, but a monad, has appeared. And now the intensity of action and beauty of movement throughout the field utterly defy description, gyrating, darting, spinning, wheeling, rebounding, with the swiftness of the grayling and the beauty of the bird. Finally, at the end of another eight to sixteen hours, a final "dip" was taken from the fluid, and under the same lens it presented as a field what is seen in Fig. 1, D, where the largest of the putrefactive organisms has appeared and has even more intense and more varied movements than the others. Now the question before us is, "How did these organisms arise?" The water was pure; they were not discoverable in the fresh muscle of fish.

Yet in a dozen hours the vessel of water is peopled with hosts of individual forms which no mathematics could number! How did they arise? From universally diffused eggs, or from the direct physical change of dead matter into living forms? Twelve years ago the life-histories of these forms were unknown. We did not know biologically how they developed. And yet with this great deficiency it was considered by some that their mode of origin could be determined by heat experiments on the adult forms. Roughly, the method was this: It was assumed that nothing vital could resist the boiling point of water. Fluids, then, containing full-grown organisms in enormous multitudes, chiefly bacteria, were placed in flasks, and boiled for from five to ten minutes. While they were boiling the necks of the flasks was hermetically closed; and the flask was allowed to remain unopened for various periods. The reasoning was: "Boiling has killed all forms of vitality in the flask; by the hermetical sealing nothing living can gain subsequent access to the fluid; therefore, if living organisms do appear when the flask is opened, they must have arisen in the dead matter de novo by spontaneous generation, but if they do never so arise, the probability is that they originate in spores or eggs."