Q. E. D., or New Light on the Doctrine of Creation

o discover the processes of imagination and memory, men have been seeking a physical or materialistic answer to

which may exist outside of and apart from matter. In a scientific sense, we only know life by its association with living matter, which in its simplest form is known as protoplasm.

it is composed of various proteids, fats, carbohydrates, etc., and these in turn of but very few elements, all of which are common, and none of which are peculiar to protoplasm itself. And yet

y going on those changes accompanying metabolism, or the building up and tearing down processes that always accompany life. All separate masses of protoplasm, such as the one-celled amoeba or the individual cells of our own bodies, are constantly taking in food and as constantly throwing off wastes. Hence, in the very nature of things, it is impossible to find any mass of protoplasm absolutely pure. And a further and impassable barrier

ng or of chemical analysis or chemical synthesis, we might really find out what life is, or what matter itself is; in short, that we might be able to solve in a scientific way the old, old riddle of existence. But already we have about reached the limits of the powers of the microscope; and even if we could devise a way of seeing th

are just as truly alive as are those composed of many cells. Even the corpuscles of which our bodies are composed move, and eat, and grow, and seem really endowed with intelligence like the higher forms of life. Suppose we could go further than is now possible and could lay bare the ultimate make-up of the chromatin of these one-celled creatures, would we even then be able to prove that life with all its properties is inherent in these material components

n the living and the not-living; for no movement can be detected in quiescent seeds, which may lie dormant for thousands of years; and on the other hand inorganic foams when brought into contact with liquids of different composition display movements that very closely simulate those of the living matter. Lastly, irritability, though so notably characteristic of living matter, is scarcely peculiar to it, for many inorganic substances seem almost

assics dealing with this subject,--words that are just as t

ral world to the plant or animal world is hermetically sealed on the mineral side. This inorganic world is staked off from the living world by barriers that have never yet been crossed from within. No change of substance, no modification of environment, no chemistry, no electricity, nor any form of energy, nor

ing by the Law of Biogenesis, and denied forever the possibility of resurrection within itself. The physical laws may explain the inorganic world; the biological laws may account for the development of the organic. But of the point where they me

we call natural; and it would be presumptuous to attempt to emulate these eloquent words by seeking to emphasize the completeness with which this gr