one at all; and that in other
parts of the world rocks of the very same formation are crowded with the
records of living forms, I think it is impossible to place any reliance
on the supposition, or to feel oneself justified in supposing that these
are the forms in which life first commenced. I have not time here
to enter upon the technical grounds upon which I am led to this
conclusion,--that could hardly be done properly in half a dozen lectures
on that part alone;--I must content myself with saying that I do not at
all believe that these are the oldest forms of life.

I turn to the experimental side to see what evidence we have there.
To enable us to say that we know anything about the experimental
origination of organization and life, the investigator ought to be able
to take inorganic matters, such as carbonic acid, ammonia, water, and
salines, in any sort of inorganic combination, and be able to build them
up into Protein matter, and that that Protein matter ought to begin to
live in an organic form. That, nobody has done as yet, and I suspect it
will be a long while before anybody does do it. But the thing is by no
means so impossible as it looks; for the researches of modern chemistry
have shown us--I won't say the road towards it, but, if I may so say,
they have shown the finger-post pointing to the road that may lead to
it.

It is not many years ago--and you must recollect that Organic Chemistry
is a young science, not above a couple of generations old,--you must not
expect too much of it; it is not many years ago since it was said to be
perfectly impossible to fabricate any organic compound; that is to say,
any non-mineral compound which is to be found in an organized being. It
remained so for a very long period; but it is now a considerable number
of years since a distinguished foreign chemist contrived to fabricate
Urea, a substance of a very complex character, which forms one of the
waste products of animal structures. And of late years a number of other
compounds, such as Butyric Acid, and others, have been added to the
list. I need not tell you that chemistry is an enormous distance from
the goal I indicate; all I wish to point out to you is, that it is by no
means safe to say that that goal may not be reached one day. It may be
that it is impossible for us to produce the conditions requisite to the
origination of life; but we must speak modestly about the matter, and
recollect that Science has put her f