The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-10-04
THE SECRET OF LIFE.
VIII the Efforts of Science Ever Solve
the Great PrObIem:


Boston Globe.
What realm Of mystery will science not
invade yet? The ordinary observer is as
founded, and not a few are alarmed as
they witness discoveries In places where
our ancestors would have felt themselves
to be on forbidden ground, even had they
dared to tread there. For thousands of
years life has been regarded with some
thing of the awe that belongs TO the super
natural. One by one, however, the barriers
of timidity have given way as sages have
approached the goal of discovery and
claimed to tell US of secrets long deemed too
life.
Since the advent Of Darwinism science
has boldly asserted that life is not the re-
suit of any special act of creation, but that
the whole world, living and not living is
the result Of mutual interacting forces act
ing as molecules throughout the universe.
Lord Kelvin, Haeckel and all the great
scientists who have studied the problem of
life are agreed that every living thing on
the earth, whether a microbe or a tree, a
horse or an oyster, is the result of cells
and that every living cell is the product of
some pre-existent cell. Science has earnest
ly taken up the search after the secret of
life which theology once told us was past
finding out.
OF Comparatively recent date the spirit
OF inquiry inspired by that of intelligent
curiosity seems to have possessed the mind
Of man, and a systematic search has been
begun all along the UNEMPLOYED realms of
nature TO produce life in order to maintain
1t. The worlds greatest savants have been
engaged in these paths of research, their
plea being that In order to save life we
must first know the secret of its origin.
Common salt, or chloride of sodium, as
1t is known TO science, is found TO maintain
life when injected into the arteries and for
a time stimulates the heart as well as uhe
blood itself. These facts have been EN-
thews with the result that no little prog
ress has been made toward discovering
what really constitutes the vital force that
causes life. The experiments which have
led to the production Of life crystals are too
lengthy and complicated to be repeated
here, but every step has been carried out
Systematically, intelligently and persist
emily.
When the experiments have been carried
to certain point the microscope is brought
into service. and with this instrument Dr.
Littlefield, the latest investigator, claims
that actual germs Of life are produced, and
he furthermore claims that for the first
time in his life the observer has witnessed
a union Of life and matter clothed I'm an
objective form. all of which is the result
of a chemical combination of hydrogen,
nitrogen, carbon, oxygen and common salt.
As II touched by magic wand a minute
spot has been endowed with life and the
origin of living form is made manifest
under the microscope.
E The great modern leaders OF science have
already declared that the promise and
potency of life exists in all matter al
though Tyndall, after long and careful ex-
pertinent, was forced to declare that no
shred of trustworthy evidence existed that
life In our day has ever appeared independ-
ent of antecedent life" But he never de-
clared that the secret of life might not
yet be discovered by some future investiga-
tor. Who knows but that in the countless
some forms Of life artificially through the
compromising of cells at will Dr. Little
field declares that he has done it already,
and can prove it TO any observer by ocular
demonstration.
And may well ask. what does it all
amount to, even though science may be
able to reproduce some of the lower forms
of lif lrtiflcially? In one way we must
admit that benefits may result, for If the
germ of healthy life can be produced the
same process may lead to the destruction
of unhealthy organisms. IT was i'm the
prosecution of vital experiments that
science first discovered that common salt
injected into the arteries would preserve
life, and even in some cases resuscitate the
apparently dead.
Marvellous the discoveries of modern
science. 1t is useless TO deny them for
TO do so is TO deny the evidence OF the
senses. All we can do Is 10 wonder ir
silence and wonder still more what tireless
investigation may yet bring forth.