Huxley knew that
this advance had not yet been made.
"It may be that, by-and-by, philosophers will discover some
higher laws of which the facts of life are particular cases--very
possibly they will find out some bond between physico-chemical
phenomena on the one hand, and vital phenomena on the other. At
present, however, we assuredly know of none; and I think we shall
exercise a wise humility in confessing that, for us at least,
this successive assumption of different states (external
conditions remaining the same)--this spontaneity of action--if I
may use a term which implies more than I would be answerable
for--which constitutes so vast and plain a practical distinction
between living bodies and those which do not live, is an ultimate
fact; indicating as such, the existence of a broad line of
demarcation between the subject matter of biological and of all
other science."
In another passage he wrote:
"Looking back through the prodigious vista of the past I find no
record of the commencement of life, and therefore I am devoid of
any means of forming a definite conclusion as to the conditions
of its appearance.
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