I
The edifice of the human body may be compared by those studying its chemical processes to a vast manufactory of which every corner and every door bears the inscription, 'No Admittance.’ The curiosity of the public could not be greater; fain would they force an entrance, for all know that the most marvellous things are fabricated therein—wonders which no human hand, no industry, can produce.
The workmen in this factory are very small—marvellously small—invisible to the naked eye, and so tightly pressed together that they sometimes resemble the cells of a beehive, and have, on this account, received the name of cells. Life proceeds entirely from these workmen, whose confederation is so perfect that not one can be touched without the others at once becoming aware of it.
The edifice is somewhat weak in parts, and here one might easily force an entrance and make a wide breach; but this violence would avail us little, for when we break into the building the machines stop, causing such disorder and confusion that we are quite bewildered. We hear a whirring and throbbing, the pipes burst, the fluids are spilt, the pumps stop, the valves open—then all grows cold and still; and this is the strike which we call death.
The history of the attempts made to discover the actual nature of the activity of these workmen who keep the secret of life is one of the most beautiful studies in science; in reading it, there comes over us a feeling of admiration and gratitude towards those men who, in all ages, have spent their whole life in investigations, accumulating experience, sacrificing worldly goods and honours for one little gleam of light, defying poverty and toil, making the hardest and most cruel sacrifices for the sake of one forward step, of lifting but a little the mysterious veil, sometimes only to stretch out a hand to help others to walk over their body.
Thousands of volumes have been written about this struggle, and those who only read an epitome of it in the treatises of physiological chemistry are yet astonished at the power of the human mind, and at the incredible, almost superhuman, difficulties with which it has to cope.
Never was there, nor will there be, any war even faintly resembling in ardour, perseverance, and power of intellectual means, this siege of centuries, which seeks to close every issue to Nature and force her to reveal the secret of her chemical operations.
It is wonderful to see how attacks are prepared in advance, what cunning traps are laid, and by what subtile signs the road of ingress is divined. Who can describe the joy of all besiegers when one step forward has been made, or a glimmer of light is detected in the darkness? The exultation and applause which welcome every invention which resolves, or analyses, or recomposes a molecule, every instrument which enables us to break one crumb off the immense rock of the Unknown? And who shall tell the tale of pain, of disappointment, bitterness, and error; of the forgotten or unknown deeds of heroism, of existences lost in the obscurity of the schools, of the laboratories, of the hospitals; of those who die unnoticed in these last trenches where spectators and witnesses to shout applause are lacking?
And yet this deters no one; all press onward. The soldiers of science renew their vigilance and redouble their caution, the phalanx of the living draws closer together, returning with fresh courage to the assault.
Nothing can resist this unremitting war, this wonderful harmony of aim, this iron will of man; we will die on the battle-field with the certainty that others will take up our weapons and that the victory will be ours.