Life is not a property of matter but something wholly different from it. Matter may exist without life; but apparently, life cannot exist without matter. It is evident that the atoms of which the human body is composed did not manifest the phenomena nor the energies of life until they were grouped into that body; on the other hand the body does not manifest vital energies after its death. Life begins at a particular moment and ceases at another specific instant.
If a piece of iron be charged with electricity, it will manifest electrical energy so long as it remains charged. But when the electricity passes from it, the iron ceases to exhibit such phenomena. So, when the human body is charged or endowed with life, it continues to manifest vital phenomena until life passes out of it.
Life is bestowed on the several species of animal under divers conditions. Thus, it is bestowed on the fertilized human ovum in the genital organs of the mother, for the reason that this is the best, if not the only, place for it to develop and grow. It is bestowed on the eggs of fishes in the water; and upon the eggs of birds, after they have passed out of the bodies of the mother bird. Let us consider the hen’s egg for a moment. When laid it contains a fertilized ovum and “the white and the yellow” of the egg. It is a complete and finished egg. But it has no life. Unless it be placed under a sitting hen or in an incubator, it will decay and disintegrate.
The hen or incubator merely keeps it warm during the period of incubation. By the end of the twenty-first day, the contents of the egg-shell have been converted into a live bird, with a skeleton, muscles, arteries, veins, nerves, brain, eyes, ears, heart, lungs, liver, wings, legs, feet, etc. There is no skeleton, model, nor any other performed outline of the coming chick, in the egg; for the contents of the egg-shell are a homogeneous mass of protoplasm. There is no reason to suppose that the warmth of the hen’s body, nor that the heat of the incubator, is, alone, adequate to impart life to the egg. Each part of the egg is necessarily kept at the same temperature as that of every other part. For this reason we cannot believe that mere heat differentiates one part of the white and yellow into bones, another part into muscles, arteries, veins, nerves, etc.
In his Principles of Biology, (vol. 1, p. 116), Spencer says:
“There is experimental proof that seeds may, under conditions unfavorable to germination, retain for ten, twenty, and some even thirty years, the power to germinate when due moisture and warmth are supplied.”
Now if these seeds are alive, what becomes of the life in them during these long periods of quiescence? There are untold millions of grains of wheat and of corn. None of these grains will germinate until they are supplied with “moisture and warmth.” Can we believe that heat and moisture alone have any creative forces? If so, all the sands of the sea shore ought to be living creatures.
Let us consider the acorn. When mature, it falls to the ground. If it be supplied with a proper degree of heat and moisture, it will germinate in a short time. But it will never germinate, so long as it is kept in a cool, dry place. Suppose an acorn is deprived of heat and moisture for five years; that it is then supplied with them and immediately germinates. When did the life of the acorn begin? Did it begin when the acorn ripened and dropped to the ground or when it germinated? If it was alive when it first matured, and germinated five years afterward, what became of its life between its maturity and its germination? Is it not reasonable to suppose that the Creator endowed it with life when it germinated?
Can we believe that the heat of the mother’s body is, alone, adequate to generate life in the fertilized ovum? Can we believe that the heat of the sun, and the moisture of the earth are, of themselves, sufficient to generate life in a grain of wheat, a grain of corn or an acorn?
It follows that the fertilized human ovum must be directly and specially endowed by the Creator with the power to absorb and assimilate food, to develop, grow and live! The Creator in every instance strikes the vital match!