Page:The Harveian oration - delivered at the Royal College of Physicians, London, June 24, 1870 (IA b22307643).pdf/12

10 generate, by its vital force, some of the elements of which it is composed. An organism was considered to be a creative agent, forming and transmuting the materials of its higher structures. How far the investigations of chemistry have separated us from such fictions I need not remind you; for whatever may be thought of the forces exhibited by living beings, no one would now question the origin and nature of their materials. No one at this day would even dare to hint at any transmutation of the organic elements. It appears, however, that we are not yet entirely emancipated from such conceptions; and that there is still wanting a full and implicit belief that the as yet mysterious phenomena of life are correlative with the lower forces in nature. Whilst the advances of chemistry were settling the question of material elements, physics was deeply occupied with the relations of forces. These relations, which had so long engaged and perplexed logical ingenuity, still remained comparatively bar-