The Principles of Biology Vol. I/Chapter I.4

§ 24. To those who accept the general doctrine of Evolution, it need scarcely be pointed out that classifications are subjective conceptions, which have no absolute demarcations in Nature corresponding to them. They are appliances by which we limit and arrange the matters under investigation; and so facilitate our thinking. Consequently, when we attempt to define anything complex, or make a generalization of facts other than the most simple, we can scarcely ever avoid including more than we intended, or leaving out something which should be taken in. Thus it happens that on seeking a definite idea of Life, we have great difficulty in finding one that is neither more nor less than sufficient. Let us look at a few of the most tenable definitions that have been given. While recognizing the respects in which they are defective, we shall see what requirements a more satisfactory one must fulfil.

Schelling said that Life is the tendency to individuation. This formula, until studied, conveys little meaning. But we need only consider it as illustrated by the facts of development, or by the contrast between lower and higher forms of life, to recognize its significance; especially in respect of comprehensiveness. As before shown, however (First Principles, § 56), it is objectionable; partly on the ground that it refers not so much to the functional changes constituting Life, as to the structural changes of those aggregates of matter which manifest Life; and partly on the ground that it includes under the idea Life, much that we usually exclude from it: for instance—crystallization.

The definition of Richerand,—"Life is a collection of phenomena which succeed each other during a limited time in an organized body,"—is liable to the fatal criticism, that it equally applies to the decay which goes on after death. For this, too, is "a collection of phenomena which succeed each other during a limited time in an organized body."

"Life," according to De Blainville, "is the two-fold internal movement of composition and decomposition, at once general and continuous." This conception is in some respects too narrow, and in other respects too wide. On the one hand, while it expresses what physiologists distinguish as vegetative life, it does not indicate those nervous and muscular functions which form the most conspicuous and distinctive classes of vital phenomena. On the other hand, it describes not only the integrating and disintegrating process going on in a living body, but it equally well describes those going on in a galvanic battery; which also exhibits a "two-fold internal movement of composition and decomposition, at once general and continuous."

Elsewhere, I have myself proposed to define Life as "the co-ordination of actions." This definition has some advantages. It includes all organic changes, alike of the viscera, the limbs, and the brain. It excludes the great mass of inorganic changes; which display little or no co-ordination. By making co-ordination the specific character of vitality, it involves the truths, that an arrest of co-ordination is death, and that imperfect co-ordination is disease. Moreover, it harmonizes with our ordinary ideas of life in its different grades; seeing that the organisms which we rank as low in their degrees of life, are those which display but little co-ordination of actions; and seeing that from these up to man, the recognized increase in degree of life corresponds with an increase in the extent and complexity of co-ordinations. But, like the others, this definition includes too much. It may be said of the Solar System, with its regularly-recurring movements and its self-balancing perturbations, that it, also, exhibits co-ordination of actions. And however plausibly it may be argued that, in the abstract, the motions of the planets and satellites are as properly comprehended in the idea of life as the changes going on in a motionless, unsensitive seed: yet, it must be admitted that they are foreign to that idea as commonly received, and as here to be formulated.

It remains to add the definition since suggested by Mr. G. H. Lewes—"Life is a series of definite and successive changes, both of structure and composition, which take place within an individual without destroying its identity." The last fact which this statement brings into view—the persistence of a living organism as a whole, in spite of the continuous removal and replacement of its parts—is important. But otherwise it may be argued that, since changes of structure and composition, though concomitants of muscular and nervous actions, are not the muscular and nervous actions themselves, the definite excludes the more visible movements with which our idea of life is most associated; and further that, in describing vital changes as a series, it scarcely includes the fact that many of them, as Nutrition, Circulation, Respiration, and Secretion, in their many subdivisions, go on simultaneously.

Thus, however well each of these definitions expresses the phenomena of life under some of its aspects, no one of them is more than approximately true. It may turn out that to find a formula which will bear every test is impossible. Meanwhile, it is possible to frame a more adequate formula than any of the foregoing. As we shall presently find, these all omit an essential peculiarity of vital changes in general—a peculiarity which, perhaps more than any other, distinguishes them from non-vital changes. Before specifying this peculiarity, however, it will be well to trace our way, step by step, to as complete an idea of Life as may be reached from our present stand-point; by doing which we shall both see the necessity for each limitation as it is made, and ultimately be led to feel the need for a further limitation.

And here, as the best mode of determining what are the traits which distinguish vitality from non-vitality, we shall do well to compare the two most unlike kinds of vitality, and see in what they agree. Manifestly, that which is essential to Life must be that which is common to Life of all orders. And manifestly, that which is common to all forms of Life, will most readily be seen on contrasting those forms of Life which have the least in common, or are the most unlike.

§ 25. Choosing assimilation, then, for our example of bodily life, and reasoning for our example of that life known as intelligence; it is first to be observed, that they are both processes of change. Without change, food cannot be taken into the blood nor transformed into tissue; without change, there can be no getting from premisses to conclusion. And it is this conspicuous display of changes which forms the substratum of our idea of Life in general. Doubtless we see innumerable changes to which no notion of vitality attaches. Inorganic bodies are ever undergoing changes of temperature, changes of colour, changes of aggregation; and decaying organic bodies also. But it will be admitted that the great majority of the phenomena displayed by inanimate bodies, are statical and not dynamical; that the modifications of inanimate bodies are mostly slow and unobtrusive; that on the one hand, when we see sudden movements in inanimate bodies, we are apt to assume living agency, and on the other hand, when we see no movements in living bodies, we are apt to assume death. Manifestly then, be the requisite qualifications what they may, a true idea of Life must be an idea of some kind of change or changes.

On further comparing assimilation and reasoning, with a view of seeing in what respect the changes displayed in both differs from non-vital changes, we find that they differ in being not simple changes; in each case there are successive changes. The transformation of food into tissue involves mastication, deglutition, chymification, chylification, absorption, and those various actions gone through after the lacteal ducts have poured their contents into the blood. Carrying on an argument necessitates a long chain of states of consciousness; each implying a change of the preceding state. Inorganic changes, however, do not in any considerable degree exhibit this peculiarity. It is true that from meteorologic causes, inanimate objects are daily, sometimes hourly, undergoing modifications of temperature, of bulk, of hygrometric and electric condition. Not only, however, do these modifications lack that conspicuousness and that rapidity of succession which vital ones possess, but vital ones form an additional series. Living as well as not-living bodies are affected by atmospheric influences; and beyond the changes which these produce, living bodies exhibit other changes, more numerous and more marked. So that though organic change is not rigorously distinguished from inorganic change by presenting successive phases; yet vital change so greatly exceeds other change in this respect, that we may consider it as a distinctive character. Life, then, as thus roughly differentiated, may be regarded as change presenting successive phases; or otherwise, as a series of changes. And it should be observed, as a fact in harmony with this conception, that the higher the life the more conspicuous the variations. On comparing inferior with superior organisms, these last will be seen to display more rapid changes, or a more lengthened series of them, or both.

On contemplating afresh our two typical phenomena, we may see that vital change is further distinguished from non-vital change, by being made up of many simultaneous changes. Nutrition is not simply a series of actions, but includes many actions going on together. During mastication the stomach is busy with food already swallowed, on which it is pouring out solvent fluids and expending muscular efforts. While the stomach is still active, the intestines are performing their secretive, contractile, and absorbent functions; and at the same time that one meal is being digested, the nutriment obtained from a previous meal is undergoing transformation into tissue. So too is it, in a certain sense, with mental changes. Though the states of consciousness which make up an argument occur in series, yet, as each of them is complex, a number of simultaneous changes have taken place in establishing it. Here as before, however, it must be admitted that the distinction between animate and inanimate is not precise. No mass of dead matter can have its temperature altered, without at the same time undergoing an alteration in bulk, and sometimes also in hygrometric state. An inorganic body cannot be compressed, without being at the same time changed in form, atomic arrangement, temperature, and electric condition. And in a vast and mobile aggregate like the sea, the simultaneous as well as the successive changes outnumber those going on in an animal. Nevertheless, speaking generally, a living thing is distinguished from a dead thing by the multiplicity of the changes at any moment taking place in it. Moreover, by this peculiarity, as by the previous one, not only is the vital more or less clearly marked off from the non-vital; but creatures possessing high vitality are marked off from those possessing low vitality. It needs but to contrast the many organs cooperating in a mammal, with the few in a polype, to see that the actions which are progressing together in the body of the first, as much exceed in number the actions progressing together in the body of the last, as these do those in a stone. As at present conceived, then, Life consists of simultaneous and successive changes.

Continuance of the comparison shows that vital changes, both visceral and cerebral, differ from other changes in their heterogeneity. Neither the simultaneous acts nor the serial acts, which together constitute the process of digestion, are alike. The states of consciousness comprised in any ratiocination are not repetitions one of another, either in composition or in modes of dependence. Inorganic processes, on the other hand, even when like organic ones in the number of the simultaneous and successive changes they involve, are unlike them in the relative homogeneity of these changes. In the case of the sea, just referred to, it is observable that countless as are the actions at any moment going on, they are mostly mechanical actions that are to a great degree similar; and in this respect differ widely from the actions at any moment taking place in an organism. Even where life is nearly simulated, as by the working of a steam-engine, we see that considerable as is the number of simultaneous changes, and rapid as are the successive ones, the regularity with which they soon recur in the same order and degree, renders them unlike those varied changes exhibited by a living creature. Still, this peculiarity, like the foregoing ones, does not divide the two classes of changes with precision; since there are inanimate things presenting considerable heterogeneity of change: for instance, a cloud. The variations of state which this undergoes, both simultaneous and successive, are many and quick; and they differ widely from one another both in quality and quantity. At the same instant there may occur change of position, change of form, change of size, change of density, change of colour, change of temperature, change of electric state; and these several kinds of change are continuously displayed in different degrees and combinations. Yet when we observe that very few inorganic objects manifest heterogeneity of change comparable to that manifested by organic objects, and further, that in ascending from low to high forms of life, we meet with an increasing variety in the kinds of changes displayed; we see that there is here a further leading distinction between vital and non-vital actions. According to this modified conception, then, Life is made up of heterogeneous changes both simultaneous and successive.

If, now, we look for some trait common to the nutritive and logical processes, by which they are distinguished from those inorganic processes that are most like them in the heterogeneity of the simultaneous and successive changes they comprise, we discover that they are distinguished by the combination among their constituent changes. The acts which make up digestion are mutually dependent. Those composing a train of reasoning are in close connection. And, generally, it is to be remarked of vital changes, that each is made possible by all, and all are affected by each. Respiration, circulation, absorption, secretion, in their many sub-divisions, are bound up together. Muscular contraction involves chemical change, change of temperature, and change in the excretions. Active thought influences the operations of the stomach, of the heart, of the kidneys. But we miss this union among non-vital activities. Life-like as may seem the action of a volcano in respect of the heterogeneity of its many simultaneous and successive changes, it is not life-like in respect of their combination. Though the chemical, mechanical, thermal, and electric phenomena exhibited have some inter-dependence, yet the emissions of stones, mud, lava, flame, ashes, smoke, steam, take place irregularly in quantity, order, intervals, and mode of conjunction. Even here, however, it cannot be said that inanimate things present no parallels to animate ones. A glacier may be instanced as showing nearly as much combination in its change as a plant of the lowest organization. It is ever growing and ever decaying; and the rates of its composition and decomposition preserve a tolerably constant ratio. It moves; and its motion is in immediate dependence on its thawing. It emits a torrent of water, which, in common with its motion, undergoes annual variations as plants do. During part of the year the surface melts and freezes alternately; and on these changes depend the variations in movement, and in efflux of water. Thus we have growth, decay, changes of temperature, changes of consistence, changes of velocity, changes of excretion, all going on in connexion; and it may be as truly said of a glacier as of an animal, that by ceaseless integration and disintegration it gradually undergoes an entire change of substance without losing its individuality. This exceptional instance, however, will scarcely be held to obscure that broad distinction from inorganic processes which organic processes derive from the combination among their constituent changes. And the reality of this distinction becomes yet more manifest when we find that, in common with previous ones, it not only marks off the living from the not-living, but also things which live little from things which live much. For while the changes going on in a plant or a zoophyte are so imperfectly combined that they can continue after it has been divided into two or more pieces, the combination among the changes going on in a mammal is so close that no part cut off from the rest can live, and any considerable disturbance of one chief function causes a cessation of the others. Hence, as we now regard it, Life is a combination of heterogeneous changes, both simultaneous and successive.

When we once more look for a character common to these two kinds of vital action, we perceive that the combinations of heterogeneous changes which constitute them, differ from the few combinations which they otherwise resemble, in respect of definiteness. The associated changes going on in a glacier, admit of indefinite variation. Under a conceivable alteration of climate, its thawing and its progression may be stopped for a million years, without disabling it from again displaying these phenomena under appropriate conditions. By a geological convulsion, its motion may be arrested without an arrest of its thawing; or by an increase in the inclination of the surface it slides over, its motion may be accelerated without accelerating its rate of dissolution. Other things remaining the same, a more rapid deposit of snow may cause great increase of bulk; or, conversely, the accretion may entirely cease, and yet all the other actions continue until the mass disappears. Here, then, the combination has none of that definiteness which, in a plant, marks the mutual dependence of respiration, assimilation, and circulation; much less has it that definiteness seen in the mutual dependence of the chief animal functions; no one of which can be varied without varying the rest; no one of which can go on unless the rest go on. Moreover, this definiteness of combination distinguishes the changes occurring in a living body from those occurring in a dead one. Decomposition exhibits both simultaneous and successive changes, which are to some extent heterogeneous, and in a sense combined; but they are not combined in a definite manner. They vary according as the surrounding medium is air, water, or earth. They alter in nature with the temperature. If the local conditions are unlike, they progress differently in different parts of the mass, without mutual influence. They may end in producing gases, or adipocire, or the dry substance of which mummies consist. They may occupy a few days or thousands of years. Thus, neither in their simultaneous nor in their successive changes, do dead bodies display that definiteness of combination which characterizes living ones. It is true that in some inferior creatures the cycle of successive changes admits of a certain indefiniteness—that it may be suspended for a long period by desiccation or freezing, and may afterwards go on as though there had been no breach in its continuity. But the circumstance that only a low order of life can have its changes thus modified, serves but to suggest that, like the previous characteristics, this characteristic of definiteness in its combined changes, distinguishes high vitality from low vitality, as it distinguishes low vitality from inorganic processes. Hence, our formula as further amended reads thus:—Life is a definite combination of heterogenous changes, both simultaneous and successive.

Finally, we shall still better express the facts if, instead of saying a definite combination of heterogeneous changes, we say the definite combination of heterogeneous changes. As it at present stands, the definition is defective both in allowing that there may be other definite combinations of heterogeneous changes, and in directing attention to the heterogeneous changes rather than to the definiteness of their combination. Just as it is not so much its chemical elements which constitute an organism, as it is the arrangement of them into special tissues and organs; so it is not so much its heterogeneous changes which constitute Life, as it is the co-ordination of them. Observe what it is that ceases when life ceases. In a dead body there are going on heterogeneous changes, both simultaneous and successive. What then has disappeared? The definite combination has disappeared. Mark, too, that however heterogeneous the simultaneous and successive changes exhibited by such an inorganic object as a volcano, we much less tend to think of it as living than we do a watch or a steam-engine, which, though displaying changes that, serially contemplated, are largely homogeneous, displays them definitely combined. So dominant an element is this in our idea of Life, that even when an object is motionless, yet, if its parts be definitely combined, we conclude either that it has had life, or has been made by something having life. Thus, then, we conclude that Life is—the definite combination of heterogeneous changes, both simultaneous and successive.

§ 26. Such is the conception at which we arrive without changing our stand-point. It is, however, an incomplete conception. This ultimate formula (which is to a considerable extent identical with one above given—"the co-ordination of actions;" seeing that "definite combination" is synonymous with "co-ordination," and "changes both simultaneous and successive" are comprehended under the term "actions;" but which differs from it in specifying the fact, that the actions or changes are "heterogeneous")—this ultimate formula, I say, is after all but a rude approximation. It is true that it does not fail by including the growth of a crystal; for the successive changes this implies cannot be called heterogeneous. It is true that the action of a galvanic battery is not comprised in it; since here, too, heterogeneity is not exhibited by the successive changes. It is true that by this same qualification the motions of the Solar System are excluded, as are also those of a watch and a steam-engine. It is true, moreover, that while, in virtue of their heterogeneity, the actions going on in a cloud, in a volcano, in a glacier, fulfil the definition; they fall short of it in lacking definiteness of combination. It is further true that this definiteness of combination distinguishes the changes taking place in an organism during life from those which commence at death. And beyond all this it is true that, as well as serving to mark off, more or less clearly, organic actions from inorganic actions, each member of the definition serves to mark off the actions constituting high vitality from those constituting low vitality; seeing that life is high in proportion to the number of successive changes occurring between birth and death; in proportion to the number of simultaneous changes; in proportion to the heterogeneity of the changes; in proportion to the combination subsisting among the changes; and in proportion to the definiteness of their combination. Nevertheless, answering though it does to so many requirements, this definition is essentially defective. The definite combination of heterogeneous changes, both simultaneous and successive, is a formula which fails to call up an adequate conception. And it fails from omitting the most distinctive peculiarity—the peculiarity of which we have the most familiar experience, and with which our notion of Life is, more than with any other, associated. It remains now to supplement the conception by the addition of this peculiarity.