sere) oes OS aa eal sup NATURE AND LIFE. FAOTS AND DOOTRINES RELATING TO THE CONSTITUTION OF MATTER, THE NEW DYNAMICS, - AND THE PHILOSOPHY OF NATURE. BY FERNAND PAPILLON. TRANSLATED FROM THE SECOND FRENCH EDITION, BY A. R. MACDONOUGH, Esa. NEW YORK: Dy ALP PT) Kt ONS ACN D.C O MORAN YY. 549 AND 551 BROADWAY. 1875. ENTERED, according to Act of Congress, in the year STD, | D. APPLETON & COMPANY, — In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washi PREFACE BY THE AUTHOR. Tus volume contains a series of essays written and published at different times, some of a general charac- ter, and others more special, and all relating to the activity of natural forces, especially those of life. The mere bringing together of these fragments has present- ed an opportunity of completing a methodical and uni- form whole, combining exactness in details with gen- erality of doctrines, and distinctly tracing the precise aspect of each group of phenomena in the picture of the close and universal relations that bind the whole together. An exposition is thus offered under au ele- mentary form, in language freed from technical dress, of the most essential truths established of late by. phys- ics, chemistry, and biology, regarding the mechanism of natural forces, and the arrangement and combina- - tion of the fundamental springs of being in the world, especially in the living world. I indulge the hope that such a work might meet a kindly welcome from minds, ever increasingly numerous, that regard science as the subject neither of idle curiosity nor of passing entertain- ment, but as the object of earnest sympathy and of se- lv PREFACE BY THE AUTHOR. rious examination. Such, at least, is the principal pur- pose of this book. | It has another, also. The evident disposition of the present day is to repose infinite hopes on the natural sciences, and to expect unlimited benefits from them. I certainly shall not view this inclination as an illu- sion, and this volume sufficiently attests the high value I set upon all that can encourage and foster such feel- ings. But precisely because I am not suspected of en- mity to those sciences, it has seemed to me the more necessary to indicate a fatal mistake accompanying those commendable sentiments; I mean the mistake of those who, after loudly praising the excellence of science, denounce the weakness and deny the author- ity of metaphysics. Now, my reader will come upon more than one page manifestly inspired by the conviction that science, properly so called, does not satiate the mind eager to know and to understand, and that therefore metaphys- ics holds a large and an authorized place in the activity of human thought. While I have retouched every thing in these essays which seemed to me, from an exclusively scientific point of view, susceptible of a higher degree of exactness and precision, I have, on the contrary, preserved with jealous care the literal tenor of all the passages expressly written under the influence of that conviction. And I have done so, not because of any peculiar value in those reflections, many of which are nothing more than a very imperfect representation of PREFACE BY THE AUTHOR. Vv “my way of seeing, but because those reflections were then made for the first time, with absolute spontaneous- ness, and without the slightest system or premeditation. The reader will thus be able to see how general ideas naturally emerge from deep and close contemplation of a group of various details, how forcible their unsought impression is; in other words, how surely thought, fol- lowing orderly and regular evolution, without studied intention as without dogmatic aim, arrives at the loftiest philosophic certainties. The thinker who freely seeks for truth, continuously changes his position in his aspirations toward mind and the ideal. He deserts the regions of phenomena and concrete things, to rise to those of the absolute and eternal. The farther he withdraws from the former, which had at first absorbed all his attention, the more strikingly does the perspective in which he viewed them alter. At last, he discerns nothing else in them but spectres without substance, and delusive phantoms. And in the degree and extent of his drawing near to the eternal and the absolute, reality comes more surely within his ken, and he gains a more vivid feeling and a keener conception of it. He measures the distance he has traversed, and values the worth of his own contem- plations by the fullness of lucid clearness which enlight- ens his faint view of the first principles of things, and by the depth of humble reverence with which he bows before the mysterious Power which created all! CONCARNEAU (FINISTERRE), May, 1878. CONTENT Ss PAGE THe Constitution oF Matter, AND THE New Dynamisu.. 1 THe Paitosopuy oF Nature, AND Lerenitz’s IpEAs...... 30 THE GENERAL CONSTITUTION oF Livine BEINGS........... 62 Licor anp Lire..... Bers Coins on ae Sta erin eee ieee see LO HEAT AND LIFE...... ee va7e-srec'e, Siaire! hla piece revere sieneraheeneeer eusteae sate 129 IP ORRIOLEY AND LINN Ss oc boc oce oe dlo os en Se ee OD Opors AND Jlire....... BPA ene, ee asian ee ae 179 MEDIOAMENTS AND LIFE...... ieee tI oe oe 204 Awimat GRAFTS AND REGENERATIONS............--+----- 229 FERMENTS, FERMENTATIONS, AND LIFE....... Baty alas «is ae 255 GREAT EpripEMIcs— ASIATIO CHOLERA....... PP ONS Sheena Ke ane My SIOLOGY OF JJEATH.: 2 <10..4s00 oe Se eee ee 303 HEREDITY IN PuystotoGy, iv MEpIcINE, AND IN PsycHoLocy. 330 NATURE AND LIFE. THE CONSTITUTION OF MATTER, AND THE NEW DYNAMISM. WHATEVER empirics and utilitarians may say on the subject, there are certainties apart from the experimental method, and there is progress disconnected with brilliant or beneficent applications. The mind of man may put forth its power in laboring in harmony with reason, yet discover genuine truths in a sphere as far above that of laboratories and manufactures as their sphere is above the region of the coarsest arts. In a word, there is a temple of light that unfolds its portals to the soul neither through calculation nor through experiment, which the soul nevertheless enters with authority and ¢onfidence, so long as it holds the con- sciousness of its sovereign prerogatives. When will pro- fessed scientists, better informed of the close connection be- tween metaphysics and science, whence our modern knowl- edge of Nature has sprung, better taught in the necessary laws that govern the conflict of reason with the vast un- known, confess that there are realities beyond those they attain? When will science, instead of the arrogant indif- ference it assumes in presence of philosophy, admit the fer- tility beyond estimate of the latter? It may be that the hour of this reconciliation, so much to be longed for, is less remote than many suppose; at least, every day brings us 9 NATURE AND LIFE. nearer to it. The spirit of Descartes cannot fail to arouse before long some genius mighty enough to revive among us a taste and respect for thought in all the departments of scientific activity. Deserted as high abstractions are for the moment, they are not, thank Heaven, so utterly aban- . doned as to deprive study of its ardor, and essays of their success, when these relate to the problem of the constitu- tion of matter. In fact, this is a question which for several years past has occupied some among our own savants and thinkers, as completely as it has employed most of those of the rest of Europe, a question which bears witness with peculiar eloquence to this fact, that, if philosophers are forced to borrow largely from science, in its turn science can retain clearness, and elevation, and strength, only by drawing its inspiration from, and recognizing its insepa- rable connection with, the abstract consideration of hidden causes and of first principles. iB Matter is presented under a great variety of appear- ances. Let us consider it in its most complicated state, in the human body, for instance. In this, ordinary dissection distinguishes organs, which may be resolved into tissues. The disintegration of the latter yields anatomical elements from which direct analysis extracts a certain number of chemical principles. Here the anatomist’s workends. The chemist steps in, and recognizes in these principles definite kinds arising from the combination, in fixed and determi- nate proportions, of a certain number of principles that can- not be decomposed, substantially indestructible, to which he gives the name of simple bodies. Carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, hydrogen, sulphur, phosphorus, calcium, iron, which thus set a limit to experimental analysis of the most com- plex bodies, are simple substances, that is to say, they are the original and irresolvable radicals of the tissue of things, THE CONSTITUTION OF MATTER. 3 We now know that matter is not indefinitely divisible, and that the smallest parts of the various simple substances existing in those that are naturally compound have not all the same dimensions, nor equal weights. Chemistry, by a course of analyses and measurements, has succeeded in de- termining the weights of atoms of the different elements, that is to say, taking as a unit an atom of the lightest ele- ment, hydrogen, in determining the weight of the atoms which are equivalent to this conventional unit in the various combinations. Though many savants continue to maintain that atomic weights are nothing but relations, and that the existence of atoms is a mere logical device, it seems more reasonable to admit, with the majority of those who have studied this difficult problem closely, that these atoms are actual realities, while it may be very far from easy to settle precisely their absolute dimensions. In any case, we may affirm that these dimensions are very much less than those presented by the particles of matter subjected to the most powerful and subtile methods of division, or decom- posed by the imagination into its minutest elements. ‘“ Let man,” says Pascal, “ investigate the smallest things of all he knows; let this dot of an insect, for stance, exhibit to him in its diminutive body parts incomparably more dimin- utive, jointed limbs, veins in those limbs, blood in those veins, in that blood humors, and drops within those humors —let him, still subdividing these finest points, exhaust his power of conception, and let the minutest object his fancy can shape be that one of which we are now speaking—he may, perhaps, suppose that to be the extreme of minute- ness in Nature. I will make him discover yet a new abyss within it. I will draw for him not merely the visible uni- verse but all besides that his imagination can grasp, the immensity of Nature, within the confines of that impercep- tible atom.” In this Pascal displays a feeling as true as it is deep of the infinitely small, and it is interesting to ob- 4 : ; NATURE AND LIFE. serve how the amazing revelations of the microscopic world have justified his eloquence and foresight ; and yet this mi- croscopic world, whose minutest representatives, such as vibrios and bacteria, are hardly less than the ten-thousandth part of #4, of an inch, how coarse it is compared with the particles thrown off by odorous bodies, and with the incon- ceivably minute quantities which chemistry, physics, and mechanics, now measure without seeing them, or make their existence plain without grasping them. We may mention some instances which can give us an idea of these. According to Tyndall, when very minute solid particles, smaller than the luminous waves, are diffused in a medi- um traversed by light, the light is decomposed in such a way that the least waves, the blue ones, predominate in the reflected rays, and the largest ones, the red waves, in the transmitted rays. This ingenious physicist thus ex- plains how the blue color of the sky depends and must de- pend on the existence of solid particles, excessively minute, diffused in infinite quantity through the atmosphere. Tyn- dall is not disinclined to the idea that these imperceptible atoms might very well be no other than those germs of microscopic organisms the presence of which in the atmos- phere has been proved by the labors of Pasteur, as well as the part they take in the phenomena of putrefaction and fer- mentation. The ova of these beings, which are barely vis- ible under the microscope after attaining full development, and of which the number, ascertained by the most decisive evidence, confounds the boldest imagination, these would be the elements of that vital ether, as we have termed it, that dust which gives its lovely blue tint to the vault of the sky. “‘ There exist in the atmosphere,” Tyndall says in closing, “particles of matter that elude the microscope and the scales, which do not disturb its clearness, and yet are present in it in so imnrense a multitude that the Hebrew hyperbole of the number of grains of sand on the sea-shore becomes THE CONSTITUTION OF MATTER. 5 comparatively unmeaning.” And, to give an idea of the minuteness of these particles, Tyndall adds that they might be condensed till they would all go into a lady’s traveling- bag. Manifestly these particles escape any kind of direct measurement and observation. Their objective reality can no more be demonstrated than that of the particles of ether can be made evident. Yet there are certain facts which aid us to form a clear conception of them. Let us dissolve a gramme of resin in a hundred times its weight of alcohol, then pour the clear solution into a large flask full of pure water, and shake it briskly. The resin is precipitated in the form of an impalpable and invisible powder, which does not perceptibly cloud the fluid. If, now, we place a black surface behind the flask, and let the light strike it either from above or in front, the liquid appears sky-blue. Yet, if this mixture of water and alcohol filled with resinous dust is examined with the strongest microscope, nothing is seen. The size of the grains of this dust is much less than the ten- thousandth part of #; of an inch. Morren makes another experiment, proving in a still more surprising way the ex- treme divisibility of matter: Sulphur and oxygen form a close combination, called by chemists sulphuric-acid gas. Tt is that colorless and suffocating vapor thrown off when a . sulphur-match is burned. Morren confines a certain quan- tity of this gas in a receiver, places the whole in a dark medium, and sends a bright ray of light through it. At first nothing is visible. But very soon in the path of the luminous ray we perceive a delicate blue color. It is be- cause the gas is decomposed by the luminous waves, and the invisible particles of sulphur set free decompose the light in turn. The blue of the vapor deepens, then it turns whitish, and at last a white cloud is produced. The par- ticles composing this cloud are still each by itself invisible, even under strong microscopes, and yet they are infinitely more coarse than the primitive atoms that occasioned the 6 NATURE AND LIFE. sky-blue tint at first seen in the receiver. In this experiment Wwe pass in steady progress from the free atom of sulphur parted fromthe oxygen-atom by the ether-waves to a mass apparent to the senses; but, if this mass is made up of free molecules which defy the strongest magnifiers, what must be the particles which have produced those very molecules ! A last instance of another kind will complete the proof as to the minuteness of the elements of matter. When a clear solution of sulphate of aluminum is poured into an — equally clear solution of sulphate of potassa, the mixture at once grows turbid, and after a few seconds myriads of little crystals, sparkling like diamonds, make their appear- ance in the liquid, which are nothing else than crystals of alum. If we suppose the diameter of these crystals to be gis of an inch, it will follow from this experiment that in the lapse of a few seconds crystals had the power of pro- ducing themselves containing tens of millions of molecules, each composed of ninety-four atoms, grouped in admirable harmony. The motions of these chemical atoms take place under the influence of the same forces that guide the motions of those enormous agglomerations of atoms called stars. The revolution of one sun around another takes a thousand years, while these atoms in course of combination perform hundreds of millions of such revolutions in the millionth part of a second ! By varied and delicate calculations, Thomson has suc- ceeded in establishing the fact that, in liquids and trans- parent or translucent solids, the mean distance between the centres of two contiguous atoms is comprised between the ten-millionth and the two-hundred-millionth part of > of an inch. It is not easy to form an exact conception of dimen- sions so small, of which nothing, among the objects that affect our senses, can convey any idea. Thomson judges that the following comparison may aid us to appreciate them: If we imagine a sphere as large as a pea magnified, THE CONSTITUTION OF MATTER. 4 so as almost to equal the earth’s volume, and the atoms of that sphere enlarged in the same proportion, they will then have a diameter greater than that of a shot, and less than that of an orange. In other words, an atom is to a globe the size of a pea what an apple is to the terrestrial globe. By arguments of quite another kind, drawn in part from the study of chemical molecules, in part from the phenomena of capillarity, Gaudin has ascertained, for the dimension of the smallest particles of matter, figures very nearly the same as Thomson’s. The maximum distance apart of the chemical atoms in molecules is the ten-millionth part of 5, of aninch. Gaudin follows Thomson in the attempt to give some sensible notion of the truly amazing minuteness of a dimension like this. He calculates, upon this estimate, the number of chemical atoms contained in about the size of a pin’s-head, and he finds that the number requires for its ex- pression the figure eight followed by twenty-one ciphers. So that, if we attempted to count the number of metallic atoms contained in a large pin’s-head, separating each sec- ond ten millions of them, we should need to continue the operation for more than 250,000 years ! There are, then, atoms in matter, and atomism is a fact, whenever we rest in the affirmation of the existence of atoms. But these are not the real principles, the simple and irreducible elements of the world. After decompos- ing sensible matter into atoms, we must subject the latter to an analysis of the same kind. Let us, then, consider any two heterogeneous atoms whatever, an atom of iron and an atom of hydrogen, for instance, and examine in what respect they can really, essentially, differ from each other. What is it which at bottom truly distinguishes these two atoms, as atoms? It is not any peculiarity of form, solidity, fluidity, hardness, sonorousness, brightness, because these properties evidently depend on the mutual arrangement and disposition of atoms, that is, because 8 NATURE AND LIFE. they are not relative to the individuality of each atom, but to that of the whole which they form by being grouped together. Neither is it any caloric property, or optic, or electric, or magnetic one, because these properties result from the movements of the ether, within the more or less complex aggregate of the respective atoms of these two — substances. Now, if these atoms, taken separately, differ from each other in virtue of none of the properties just enumerated, they can only be dissimilar as regards two attributes, dimension and weight ; but difference in weight results from difference in dimension, and is not a quali- tative difference, but simply a quantitative one.* Con- sequently, any two heterogeneous atoms whatever, com- pared together, as atoms, have scarcely any of the differ- ential attributes peculiar to the groups which they make up by aggregation, and represent no more than two dis- tinct functions, two different values of one and the same initial matter, of one and the same primitive quality or energy. This simple demonstration establishes the unity of substance, not as a more or less plausible physical hypothesis, but as a metaphysical certainty, alike underiv- able and necessary. If we add now, reserving the demon- stration for a later period, that dimension, corporeal ex- tension itself, as Leibnitz said and as Magy has lately proved, is only a resultant of force, it will become evident that matter, in the last analysis, is reduced to force. Tyndall, in his biography of Faraday, tells us that one of the favorite experiments of this physicist gives a true image of what he was: “ He loved to show how water, in erystallizing, eliminates all foreign substances, however intimately mingled they may be with it. Separated from all these impurities, the crystal becomes clear and limpid.” 1 We purposely take no notice of chemical forces, which can only be regarded as attractions, and must therefore be explained by forces acting outside of the atom itself. THE CONSTITUTION OF MATTER. 9 This experiment is especially the true image of what Faraday was as a metaphysician. For him nothing had so great a charm as those serene transparent regions, in which science, cleared of impurities, appeared to his great mind in all the glory of its power and splendor. He yielded himself to it with absolute abandonment. He particularly loved to dwell upon the problem which is now engaging us: ‘‘ What do we know of an atom apart from force?” he exclaims. ‘‘ You conceive a nucleus which may be called a, and you surround it with forces which may be called m, to my mind your @ or nucleus vanishes, and substance consists in the energy of m. In fact, what notion can we form of a nucleus independent of its energy?”