INHERITANCE 223 



at the anterior end of the other half forms an anterior one. 

 Again, it is the ideal whole which we meet here : each 

 section of the body indeed may be said to contain the 

 potencies for the production of the totality, though actually 

 this totality is always realised by the addition of two 

 partial organisations. The title of complex-equipotential 

 systems thus seems to be fully justified as applied to the 

 systems which are the basis of regeneration : each section 

 of the regenerating body may in fact produce the same 

 complex whole, or may, if we prefer to say so, at least 

 prepare the ground for that complex Anlage, out of which 

 the complex totality is actually to arise, in the same 

 manner. 



It often occurs in science, that in rather strange and 

 abnormal conditions something becomes apparent which 

 might have been found everywhere, which is lying before 

 our eyes quite obviously. Are we not in just such a 

 condition at present? In order to study the cornplex- 

 equipotential systems, we turn to the phenomena of 

 regeneration and of restitution in general ; we occasionally 

 even introduce hypotheses to render our materials more 

 convenient for our purposes ; and all the time there is 

 one sort of complex-equipotential system in the body of 

 every living being, which only needs to be mentioned in 

 order to be understood as such, and which indeed requires 

 no kind of preliminary discussion. The system of the 

 propagation cells, in other words the sexual organ, is the 

 clearest type of a complex-equipotential system which 

 exists. Take the ovary of our sea-urchin for instance, and 

 there you have a morphogenetic system every element of 

 which is equally capable of performing the same complex 



