70 PROTOPLASM. 



very forcible and high-sounding terms employed, but the 

 writing is often remarkable for vagueness and laxity of ex 

 pression, and conspicuous for its complete want of precision 

 and clearness of meaning, and the use of terms that beg 

 the question under consideration. 



The matter in dispute has, at least as regards my own 

 observations, been actually misrepresented ; for 



1. It has been said that the actions which I have 

 termed vital are really physical and chemical. 



2. The actions to which I have restricted the term 

 vital, and which occur in the germinal matter only, have 

 been completely ignored. 



But although the new schools hold it absurd to suppose 

 that any peculiar power acting from within or from without 

 can influence the changes in matter, or direct its forces, 

 they see no impropriety in attributing to matter itself, and 

 to force, guiding and directing, and forming agencies. 

 They transfer to the non-living those active, controlling, 

 and directing powers which have been hitherto considered 

 as limited peculiarly to the living world. It is the inorganic 

 molecule, not will, or mind, or power, which governs, 

 arranges, and guides. 



Only recently, Professor Huxley has affirmed that a 

 "particle of jelly" (protoplasm ?) guides forces." 1 But 

 the Professor has not explained what he means by 

 guiding physical forces. He should have given us some 



* Mr. Huxley remarks, that to his mind it is a /for/ of the profound - 

 est significance that "this particle of jelly (!) is capable of guiding 

 physical forces in such a manner as to give rise to those exquisite and 

 almost mathematically arranged structures," c. "Introduction to the 

 Classification of Animals." 



