LECTURE III 



THE REPRODUCTIVE PROCESS IN ANIMALS: 

 SOME OF THE GENERAL PRINCIPLES 



PERHAPS the most wonderful thing in Nature is a living 

 animal. And there is nothing more terrible in its im- 

 pressiveness than to be a witness when such a living 

 creature is suddenly deprived of its life, and to see in 

 the place where it was a moment before a mass of inert 

 material bearing the same outward form that the living 

 creature had, but without that characteristic life- 

 that gave it its all-transcending interest. What that 

 ' life ' really is in its ultimate nature is an absolute 

 mystery, and there are many of us who believe that it 

 must necessarily remain forever a mystery. For the 

 main instrument upon which w r e are dependent for its 

 investigation is our brain, and the whole activity of that 

 organ is merely a phase of that living activity the nature 

 of which it is our endeavour to understand. 



Even when we leave on one side the ultimate nature 

 of Life itself and restrict ourselves to the study of its 

 more superficial phenomena we find ourselves up against 

 quite unexpected complexities. Take the case of a 

 human being and consider one of his very simplest 

 actions. What can be more simple than to stand still 

 doing nothing ? One can observe the phenomenon at 



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