24 SPECIAL CREATION 



less and transparent, or nearly so, and of glairy or 

 viscid semi-fluid consistency, as is well seen in the 

 bodies of foraminifers, amoebre, and other of the 

 lowest forms of animal life. Such protoplasm (orig- 

 inally named sarcode) when not confined by an in- 

 vesting membrane, has the power of extension in any 

 direction in the form of temporary processes capable 

 of being withdrawn again ; and it has also the char- 

 acteristic property of streamnig in minute masses 

 through closed membranes without the loss of the 

 identity of such masses. An individuated mass of 

 protoplasm, generally of microscopic size with or with- 

 out a nucleus and a wall, constitutes a cell, which may 

 be the whole body of an organism, or the structural 

 unit of aggregation of a multicellular animal or plant. 

 The ovum of any creature consists of protoplasm, and 

 all the tissues of the most complex living organisms re- 

 sult from the multiplication, differentiation, and 

 specialization of such protoplasmic cell-units. The 

 life of the organism, as a whole, consists in the con- 

 tinuous waste and repair of the protoplasmic mater- 

 ial of its cells. No animal, however, can elaborate 

 protoplasm directly from the chemical elements of 

 that substance. The manufacture of protoplasm is a 

 function of the vegetable kingdom. Plants make it 

 directly from mineral compounds and from the at- 

 mosphere under the influence of the sun's light and 

 heat, thus becoming the store-house of food-stuff for 

 the animal kingdom. (See Cent. Die. 6, p. 4799.) 



Hence this substance, known in Vegetable Physi- 

 ology as protoplasm, but often referred to by zoolo- 

 gists as sarcode, has been appropriately designated by 



