The Views of Botanists 113 



Now we have demonstrated that the empirical basis 

 for the assumption of the germ-plasm, which was to lie in 

 the qualitative difference between germ and somatic cells, 

 was only an apparent one and disappears when we con- 

 sider cell-pedigrees in detail, and from every point of 

 view. 



Nor from this point of view can we recognize as justi- 

 fied the assumption of the germ-plasm. Because if we 

 were to attribute germ-plasm to all the cells of the en- 

 tire organism, the hypothesis would thereby become 

 superfluous, and the term practically synonymous with nu- 

 cleo-plasm. 



I propose to follow out these general discussions more 

 in detail in the two following subdivisions of this chapter. 



77. The Views of Botanists 



That all the cells of the germ-tracks must contain 

 the hereditary characters of their species, in either the 

 active or the latent state, can hardly be doubted. How the 

 somatic cells behave in this respect, cannot on the whole 

 be determined by experiment. Especially not negatively, 

 because the absence of latent hereditary characters can 

 never be experimentally proven. The quite isolated, non- 

 nucleated cells of nucleated organisms form possibly an 

 exception. But positive experimental results would lead 

 us to recognize the investigated cells, which, up to that 

 time had been called somatic, as elements of secondary 

 germ-tracks. Therefore they only shift the limit without 

 deciding the question. 



And yet, as we have seen in the preceding paragraph, 

 the question is one of high theoretical value. And as 

 long as this point has at all been an object for reflection, 

 botanists have been of the opinion that all, or at least by 



