IV THE CELL AND THE ORGANISM 77 



stereotyped through the two processes of photo-synthesis 

 and osmosis, the second of which has enabled it to get water 

 and mineral salts direct from the soil, and the first of which 

 has enabled it by the help of chlorophyll to utilise the energy 

 of sunlight for making sugars, starch and cellulose from the 

 carbon dioxide of the air. The plant, being thus dependent 

 for its food solely on the soil and the air, could afford to 

 remain stationary and mostly fixed in the soil; while animal 

 forms, which are dependent on organic foods, have had to be 

 mobile in order to look for and find the necessary plant or 

 animal substances on which to live. The struggle for food 

 has been a much harder one for animals, which have in 

 consequence not only to be mobile and 'develop a complex 

 motor system, but also to evolve in the nervous system a 

 special co-ordinating mechanism with which to work the 

 motor system. This mechanism, again, has led to unique 

 developments in the direction of sensitiveness and con- 

 sciousness, which in the case of man have come to over- 

 shadow all that has gone before. But mind is a later 

 development, the discussion of which should not be raised in 

 connection with the cell. The primitive cell of life is on the 

 way to Mind, but Mind at this stage is still far off, and those 

 who ascribe Mind or even potential Mind to the cell open the 

 door to the most serious confusions. The cell undoubtedly 

 presents a great mystery. And there is a strong temptation 

 to ascribe its surprising activities to an inner mentality or 

 organic psychism. But even the most highly evolved human 

 intelligence finds it difficult to understand all that goes on in 

 the cell. If psychism is the key,«we should have to ascribe 

 to the cell so large a measure of mentality as to reduce the 

 whole supposition of psychism to absurdity. The cell has 

 not yet mind. Mind as we know it, or anything at all 

 resembling it, is a much later development in the process of 

 organic Evolution, as will be shown in Chapter IX. 



Enough has been said about the structure and the func- 

 tions of the cell to give a rough general idea of what the cell 

 is. Let us now pass on to consider the inter-relations of ele- 

 ments in the cell, and among cells in the same organism, and 

 especially the aspect of co-ordination in and among cells. 



