THE GENESIS OF LIVING ORGANISMS 185 



The anatomist will say, " Yes," but the physiologist will 

 say " No." 



The anatomist and morphologist delimits organs by their 

 form, the physiologist by what they perform. As the above 

 example shows, the boundaries of the morphological need not 

 coincide with the physiological. The physiologist will prefer 

 to consider all the legs of the chair as one organ, without 

 regard to the number of joins that separate them, or how many 

 parts intervene. Conversely, he will think the suggestion 

 simply absurd that parts which have different functions can 

 be ascribed to one and the same organ, even supposing there 

 is a morphological connection between them. 



From this simple example, we perceive that we must 

 analyse all implements down to their morphological and to 

 their physiological building-stones, if we are to do justice to 

 the facts. In the case of our own tools, these facts seem 

 perfectly obvious, for we know that the man who uses such 

 an implement is a different person from the man who manu- 

 factures it, and that each of them, in analysing it down to its 

 organs, works from a totally different standpoint. 



The joins that we observe in our implements are there 

 because only in certain special cases can the manufacturer 

 make the whole article out of one piece : he is obliged to make 

 the parts separately, and to connect them together later on ; 

 and so it is impossible to avoid having joins. 



Joins, therefore, are to be regarded as " signs of genesis," / 

 which direct our attention to the method by which the object 

 was prepared. And so the morphological building-stones that 

 the joins delimit, are to be considered as " genetical building- 

 stones " : that is their real significance. 



Now in most implements there are joins which are neces- 

 sitated by the particular function ; and I need only remind 

 you of those that separate the wheel from its axle and make 

 possible its turning. Joins of this kind must be taken into 



