BIOLOGY AND « WOMAN'S RIGHTS:' 211 



It is a fact, long familiar to the world, that the polyp may be cut into 

 without injury, each part soon becoming a complete animal. 



To such simplicity of structure the completest contrast is afforded 

 by the higher animals. Throughout their bodies we find a " division 

 of labor," each function having its organ and each organ its distinct 

 function. To trace how this differentiation is carried out would be 

 wearisome, and, being admitted, is fortunately needless. 



It may be useful, however, to call to mind the fact that animals 

 which, when mature, are broadly and easily distinguished from each 

 other, are more and more alike the earlier the stage of growth at which 

 we institute a comparison. The differences between a baby chimpanzee 

 and a human infant are much slighter than those between the adults 

 of the respective species. If we extend our researches to the em- 

 bryonic state we find that the rudimentary man can scarcely be dis- 

 tinguished from many of the other vertebrates. It is only, as Prof. 

 Huxley points out, in the later stages of prenatal growth that the 

 human foetus differs from that of an ape. In the former the convolutions 

 of the brain, according to Prof. Bischoff, reach about the same stage of 

 development as in an adult baboon. The great toe, in man, is con- 

 sidered by Prof. Owen the most characteristic feature of the human 

 skeleton ; but, in an embryo about an inch in length. Prof. "Wyman 

 found this member not lying parallel with the other toes, but project- 

 ing out from the side of the foot as it does permanently in the so-called 

 Quadrumana in their mature condition. Thus plainly does it appear 

 that differentiation is the way to perfection, each animal as it ap- 

 proaches maturity diverging more and more from other forms, from 

 which, in its earlier stages, it was scarcely distinguishable. 



Yet again, we may turn from a survey of the growth of the indi- 

 vidual, and from a comparison of the highest and lowest forms of con- 

 temporary organic life, to the consideration of the successive phases of 

 being that have peopled our earth. Here, too, we find the same great 

 law prevail. In the remote past we find what are called " generalized 

 forms" — animals which seem to have combined in themselves the 

 rough outlines of what we now find developed into perfectly distinct 

 beings. 



Suppose it were now proposed as an improvement in the structure 

 of man, or of any other mammalian species, that the functions now exer- 

 cised by two distinct organs — such as, e. g., the eye and the ear, or the 

 nerves of motion and of sensation — should be " lumped " together, com- 

 mitted to one only set of organs ; would such a change, if we for the 

 moment* suppose it practicable, be an advance or a retreat ? "Would it 

 raise or lower the species in the scale of existence ? It might seem a 

 convenience if, instead of seeing with our eyes alone, we could also see 

 and hear with our ears ; but would either the seeing or the hearing be 

 done as well as now, Avhen each is the sole function of an express 

 organ ? On the principles of the old natural historj', as well as of the 



