34 JOURNAL OF THE [April, 



tinct from that of another bit of living jelly optically exactly 

 like it ; and that the one never would fulfill by accident, and 

 never could be made to fulfill, the destiny of the other. But 

 this difference of function and behavior in forms merely looking 

 alike, they undertook to account for either by purely chemical 

 symbolism, as we have seen Professor Huxley doing, or else by 

 arguments from the laws of molecular physics. Thus Professor 

 Rutherford, at the British Association meeting in 1873, said : 

 " There appears to be no reason for supposing that two particles 

 of protoplasm, which possess a similar microscopic structure, 

 must act in the same way ; for the physicist knows that molec- 

 ular structure and action are beyond the ken of the microscop- 

 ist, and that within apparently homogeneous jelly-like particles 

 of protoplasm there may be differences of molecular constitution 

 and arrangement which determine widely different properties." 

 Hseckel also had said : " All the immeasurable variety in the 

 most diverse properties of organic bodies perceptible to the 

 senses, which excite and delight our perceptions, is to be traced 

 back to the alike infinitely numerous and delicate differences in 

 the atomic constitution of the albumen-compounds which con- 

 stitute the plasma of the plastids."'^ 



The trouble with these arguments is that they assume that 

 investigation into the composition of protoplasm had really got 

 down as deep as molecular structure. The fact is that the occa- 

 sion had not yet arisen for a final refuge in what Professor Tyn- 

 dall has aptly termed " the scientific use of the imagination ; " 

 for it was soon proven that the resources of instrumentally- 

 aided eye-sight had been by no means exhausted. Purely opti- 

 cal methods began to develop a necessity for a distinction of 

 parts in what had been regarded as homogeneous, and the intro- 

 duction of the words " cytoplasma," " hyaloplasma," "polio- 

 plasma," "paraplasma," etc., into the nomenclature of the sub- 

 ject, testified to the dififerentiation which was coming to light. 



Professor Goodale has set forth very clearly the changes 

 which have taken place in the botanical phase of this subject 

 during the last twenty years, in his presidential address to the 

 biological section of the American Association, at its recent 

 Toronto meeting. He shows that at the beginning of this period 

 "the following points were regarded as established: i. All of 

 '* "Generale Morpbologie." 



