256 CONTRIBUTIONS TO 
The cells of the vascular bundle and of the epidermis 
appear in this way to be less potentialized,—are as it were 
cells of lower dignity than those of the parenchyma; and 
perhaps this physiological peculiarity is connected with the 
fact, that they more rarely secrete peculiar chemical substances, 
but for the most part become thickened only by depositions 
within their walls of new vegetable fibrous (or more correctly 
membranous) substance. I cannot forbear venturmg some 
suggestions in this place, which are perhaps less closely con- 
nected with the subject of this memoir, but which may possibly 
at some future time be of importance for the understanding of 
the entire plant. Let us recapitulate the process of growth of 
the plant just now represented. A simple cell, the pollen-tube, 
is its first foundation. Within this, cells are generated; in them 
new cells are developed, and so forth, throughout the entire 
life. But here the above-mentioned mode of the origin of the 
vascular bundles and of the epidermis in relation to the paren- 
chyma would indicate, that the lower the dignity of the cell, 
the greater power does it possess, in the first place, of expand- 
ing and extending in length, and the less capacity does it 
possess, in the second place, of forming peculiar finer sub- 
stances in its interior. If now the potentialization (poten- 
zirung) of the cells proceed throughout the entire growth of 
the plant, there thence results a constantly advancing approxi- 
mation of organs otherwise kept asunder, and continually rising 
ennoblement of the substances developed in the cells. Conse- 
quently, the lower parts of the internodes will appear to be 
more elongated than the upper; the leaves and young shoots 
(summitates herbarum, Pharmacol.) to contain nobler saps than 
the stem; the members become shortened as they approach 
nearer to the upper terminal point of the plant, the leaves 
come closer together, and the result of the continually 
increasing potentialization of the cell, of the constantly dimi- 
nishing expansion in length, of the constantly advancing ap- 
proximation of the lateral organs, of the constantly rising 
ennoblement of the substances developed, is, finally, the flower 
in its individualised distinctness, with its splendour of colour, 
its perfume, and its mysterious capacity of determining, by 
means of its juices, a single cell to be developed afresh into an 
independent plant, and to pass anew though the same cycle. 
