92 
Like most Germans, Heckel thinks that his interpretation of 
facts is so palpably and unmistakably the right one, that it cannot 
be disputed. Nevertheless it is disputed, and amongst others, by 
no less eminent a person than the President of the last meeting of 
the British Association, Professor Allman ; and a brief summary of 
the points of divergence in the conclusions which these two 
physicists draw from the facts which scientific investigation has 
disclosed, may be of use. 
As to the facts themselves, there appears to be no difference 
of opinion of any great importance; in proof of which I will simply 
quote one or two passages from Professor Allman’s address :— 
**In the most complex animals, even in man himself, the component cells, 
notwithstanding their frequent modification and the usual intimacy of their 
union, are far from losing their individuality.” 
Again :— 
““The whole complex organism is a society of cells in which every indi- 
vidual cell possesses an independence, an autonomy, not at once so obvious as in 
the blood cells, but not the less real. With this autonomy of each element, 
there is at the same time a subordination of each to the whole, thus establishing 
a unity in the entire organism, and a concert and harmony between all the 
phenomena of its life. 
“In this society of cells each has its own work to perform, and the life of 
the organism is made up of the lives of its component cells. Here it is that we 
find most distinctly expressed the great law of the physiological division of 
labour.” 
In spite of this agreement as to the facts of cell-phenomena, 
however, Professor Allman does not give in to the theory of the 
cell-soul. He does not allow consciousness to the cell. Living 
matter is with him indeed distinctly separated from non-living 
matter. I think, however, we should not misrepresent him in saying 
that he regards what he calls life as belonging to a sort of department 
of mechanics; different from non-living matter, but still simply 
mechanical in its operations. The three distinguishing marks of 
living matter are—assimilation, reproduction, and irritability or 
responsiveness to excitations. The last of these he calls “the one 
grand character of all living beings.” And it is this which seems 
(to my mind at least) so difficult to regard as acting without 
consciousness. “There is no greater difficulty,” he says, speaking 
