164 QUARTERLY CHRONICLE. 
their conditions, their sensations, we may even say their 
experiences, with one another. Each therefore is confined to 
the bare circle of its own sensations (which we are as little 
able to dispute in plant-cells as in animal-cells), and there- 
fore it can reach to no higher grade of physical life. 
“The cells of a plant are, in a word, like a number of men 
shut up from childhood together in a cellular prison, who 
perhaps might have exercised much important influence on 
one another, but between whom all spiritual intercouse has 
been prevented. ‘These men would never display the deeper 
characteristics of spiritual development. 
“Tn the higher animals there are numerous groups of cells 
which are disposed in a manner analogous to that observed 
in the plant cells; that is to say, they lie isolated, yet near 
each other, though not enclosed in the same hard dwellings: 
as in plants. Such aggregates of cells, for example, are the 
blood and the epithelium. The epithelium is the name given 
to the layers of cells which he arranged like strata wherever 
an organic structure is bounded towards external space, as in 
the outer skin (epidermis), and the slime-skin, or mucous 
membrane, which lines the surface of internal cavities open to 
external space. Many other tissues also form the same kind 
of cell-masses, upon the principle of the plant’s organization. 
Their action has been long designated as ‘ vegetative,’ 
correctly referring to the analogies which they present to 
plant-life. 
“ In the higher animals a new system of cells is added to this 
vegetative group, which are disposed on a totally different 
plan. It defines what is truly animal, and its actions are 
rightly designated ‘ animal.’ 
“Tn fact, the difference between plants and animals does 
not really lie in their elementary components. The distinction 
can only be clearly shown where one has to deal with complex 
organisms formed of many cells. The true characteristics of 
the two kingdoms are to be found in the manner in which the 
colony is built up by its imdividuals, and thus especially in 
that system of cells just mentioned which gives its peculiarity 
to the animal kingdom. This system is a series of cells 
widely spread through the whole body, in which the proto- 
plasmic matter is maintained in unbroken continuity through- 
out, by fine, long threads. It is the ‘nervous system.’ ” 
