66 Natural Salvation. 



accidents, bacteria, improper food, duress of climate and 

 hostile fellow-creatures. First the cell was driven to a 

 mode of reproduction, to escape extinction ; multicellular 

 creatures developed from cells and may be said to have 

 inherited the reproductive mode of life. Humanity has 

 arisen from its lower ancestry to its present estate, by vir- 

 tue of the reproductive, alternate mode of life. Hence, 

 to die appears to many persons to be as natural a fate as 

 to be born; yet when more closely examined, death is 

 seen to be an unnatural event, a result of hardship and 

 distress, a fate repugnant to life everywhere and a catas- 

 trophe to be escaped. 



The Weismann hypothesis of life, death and heredity 

 is so well known and so generally accepted, in part, among 

 English and American biologists, that an extended state- 

 ment of it is unnecessary here. It has taken its place in 

 our science ; and the two important modifications to which 

 it must be subjected are now fairly well outlined. Pro- 

 fessor Weismann has been termed the Darwin of cell devel- 

 opment; to the present writer it seems that he might 

 better be called the Lamarck, and that the Darwin of the 

 animal cell has yet to appear. 



Weismann's positions are (1) that death is not an in- 

 herent necessity of unicellular life. The unicells do not 

 die, but divide, giving rise to offspring by fission. " No 



