THE PLANT AND THE ANIMAL 283 



So, then, neither in the life of the animal nor in that 

 of the plant have we found a single feature specially 

 peculiar to the one or to the other ; not a single indica- 

 tion by means of which any and every organism might 

 be classified in the one or the other kingdom. Is there 

 then no difference between plants and animals ? 



The difference is, in truth, very apparent ; it is 

 too deeply rooted in our minds to be given up so easily. 

 Common sense based upon everyday experience persists 

 in repeating, whatever we may say, that a tree will 

 always be a tree and a horse a horse, that a whole abyss 

 lies between them. 



How can we reconcile this contradiction ? Some- 

 times the difference is plain, sometimes it is not. The 

 issue is simple and the contradiction comprehensible. 

 It is based upon a logical fallacy, on the strength of 

 which man attributes real existence to abstract ideas, 

 the creations of his own mind. Unfortunately this 

 fallacy is very widespread, and has not a little thwarted 

 the success of natural science. As a matter of fact 

 there are no plants or animals as such, but a single 

 undivided world. Plants and animals are only aver- 

 ages, typical conceptions that we form for ourselves, 

 attributing special significance to some properties, 

 and neglecting, almost ignoring, the rest. These con- 

 ceptions, moreover, were formed at a time when only 

 the outstanding representatives of these groups were 

 known. So long as the comparison dealt with a tree 

 and a horse, no misunderstanding was possible ; but 

 the matter appeared in quite a different light when 



point out that this theory has not brought forward a single argument 

 based upon fact. Only metaphysical, not scientific, considerations can be 

 adduced in its defence to-day, just as a quarter of a century ago when I 

 first raised the question. I would also remark that to explain com- 

 paratively simple phenomena of vegetable life by comparing them with 

 much more complicated phenomena of psychical life in animals is to leave 

 the track by which every science, every kind of knowledge, has advanced 

 until now. 



