THE "GENERAL MORPHOLOGY" 179 



was possible to conceive this slimy substance with- 

 out any firm membrane, without a chamber. In- 

 side it, however, there was always (it was then 

 thought) a thick and hard substance, the nucleus. 

 If that was the fundamental and only really essen- 

 tial form, the Darwinian primitive and initial type 

 of all terrestrial life must have been a similar 

 drop of living matter with a solid central nucleus, 

 a nucleated individual cell. 



How could we pass from this primitive cell to 

 the " inorganic," the " lifeless," the " dead," the 

 ordinary matter of stone, metal, and crystal ? 

 Haeckel believed that it was possible to make a 

 step in that direction not theoretically and philo- 

 sophically, but practically by showing that there 

 were still living things on the earth that did not 

 come up to the definition of a true cell, things that 

 had not yet a nucleus in their soft gelatinous body. 

 He discovered a number of tiny creatures that had 

 a homogeneous particle of living matter for body, 

 and showed no trace of a nucleus. The nucleus 

 seemed to be the first beginning of an organ. It 

 was altogether wanting in them. 



To these most primitive of all living things he 

 gave the name of monera, or the absolutely 

 " simple." 



In these investigations it is very difficult to 

 determine whether one of these tiny drops of plasm 

 has a more or less transparent nucleus or not. It 

 has often been affirmed in later years that these 

 monera of Haeckel's did not correspond to their 

 description as living things without a nucleus, or 



