332 SYMBIOGENESIS 



explanation of many morbid phenomena of the uncertain 

 facts of pathology will speedily follow. 



This study, however, I submit, resolves itself mainly into 

 one of domestic and biological symbiosis in the widest sense, 

 and especially of nutrition as the means to these, and it is this 

 study I have tried to commence. 



Somewhat forestalling this study, Prof. Richet throws out 

 the following general biological considerations, which, he says, 

 have not been presented, and which, as it seems to him, it is 

 necessary to place before the learned for reflection : 



It may be asked how anaphylaxis can be reconciled with the law 

 of defence of organisms ; for, after all, defence is diminished when 

 sensitivity to intoxication is increased. 



Now, although it can only be an hypothesis, it may be allowed that 

 the defence of the organism is not merely a defence of individuals but 

 also a defence of the species. It is not merely a question of each indi- 

 vidual maintaining its existence, it is also necessary that the individuals 

 shall remain like to each other. If heterogeneous substances could 

 penetrate the organism with impunity and modify its fundamental 

 chemical properties, entering into the protoplasm and altering its nature, 

 then all would be over with the somatic constitution, the fruit of slow 

 and ancestral acquisition, of each kind of animal. All progress acquired 

 by selection and heredity would be lost and we should be at the mercy 

 of chance, of accidents, and the occurrences of each day which would 

 be capable of modifying, in accordance with complicated formulae, the 

 actual optimum state in which we are. Every being must be stable and 

 it is to maintain this stability that the individual reacts with such 

 energy to the chemical changes which affect it. 



With this passage I have no fault to find, but, on the 

 contrary, hasten to give full assent, glad to see that such wider, 

 practically bio-economic, considerations commend themselves 

 increasingly to leading men in the various fields of Biology. 

 It is all a question of maintaining stability in the interest of 

 indispensable bio-economic (reciprocal or symbiotic) specialisa- 

 tion. This is why every being "must be " stable, and this is 

 also why it must be whole and healthy and on its defence 

 against any interference with its integrity. 



