SYSTEMATIC SYNTHESIS OF TISSUES. 177 



138. THE CELLS SEEM TO GROW from the granules, 

 and as they reach maturity portions of the walls elongate 

 and become continuous with the filaments of white tis- 

 sue constituting the nerves or commissures. 



139. THE CONTENTS OF THE CELLS, as well as the 

 substance in which they are imbedded, is constituted of 

 the six Elements of the first two groups, the proportion 

 of phosphorus being larger than in any other tissue. 



140. IF THE NERVOUS MATERIALS ARE TRACED BACK, 



it will be found that the powers that Nervous Tissue can 

 exhibit are condensed by the plant under the influence of 

 the sun's rays, in the albuminoid products of the plant, 

 and that the power of the nervous cells is a representative 

 of so much power as the plants have stored, and no more. 



141. ALL POWER THAT CAN BE MANIFESTED BY THE 

 NERVOUS CELLS is exhausted when their substance is de- 

 composed, which must be replaced from food eaten, con- 

 taining the appropriate Elements properly prepared. 



142. IT is NOT PROBABLE that the nerve-cells can 

 secrete their important contents directly from the albu- 

 men of the Blood, but it is probable that it is wrought up 

 to a certain degree before the nervous Tissue performs 

 upon its Elements the finishing secretion that endows 

 them with the highest and most wonderful power that 

 matter is ever capable of exhibiting, and enables them to 

 fulfil duties most intensely important to human welfare. 



143. WHETHER THE SUBSTANCE ABOUT THE CELLS is 

 aifected by them or not, is not known ; the probabilities 

 favor the idea that it is. 



144. THE WHITE NERVOUS TISSUE does not exhibit 

 the cellular arrangement (though originally constituted 

 from cells), nor is it necessary that it should, as its office 

 is passive so far as it is understood, having merely to 

 communicate the influences that originate at either 

 extremity of the fibres that it constitutes. 



138. How do ? 139. What said of ? 140. What ? 141. What said ? 

 142. What ? 143. What said of ? 144. What said ? 



8* 



