102 SUPER-ORGANIC EVOLUTION 



society, super-organic organism, the rapidity of 

 change will be greater than in any other. So that 

 the progress of humanity, when once it has found 

 the true path, will not only be free from alterna- 

 tions, but proceed with greater speed. The de- 

 cadence of humanity as an organism cannot be 

 admitted until our planet begins to decline in its 

 evolution, and until then we need not think about 

 this reflux, which would be unique and definite. 



When Ramon y Cajal made known the conclu- 

 sions quoted in the last paragraph, the seventh, of 

 supreme importance, excited the widest interest, as 

 it deals with the reticulum or cellular woof, which 

 was then little understood, although the clever 

 neurologist was tracing by experiment and observa- 

 tion the modifications which the body of the neurona 

 has necessarily to undergo, according as it is in a 

 state of activity or repose. 



The philosophic spirit of Ramon y Cajal suc- 

 ceeded in discovering the collateral terminations 

 of the cylindric axis, looking for them, not, as Golgi, 

 in man, but, knowing well the law of evolution, in 

 the lower mammiferse in embryology and ontogeny ; 

 for in animals of small size it was easy to discover 

 at the edges the terminations of the collaterals, or 

 rather to come upon their development in the 

 embryonary period, and thus show the very im- 

 portant datum of the independence of the neurona. 



