66 LIFE AND HABIT. 



protoplasm, and protoplasm is like certain prophecies, 

 out of which anything can be made by the creature 

 which wants to make it. Everything depends upon 

 I ; whether a creature knows its own mind sufficiently 

 I well, and has enough faith in its own powers of 

 ■achievement. When thSse two requisites are wanting, 

 the strongest giant cannot lift a two-ounce weight; 

 when they are given, a bullock can take an eyelash 

 out of its eye with its hind-foot, or a minute jelly 

 speck can build itself a house out of various materials 

 which it will select according to its purpose with the 

 nicest care, though it have neither brain to think with, 

 nor eyes to see with, nor hands nor feet to work with, 

 nor is it anything but a minute speck of jelly — faith 

 and protoplasm only. 



That this is indeed so, the following passage from 

 Dr. Carpenter's " Mental Physiology " may serve to 

 show : — 



"The simplest type of an animal consists of a 

 minute mass of ' protoplasm/ or living jelly, which is 

 not yet differentiated into ' organs ; ' every part having 

 the same endowments, and taking an equal share in 

 every action which the creature performs. One of 

 these 'jelly specks,' the amoeba, moves itself about 

 by changing the form of its body, extemporising a foot 

 (or pseudopodium), first in one direction, and then in 

 another ; and then, when it has met with a nutritive 

 particle, extemporises a stomach for its reception, by 

 wrapping its soft body around it. Another, instead 

 of going about in search of food, remains in one place, 

 but projects its protoplasmic substance into long 



