Il8 THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. 



but are bounded by an outer membrane 1 . He says 2 : 

 C I have called those forms of life standing at the 

 lowest grade of organization Monera. Their whole 

 body, in a fully developed and freely moving con- 

 dition, consists of an entirely homogeneous and struc- 

 tureless substance, a living particle of albumen 3 , 

 capable of nourishment and reproduction. These 

 simplest and most imperfect of all organisms are, 

 in many respects, of the highest interest. For the 

 albumen- like organic matter meets us here as the material 

 substratum of all life phenomena^ apparently not only 

 under the simplest form as yet actually observed, 

 but also under the simplest form which can well be 

 imagined. Simpler and more incomplete organisms 

 than the Monera cannot be conceived. . . . Indeed, the 

 whole body of the Monera, however strange this may 

 sound, represents nothing more than a single, thoroughly 

 homogeneous particle of albumen, in a firmly adhesive 



1 Professor Haeckel proposes that the word ' Sarcode,' introduced by 

 Dujardin, should be applied to the free protoplasm which exists without 

 a covering or limiting membrane, only with the distinct understanding 

 that such free protoplasm differs in no essential respect from that which 

 is encapsuled, whether it is marked off from surrounding things by 

 a mere limiting membrane, or whether it is enclosed within a definite 

 cell-wall. 



2 Translation in 'Journal of Micros. Science,' Jan. 1869, p. 28. 



3 ' In all chemical and physical respects,' Prof. Haeckel writes else- 

 where, ' this substance shows the qualities of a consistent carbonaceous 

 compound of the group of albuminous substances (Proteine). It is 

 identical with the substance which as Plasma or Protoplasm forms 

 the contractile living substance of all organic Plastides, of all cells, and 

 cytodes of animals, protista, and plants.' 



