218 VITALISM AND SCHOLASTICISM 



that the composition of the sex-products would, 

 in these circumstances, be too complicated to be 

 thinkable. However this may be, and accord- 

 ing to prevalent physical ideas as to the com- 

 position of matter there is room for an enormous 

 number of particles in the spermatozoon, not to 

 speak of the ovum, there is a further matter and 

 that is the question of arrangement a word 

 often used with great freedom but, one is bound 

 to say, less consideration as to its exact mean- 

 Bateson ing. For example, in a recent British Associa- 

 tion Address, the President committed himself 

 to the opinion on the matter we are now con- 

 sidering that " though it is obvious that they 

 are transmitted by the sex-products it is un- 

 likely that they are in any simple or literal 

 sense material particles." Here we may break 

 off for a moment to inquire, in the interests of 

 plain thinking, how we are to understand this 

 passage. A thing must be either material or 

 immaterial simply and literally and it cannot 

 be both. But to proceed, for what follows is 

 much more important. " I suspect rather that 

 their properties depend on some phenomenon of 

 arrangement." 



Let us deal fully with this question of "ar- 

 rangement," and to make it clear let us con- 

 sider the following parable. Let us suppose 

 that a visitor to some well-arranged garden is 



