Scientific Sophisms. 109 







vessels formed, and conditioned the further pro- 

 gress. When, at a later date, the conception of 

 a cell had been arrived at, Schleiden, for start- 

 ing point, required an intracellular plasma, 

 and Schwann, a structureless exudation, in 

 which minute granules, if not indeed already 

 pre-existent, formed, and by aggregation grew 

 into nuclei, round which singly the production 

 of a membrane at length enclosed a cell. 

 Brown demonstrated a nucleus in the vegetable 

 cell ; as Valentin subsequently did in the 

 animal one ; Miiller insisted on the analogy be- 

 tween animal and vegetable tissue; Schwann's 

 labour in completing the theory of the animal 

 cell may be regarded as completing the first 

 stage of the cell theory : but the raising it to 

 the second stage must be attributed to the 

 wonderful ability of Virchow. And it is to the 

 resolution of this second stage that we owe the 

 word Protoplasm. 



In Virchow's view, the body constituted a 

 free state of individual subjects, with equal 

 rights but unequal capacities. These were the 

 cells, which consisted each of an enclosing 

 membrane, and an enclosed nucleus with sur- 

 rpunding intracellular matrix or matter. These 

 cells propagated themselves, chiefly by partition 

 Or division ; and the fundamental principle of 



