THE REPRODUCTION OF LIFE. 87 



tions of digestion, assimilation, respiration, sen- 

 sation and reproduction. The cell, therefore, is. 



Organism. 



a physical organism animated by a psychic or- 

 ganism or form of life. The many celled organ- 

 ism is an anatomy composed of physical units and 

 a soul composed of psychic units. 



Life in its ultimate nature is composed of two 

 principles, a masculine and a feminine. All forms 

 of life are reproduced by the union of these two How Life is 

 principles. In the lower forms of life the mascu- epr 

 line and feminine attributes exist in one organ- 

 ism. Such multiply by the union of these princi- 

 ples within the organism. The new life thus 

 created when sufficiently developed is cast of from 

 the parent cell. This is called multiplication by 

 division. In the many celled organisms in some 

 mysterious way each psychic unit sends its repre- 

 sentative to help form a miniature, or rudimentary 

 psychic nature which becomes an epitome of the 



ductive elements are formed from their union, then the 

 introduction of gemmules of another kind will necessarily 

 modify the offspring. He therefore infused eighteen silver 

 gray rabbits with the blood of other kinds. They produced 

 86 young, but showed in no instance any tendency towards 

 variety. He finally arrived at a "process of heredity" 

 founded on the continuity of what he- termed "strip." This 

 advances the idea that every cell in the body, including the 

 sperm cells and ova, are descended from a fertilized ovum. 

 Of these cells of the body all obviously die except those 

 sperm cells and ova that give rise to the next generation 

 and so on. We have, therefore, a continuing chain of Actual 

 organic matter strip linking every living form with those 

 that are most ancestral and remote. From these chains all- 

 the so-called living organisms that have ever existed have, 

 as it were, been thrown off. Many have emphasized this 

 point, Owen, Haeckel and others, but perhaps to Francis 



