130 The Unity of the Organism 



frere's writings, significantly enough the theses he upheld in 

 this essay led liim to regard somewhat lightly Schultze's 

 leading contention, namel}^, for the importance of the cell- 

 contents, protoplasm and nucleus, as against the cell-mem- 

 brane. That the cell should be regarded as an organism 

 was, as is well known, what Briicke undertook to show, and 

 his motive should be distinctly recognized. He was working 

 in the interest of observational and descriptive histology and 

 physiology. Nothing in this essay, at least, indicates that 

 he was particularly interested in the broader implications 

 of his main thesis, and there is much, as we shall presently 

 see, to show that he was decidedly wary of "ultimate ques- 

 tions." 



Tlie very word "organism" implies organization, and 

 organization implies some thing organized; something, that 

 is, composed of parts a number of which, at least, are in- 

 dispensable and correlated with one another. An organism, 

 then, or an organized thing, and a thing of ultimate sim- 

 plicity, are terms not only contradictory but are mutually 

 annihilative of meaning. Briicke does not say this in just 

 this language, but his whole argument is a setting forth of 

 the idea in a concrete, particular case, namely that of the 

 cell. After calling attention to the similarity of the cells 

 to the organism in various attributes, as that of growth 

 by ingestion of foreign material, movement, change of form, 

 response to stimulation, and so on, and after reminding us 

 further of the fact that organisms are composed of parts 

 which we call organs and systems of the body, he says, "We 

 can hardly think otherwise than that in the cell also the 

 different activities proceed from differently constructed 

 parts." 1^ 



Going further with this idea, he writes : "We naturally 

 do not expect that the organs and systems repeat themselves 

 as we find them in the human organism taken in its entirety. 

 We know this is no more the case even in the lower animals. 



