556 THE BEGINNINGS OF LIFE. 



been much perturbed by this aspect of the question, the 

 view is, as we have already pointed out, undesirable on 

 other grounds. Whilst it is not adopted by Mr. 

 Herbert Spencer, it is also discountenanced by Prof. 

 Allen Thomson, who said 1 , even in 1855, in his 

 valuable article on the c Ovum ' : c It seems to require 

 a greater departure from the ordinary signification of 

 a common term than is warranted by our present im- 

 perfect knowledge of the phenomena, arbitrarily to 

 determine to regard merely as one individual all those 

 bodies which may be formed by a non-sexual process 

 from the product of a single ovum, notwithstanding the 

 great variations in their structure and mode of life, 

 and the complete separation and apparent independence 

 to which they may attain.' 



It should not be forgotten, in fact, that the word c in- 

 dividual' is a general name of the widest applicability, 

 whilst c species' is an abstract name corresponding 

 to no external reality which is, therefore, capable of 

 receiving an amended signification, without much in- 

 convenience, whenever the progress of science may 

 demand any such change. The connotation of the 

 word c species' has indeed already been unmistakeably 

 modified in the minds of many persons, even within 

 this generation; and we think it will be found that 

 all the difficulties experienced by those naturalists 

 who thought it necessary to alter the meaning of the 

 word c individual,' will be cleared away at less cost, 



1 ' Cyclop, of Anat. and Phys.' (Supplement), vol. v. p. 39. 



