46 The role of the cell-nucleus 



every living cell, whether living in isolation or 

 as a member of a complex organism, must be 

 credited with that " organic memory " which 

 all life implies. Next, we can set no limit to 

 the consentient interaction between such 

 cells when they have become "members one 

 of another." " Even in normal circumstances " 

 — to quote Sir Clifford AUbutt once more — 

 "their play and counterplay, attractive and 

 repellent, must be manifold almost beyond 

 conception." 



Now the reactions of the body-plasm in 

 the higher organisms are, as said, guided 

 mainly by the nervous system; and there, 

 we know, facility and familiarity become 

 automatic, more or less "unconscious" 

 through repetition. But in the germ-plasm 

 the role of regulating ontogeny, it is allowed, 

 belongs mainly, if not solely, to the cell- 

 nuclei or chromatin, Weismann's "germinal 



