10 DEATH OF BIOPLASM, 



By its d'eatli marvellous things are produced, and 

 wonderful acts are perfonned. Every form in 

 nature — leaves, flowers, trees, shells ; every tissue — 

 hair, skin, bone, nerve, muscle — results from the death 

 of bioplasm. Every action in every animal from 

 the first instant of its existence to the last, marks the 

 death of bioplasm, and is a consequence of it. Every 

 work performed by man, every thought expressed by 

 him is a consequence of bioplasm passing from the 

 state of life,— ceasing in fact to be bioplasm, and 

 becoming non-living matter with totally different 

 properties. To produce these results the death of the 

 bioplasm must occur in a particular way, under par- 

 ticular cu-cumstances, or conditions. These are often 

 very complex, and as yet very imperfectly under- 

 stood ; but it will be my business, to endeavour to 

 elucidate them, as far as I am able, in this volume. 



1?. Products of the death of Bioplasm. — When the 

 life of a mass of bioplasm of any kind is suddenly 

 cut short, lifeless substances having very similar 



roasted without ceasing to be protoplasm ! The protoplasm of 

 Huxley includes both my bioplasm and formed material, and 

 although these things are to be distinguished from one another 

 by so many essential characteristics, Mr. Huxley continues to 

 afSrm that both are protoplasm, though he is obliged to admit 

 that one is " modified" protoplasm. More than twenty years ago, 

 Huxley added to the confusion at that time existing on the cell 

 theory, by afBrming that the endoplast (my germinal matter) 

 was uuimportant, and but an accidental modification of the 

 nucleus, which was sometimes altogether absent. He wrongly 

 attributed formative propei-ties to x\\c formed lifeless periplastic 

 substance, which is perfectly passive. But his new "proto- 

 plasm" is a compound to which it would be difficult to find any- 

 thing analogous even in the annals of conjectural science. In 

 that substance he has i-e-uuited the very matters he had before 

 " differentiated, " and has given rise to a further confusion 

 of ideas by calUng such things as white of egg protoplasm. 

 Until, therefore, the term "protoplasm" is by common consent 

 restricted to matter while it is living and growing, I must 

 employ for the latter some other word which more accurately 

 defines it, and " bioplasm " seems upon the whole the most 

 convenient, as well as the shortest word that can be selected. 



