Comparison with Darwin's Hypothesis 207 



the same object is continued for hours under favorable 

 life-conditions, there will be noticed all kinds of displace- 

 ments, which put the presence of slow currents beyond 

 a doubt. 



From this side, therefore, no difficulty stands in the 

 way of the assumption that the transmission of the pan- 

 gens in plant-cells is accomplished by the currents of the 

 granular plasm. In the domain of animal physiology we 

 are far from possessing the necessary knowledge of the 

 currents of the protoplasm. But then the difficulties of 

 investigating are here considerably greater than in the 

 plant-world. 



5. Comparison with Darwin's Transportation- 

 Hypothesis 



Possibly to some readers there will appear to be a 

 great similarity between the assumption of a transmission 

 of pangens from the nucleus to the other organs of the 

 protoplast, as described in the previous paragraphs, and 

 Darwin's hypothesis of the transportation of gemmules. 

 However, this agreement is only apparent and not real. 

 The two hypotheses are fundamentally different through- 

 out. 



Darwin assumed a transportation of gemmules 

 through the entire body ; my view requires only a move- 

 ment within the narrow limits of an individual cell. But 

 this is not the chief difference. In the gemmule-theory, 

 the particles that are separated from a cell or a member 

 can again enter new cells, especially the germ-cells, and 

 thus endow them with new hereditary factors. Not only 

 can the latter then reach their development in the given 

 germ-cell, but they can also be transmitted to all its de- 



