82 THE BIOLOGY OF DAILY LIFE. 



materials but also the forces of organic life are con- 

 tained in the substance so named. 



To make it square with the facts, we must express 

 it 'thus. (I admit rather cumbrously, but it is better 

 to be awkwardly moving on the right path than, with 

 all scientific airs and graces, to be going wrong.) 



(a) Vegetable substances not deprived of the solar 

 force, " locked up in their compounds," constitute 

 the animal protoplasm i.e.) the material and forces 

 required for animal organisms. 



(b) Certain inorganic compounds, plus an unknown 

 amount of sun-power, constitutes the vegetable proto- 

 plasm i.e., the material and forces required for vege- 

 table organisms.* 



from the latest edition (Part I., 1888) of Prof. Foster's " Text 

 Book of Physiology" will make these two senses as clear as such 

 needless confusion can be made. 



" Protoplasm," in fact, as in the sense in which we are now 

 using it, and shall continue to use it, is a morphological term ; 

 but it must be borne in mind that the same word protoplasm is 

 also frequently used to denote what we have just now called 

 "the real living substance." The word then embodies a 

 physiological idea ; so used it may be applied to the living sub- 

 stance of all structures, whatever the microscopical features of 

 those structures ; in this sense it cannot at present, and possibly 

 never will be, recognised by the microscope, and our knowledge 

 of its nature must be based on inferences" (p. 5). 



* As we have certainly no proof that sun-power only, and not 

 also star, planet (including earth) and moon power, may be con- 

 cerned in the vital forces of both plants and animals, it may be 

 better to borrow a term from astrology and speak of the " cir- 

 cumambient" meaning the whole environment in the fullest 

 sense, which evidently includes the whole material creation. 

 Herbert Spencer says ("Biology" p. 85), "literally, the environ- 

 ment means all surrounding space, with the co-existences and 

 sequences contained in it . . . ." Compare also the table at page 



