48 BEALE'S PROTOPLASMIC THEORY. 



By its agency every kind of living thing is made, and 

 without it, as far as is known, no living thing ever has 

 been made, or can be made at this time, or ever will 

 be made." 



" The difference between germinal, or living matter, 

 or bioplasm, and the pabulum which nourishes it, on 

 the one hand, and the formed material on the other, 

 is, I believe, absolute. The pabulum does not shade 

 by imperceptible gradations into the living matter, 

 and this latter into the formed material ; but the 

 passage from one state into the other is sudden and 

 abrupt, although there may be much living matter 

 mixed with the little lifeless matter, or vice versa. 

 The ultimate particles of matter pass from the lifeless 

 into the living state, and from the latter into the dead 

 state suddenly. Matter cannot be said to half-live 

 or half-die. It is either dead or living, animate or 

 inanimate; and formed matter has ceased to live" 

 (ProtopL, 3rd edit., p. 185.) 



It is unnecessary to multiply quotations on this 

 subject, as further illustration of what is deemed 

 specifically vital action will come in incidentally as 

 we proceed. Indeed, the majority of vital properties 

 are not capable of being singled out for separate de- 

 monstration the whole of physiology being, in fact, 

 nothing but these properties in action but there is 

 one which is palpable to the senses, which may be 

 noticed, viz., that which gives the power of apparently 

 spontaneous movement. These protoplasmic or bio- 

 plasrnic movements have attracted the attention of all 

 observers ; but particular stress is laid on them by Dr. 

 Beale as an important element in vital functions, 



