1S6 DEFINITIONS. 



5thly. But still more particularly in what appears to 

 be the first state of organization, namely, the existence 

 of a flexible cellular substance, the iissu areolaire oi 

 the French, containing fluids circulating freely in the in- 

 . tervals which separate the reticulated fibres of which it 

 is composed. 



24. Fibres, lamellae or filaments are the most simple 

 solid parts of an organized body ; they are the elementary 

 Inolecuies of its cellular substance as far as our methods 

 of mechanical division will allow us to discern. The ex- 

 istaice of this cellular substance is a natural result of the 

 foregoing definition of a living body ; since it was neces- 

 sary/in order that foreign substances should be incorpo- 

 rated in such a body, that its composition should be 

 porous for the free admission of these molecules. 



25. It appears then that the formation of the germ 

 depends upon the life of the parent stock ; it is in fact a 

 portion of its organization, which on being impregnated 

 may itself be capable of oi-ganification. When before 

 impregnation, the germ is disorganized ; or when after it, 

 the principle of organification is extinct; when, in brief^ 

 the motion of the fluids in the cellular substance ceases, 

 the body is said to die. On this event the distinctive ap- 

 pearances of organization, and particularly the cellular sub- 

 stance itself, rapidly disappear, and the body gradually 

 dissolves and separates into the various species of inorganic 

 matter which formed its chemical constituents, and which 

 are. soon assimilated agaiii by new living beings. 



26. Though for the sake of simplicity, and in order to 



I 



