Weismann 285 
of several cilia, would then become transmitted only to 
that one of the two new individuals to which the anterior 
part falls in the division, and could in no wise be trans- 
mitted to the other individual in which this anterior part 
is formed anew. If one assumes on the contrary, that 
transmission goes on by means of the nuclei, and can 
therefore proceed equally into both of the two newly 
forming individuals, one could not then understand, 
wherein the transmission of somatic modifications in the 
unicellular animals, which is accomplished by means of a 
part of the organism containing in itself no membranelles 
and quite distinct from them, would differ from the trans- 
mission of any modification experienced by any organ of 
a pluricellular organism, which likewise goes on by means 
of a fragment containing no part of the modified organ 
and quite distinct from it. So much the more since the 
substantial identity of the complex unicellular with the 
pluricellular organisms, which we have already discussed 
above, corresponds also with a substantial identity in their 
development, as is shown by the fact that the funda- 
mental biogenetic law of the repetition of phylogeny by 
ontogeny is followed in the development of unicellular 
animals also, as for example, in the formation of the new 
frontal field in the division of Stentor coereleus.?’® 
And in relation to all these theories with preformistic 
germs from Darwin to Weismann we might mention 
once more the insurmountable difficulties that would be 
encountered if one were required to explain by them this 
very fundamental law, either in unicellular or pluricellu- 
lar organisms. This impossibility and the fact that in the 
218Johnson: A contribution to the Morphology and Biology of 
the Stentors. Journ. of Morphol.; vol. VIII, No. 3, Boston, U. S.A, 
Ginn, August 1893. P. 519. 
