466 On Archcesthctism. [June, 



and unspecialized, but unknown forms of matter possessing this 

 capacity." 



The condition of living protoplasm was also referred to in the 

 following language in a later publication : l 



" The cause of the difference between conscious and uncon- 

 scious force must be secondarily due to different conditions of 



possible, so fir as we can ascertain, to matter winch has not fallen 



Protoplasm in the form of food is not conscious; and tissue 

 formed of protoplasm is not conscious, excepting certain cells 

 where the forming process is in action. Nor is consciousness 

 present in all cells where nutrition is active. From the increased 

 consumption of energy, and the increased expenditure of energy 

 (heat, Lombard) which takes place during conscious processes, 

 we may well believe that the decomposition of protoplasm is 

 more considerable in such processes than in other forms of nervous 

 activity. We can imagine simple nutrition to be a condition of 

 the elements of this substance in which the chemical force is 



that during the process there is a condition in which the chemism 

 is for the time being unsatisfied, though present. The direction 

 which this nutrition or metastasis takes, is due to the arrange- 

 ment of the molecules already existing in the tissue, the new 

 molecules taking the form of the old ones in replacement, so long 

 as no extraneous force interferes. That they are rearranged under 

 the influence of consciousness is apparent in the origin of varia- 

 tions of structure in accordance with the views of evolution 

 already entertained. It is the arrangement of the molecules 

 which constitutes the automatic machinery of nutrition as well as 

 of other activities, so that consciousness necessarily only appears 

 in that stage of nutrition while the matter is in a transition state, 

 and unformed. Whether chemism must be regarded as suspended, 

 or only unsatisfied, at this stage, can only be imagined. As non- 

 satisfaction is probably the temporary condition in all nutrition 

 it is not unlikely that suspension may be the condition of con- 

 sciousness. 



Perhaps the character of the components of protoplasm is such, 

 that the movements of their atoms, /. e., their chemism, mutually 







