1883. ] Organic Physics. 147 
the former may aid in checking the current, the direct fiber of 
the latter may assist its subsequent flow. 
This hypothesis greatly simplifies the conditions of the motor 
organism of animals. It consists fundamentally of fibers which 
permeate the body, and convey motor energy from without in- 
ward. At their extremities, and at intervals on their course, 
these fibers are reduced: to minute fibrils, which check the flow 
of the current, and cause its lateral distribution as heat or vibra- 
tory energy. Cellular masses of protoplasm surround these 
fibrils, constituting the nerve and the muscle cells. The checked 
energy outflows into this protoplasm, and instigates chemical 
change there. In one relation of these cells the energy set free 
by the chemical action is locked up in the mental organism,— 
how we know not. In another relation it yields muscular con- 
traction, and animal motion. In still other relations it may yield 
other effects, as above indicated in the sympathetic ganglia. But 
the fundamenta! principle is the same throughout. The flow of 
force is checked, wholly or partly tapped off from the fiber, and 
employed to instigate chemical action, from which important effects 
arise. Similarly in an electric circuit fine wires interposed check 
the current, and part of it outflows as heat which may be used to 
producé various effects, as the fine wires are surrounded by ma- 
terial differently acted on by heat, and differently arranged. The 
analogy is a singularly exact one. 
If, as is undeniable, all animal activity is a utilization of the 
normal motions and changes of form in cell protoplasm, and if 
all these motions arise from oxidation induced by superficial con- 
tact with foreign matter, then all active life must depend upon 
contact influence, and any animal so situated.as to feel at no part 
of, its surface any force of pressure from foreign matter could not 
display the attributes of life. All life is a response to the finger 
touches of the world without, which set free the dormant ener- 
gies within, and call them into responsive action. This may 
seem only partially true, since in the higher animals the mind in- 
stigates the greater part of the voluntary motions. Yet the 
mind has been built up under influences received from without. 
Whatever its innate character, its energies are resultants of for- 
meee physical contact. Thus all our motions arise as results of 
a ene or of former contacts with the sensory nerve extremi- 
Bee! And it is doubtful if even the mind would arouse of itself 
