9, REMARKS ON THE FIGURES OF PLATE XXXVII. 
reminding us of the. surpassing plan of that whole struc- 
ture, the human hand, of which they are the parts. 
The dorsal vertebra implies the presence of a costa, as 
much as a carpal bone suggests the idea of the human 
hand. When the anatomist separates the part from the 
whole, and describes the part irrelatively of the whole, then 
he must speak irrelatively of design, for design is the 
constant attendant upon whole quantities where Nature 
thinks fit that these shall appear in full condition. When 
the anatomist dismembers those whole quantities which 
Nature has created whole for the purpose of expressing the 
whole sentence of design, then he may be said to wreck 
the design of Nature, and to lose sight of her meaning. 
The anatomist may be said to disconnect design when he 
separates a dorsal vertebra from its costae. 
The thoracic costo-vertebral figure is plus quantity, and 
we have seen that it contains a proportional homologous 
to any minus unit of the cervix or los. We have seen 
that the autogenous elements of a cervical or lumbar 
vertebra were proportionals equal to the costal heads of a 
thoracic costo-vertebral unit. Hence it must appear evident 
that if we describe a dorsal vertebra without its coste, we 
have, in fact, as little right to do so as we would have in 
describing a lumbar or cervical unit without its autogenous 
costal pieces. Be it granted, therefore, that where Nature 
creates the whole or archetype quantity in one part of series, 
we should not presume to spoil her design by any dismem- 
berment of our own. As Nature creates the form so let 
it stand, for every human touch will only make a riot 
against her order. 
iterpret her. 
As we find Nature so are we to 
Her whole quantities express their own 
full meaning. Her minus proportionals express their own 
meaning also, and as we find minus to be a proportional of 
plus, both conditions of development holding the same 
serial order, the vertebre of cervix or lois holding series 
with the costo-vertebral archetype, so must the comparison 
of minus with plus and the equation of the one quantity 
with the other, interpret the law whose simple operation 
in furtherance of the design is by the metamorphosis of 
plus quantity through all degrees of minus proportioning. 
As the dorsal form of costo-vertebral quantity contains 
proportionals equal to any other unit of series, so we have 
indicated in the opposite figures that law of proportioning 
which could render this full archetype of the thoracic 
region of series equal to any minus quantity holding serial 
order with itself. ; 
’ The dotted lines in each of the opposite figures express 
the quantity lost by metamorphosis. In each of the figures 
the whole quantity is indicated by both the continuous 
and dotted lines. 
Fig. A is a thoracic archetype, a whole quantity; a 
circle bounded behind by 4, the vertebral piece, on either 
side by the costa, and in front by c¢, the sternal element. 
The centre of this circle is d, and metamorphosis oblite- 
rates the form from ¢, the sternum, back to a, the costal 
heads. Supposing this to have taken place, and that we 
now only find the vertebral proportional a 4, to persist, 
still we cannot be unmindful of the archetype quantity 
from which it has been metamorphosed. It is a propor- 
tional of such as fig. B, and still holds serial order with . 
the homologous proportional of fig. B, which is the per- 
sistent archetype quantity. 
Fig. C is another whole quantity similar to fig. B. Meta- 
morphosis obliterates the costal sides of fig. C, leaving at 
dorsum a 4, the vertebral piece, and c, the sternal element, 
with the costal cartilages persistent in front, but still both 
these pieces are parts of fig. B, the whole. 
Fig. D is the same quantity of an archetype from which - 
the sternal element c, has been subtracted, but taking the 
form which persists, with the element subtracted from it, 
a whole quantity is then summed up which equals E the 
archetype. So likewise does fig. F when we understand 
that it is the quantity between a, the extremity of the 
costa, and ¢, the sternal piece, which has suffered meta- 
morphosis or subtraction. 
Fig. G, again, when considered plus all that quantity. 
ranging between a, the rib, and c, the sternal element, 
equals H, whose entire quantity persists. And fig. I, 
now minus all that quantity between a, the rib, and ce, 
_ the sternal piece, would, if all its archetype structure stood 
created, equal H as completely as the others. Fig. K, 
plus all those parts of which it is now minus, would equal 
L, the archetype; and, m like manner, fig. M, whose 
sternal and vertebral elements alone persist, would, when 
plus the coste which are now wanting, equal the arche- 
type L. 
The subtraction of quantity from. an archetype has no 
limits on this side of absolute annihilation, and so fig. N 
may be metamorphosed to the elemental nucleus 6; but 
as 5 holds series with the centrum, 0, of all the other 
archetype figures, it is for this reason that it must be 
interpreted as the last remains of its own archetype 
quantity, which equals fig. O, the persistent archetype 
structure. Lastly fig. P, which has suffered degradation 
in all its regions except at c, its sternal piece, and 4, its 
centrum, would, if all its original quantity remained, equal 
fig. O, the same existing archetype. | 
In all the opposite figures it will be seen that the part 
is related to the whole. That the whole is unity and the 
archetype. ‘That variety is consequent upon subtraction 
from full quantity, but that all variety of parts is nothing 
more or less than some regional element of the archetype. 
Tt is also to be seen in those figures, that the parts of 
the archetype which persist after the metamorphosis of 
the other elements, still hold series with their counterpart 
structural elements in the fully created archetype. Thus 
the elemental parts 0, and ¢, of fig. P, which alone remain 
out of the whole quantity, still hold serial order with 
the elements 6, and C, of fig. O, whose entire quantity 
exists. 
And the common median line passes through the same 
structure in all the archetypes which persist uniform with 
each other. This lime cleaves similar parts in figs. B, H, 
H, L, and O; and so likewise may this line be said to 
cleave the ideal archetypes when it passes through the 
persistent proportionals of figs. A, D, G, K,N; for those 
proportionals can come of no other form than that of the 
archetype quantity. Neither can the persistent elements 
