LETTER XVII, 



185 



12. The third is, that Dr Carpenter's notion as to 

 the bud being but the continuous product and a mere 

 extension of the general cellular basis, possessed of no 

 proper individuality, and as to the whole series and 

 succession of parts in the same tree forming but one 

 individual plant, involves this violation of the general 

 analogy of organic nature, that it invests the tree 

 thus regarded as one integer" with the attribute of 

 immortality. It makes that true of the individual 

 which heretofore we have been taught to regard as 

 true only of the race to which it belongs. 



13. There is yet one other consideration, the force 

 of which is to my own mind irresistible and conclusive. 

 The hud can evolve the seed. This consideration in- 

 ieed has already been repeatedly adduced, and is 

 included in the general statement made in the earlier 

 part of this letter, that the bud can evolve all that 

 the seed can. But it is one which well deserves being 

 dwelt upon separately, and which cannot, I think, have 

 been duly weighed by Dr Carpenter. What, let me 

 isk, is included in the statement that the bud can 

 3volve a perfect and complete plant,— that it can 

 3volve the flower and the seed ? This : that it must 

 contain within itself the two kinds of cell regarded by 

 Dr. Carpenter as essential to the constitution of the 

 seed — as forming the essential characteristics of the 

 seed, viz. the sperm-cell" and the germ-cell." — 

 Dispute the force of this consideration, and, as it seems 



