93 
The Nucleus and Heredity. 
general life-processes of the cell. Without the protoplasm the 
“ anlagen ” carried, according to the hypothesis, by the nucleus 
would never be brought to development. As De Vries has pointed 
out, the transmission of a character and its development are quite 
different processes; the one may be the special function of the 
nucleus alone, the other the work of the cytoplasm or of the 
cytoplasm and nucleus together. 
The second class of objections arise from those biologists who, 
like Verworn and Loeb, deny to living organisms the possession of an 
underlying organisation and consider plants and animals as mere 
complexes of materials reacting to chemical and physical forces. 
The question of the main distinction between dead and living 
material is of course one which in the present state of our 
knowledge it is not profitable to discuss at any length. It must be 
pointed out, however, that there is much to be said for the view, in 
no sense vitalistic, that the play of physical and chemical forces in 
the organism is regulated by a definite anatomical substratum. It 
is well known in chemistry that the reaction of a chemical substance 
depends largely on the configuration of the molecule, and recently 
the nature of crystals and such difficult questions as change of 
valency have been shown to be explicable on a theory of molecular 
architecture. It would seem possible then that the cell, or some 
smaller unit of it, is the seat of an architectural organisation on a 
higher scale, by means of which the activities and the form of the 
organism are controlled. Such a view is not a vitalistic one, for 
though the complexity of the living organisation is probably far 
greater than that of any dead material, yet it is possible that the 
one has arisen from the other, and that the living organisation has 
reached its present degree of complexity by slow degrees in long 
periods of time. If such an organisation be accepted the view is 
certainly tenable that there are material carriers of this organisation 
which are transmitted from cell to cell and are possibly localized 
in the nucleus. 1 
In relation to the third series of general objections, it is 
interesting to find that the attempt to explain such a process as 
development without having recourse to any fundamental organi- 
1 It is difficult of course to understand how two organisations 
can fuse at fertilization, or if they remain separate then how 
they can mingle and be “ reduced ” at meiosis. Even on the 
view, which has found favour with some workers, that the 
factors which work in inheritance are of the nature of 
ferments there seems no objection to considering the nucleus 
as of chief importance in transmitting the mechanism for the 
production of these ferments. 
