Heredity : with preludes on current events / by Joseph Cook.
- Josephus Flavius Cook
- Date:
- 1882
Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)
Credit: Heredity : with preludes on current events / by Joseph Cook. Source: Wellcome Collection.
160/208 page 152
![152 HEREDITY. of the -system. From not making this distinction between vitality and life, the greatest blunders have been committed in biological reasoning. A co-ordi¬ nating of movements must occur before we have evidence of the existence of what we call the co¬ ordinating power. 13. After the union of the two elements, there is life.; that is, a power co-ordinating the movements of germinal matter according to the laws of its type. Does anybody doubt this ? When an acorn begins to sprout, do you doubt that there is in that acorn a co-ordinating power which begins to weave the oak ? The instant the co-ordinating force, which ultimately produces your king of the forest, commences its work in that acorn, life is there. What is life ? Co¬ ordinating power behind the movements of germinal matter, A structuring power must exist before anj^- thing is structured. Crush your germinant acorn, and you kill an oak. You pei-ceive that I am tread¬ ing here on holy ground. 14. If the two parts which are united by the pistils and stamens of the flowers of the oak are destroyed, that which is destroyed is not life, but vitality. 15. If an acorn be destroyed after it has become germinant, not merely vitality is destroyed, but life, 16. This law holds good in all the higher organiza¬ tions, not exce2^ting man. I am passing here across chasms in which lie dead men's bones, and dead women's, not merely in China, not merely among the seven hills of Rome, not merely among Romanists, but among Protestants, and under the shadow of church-spires on the Christian sward of New England. Dr. Storer is the authority for you to read; and a famous essay of his (Why Not? Lee &; Shepard, 1875], scattered broadcast over America by vote of the American Medical Associa¬ tion, I need only name to give sufficient emphasis to unspeakable matters here visible, but not audible.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b18030051_0161.JP2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
