--EDITOR.]
To Weismann is due the credit of transforming those vague ideas on the
immortality of the germ plasma which have been for some time in the
minds of many scientific men, myself among the number, into a clear
and sharply-defined theory, against the accuracy of which no doubt can
be raised either from the theoretical or from the empirical
standpoint. This theory, defined as it is by Weismann, has but
recently come before us, and some time must elapse before all the
consequences which it entails will be evident. But there is one
direction which I have for some time followed, and indeed began to
think out long before Weismann's remarkable work showed the importance
of this matter. I mean the origin of the conception of the immortal
soul.
Before I approach the solution of this problem, it may be advisable to
recall in a few words to my readers the theory of the immortality of
the germ plasm.
All unicellular beings, such as the protozoa and the simpler algae,
fungi, etc., reproduce themselves by means of simple fission. The
mother organism may split into two similar halves, as the amoeba does,
or, as is more common in the lowest unicellular plants, it may divide
into a great number of small spores.
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