Germinal

“ We have seen that, for internal reasons, germinal selection continues to impel the varying determinants further along the path on which they have started, and thus gives them cumulative strength, and that it is in this way that adaptations to the conditions of life are brought about. ”

“ For six months he travelled about the coal-mining district in northern France and Belgium, especially the Borinage around Mons, note-book in hand. 'He was inquisitive, was that gentleman', miner told Sherard who visited the neighbourhood at a later period and found that the miners in every village knew Germinal. That was a tribute of admiration the book deserved, but it was never one of Zola's most popular novels; it was neither amusing enough nor outrageous enough to attract the multitude. ”

“ In practice, one can often reach a decision by much simpler means: if the character is one that appears at [Pg 32] birth, e.g., skin color, it is usually safe to assume that it is a germinal character, unless there is some evident reason for deciding otherwise, as in the case of a child born with some disease from which the mother had been suffering for the previous few months. In general, it is more difficult to decide whether a mental trait is germinal, than whether a physical one is ”

“ We had applied the principle, but only to a portion of the natural units engaged in struggle. If we apply the principle throughout we reach a satisfactory explanation. Selection of persons alone is not sufficient to explain the phenomena; germinal selection must be added. Germinal selection is the last consequence of the application of the principle of Malthus to living nature. ”

“ Even when we fully recognise the unity of the organism, or recognise it as fully as we know how, it is difficult to suggest any modus operandi whereby a particular modification in, say, the brain or the thumb can specifically affect the germinal material in such a way that the modification or a tendency towards it becomes part of the inheritance. Did we accept Darwin's provisional hypothesis of pangenesis according to which the parts of the body give off [Pg 174] gemmules which are carried as samples to the germ-cells, the possibility of transfer might seem more intelligible. ”

“ Not only is the word germinal strictly accurate, but also it suggests the idea of the germ-plasm, and has the particular virtue of avoiding all reference to the change of environment to which young mammals are subjected and which is called birth. ”

“ Inherited organization, as now understood, is founded on the idea of germinal continuity and is vastly different from the old theory of pre-formation. The meaning of epigenesis, as expressed by Wolff, has also been modified to include the conception of pre-localization of hereditary qualities within particular parts of the egg. It has come now to mean that development is a process of differentiation of certain qualities already laid down in the germinal elements. ”

“ The most notable attempt to supplement and strengthen the theory of natural selection has been made by Weismann in his theory of Germinal Selection. In Weismann's hypothesis, which has furnished in a sense the philosophical basis for the popular Eugenics movement, the struggle for existence is transferred to a struggle among the constituents of the germ-plasm. ”

“ It is conceded even by my opponents that the reason why one egg produces a chicken and another a duck is not to be sought in external conditions, but lies in a difference of the germinal substance. Nor can they deny that a difference of germinal substance must also constitute the reason why a slight hereditary difference should exist between two filial organisms. ”

“ The formation of the germinal layers by the repeated division of the stem cell, the growth of the gastrula and of the later germ structures which succeed it, take place in man in just the same manner as in the other higher mammals, under the peculiar conditions which differentiate this group from the lower vertebrates. ”

“ It is, indeed, quite possible to see why, although theoretically a random application of birth-control cannot affect the germinal possibilities of a community, in practise it may improve the somatic conditions under which the germinal elements develop. ”

“ The determinants [16] of the useless organ are constantly at {43}a disadvantage as compared with the determinants of their environment in the germinal tenement, because no assistance is offered to them by personal selection after they have once been weakened by a decrease of the passive nutrient influx. ”

“ By modifications I mean those changes which are in some way wrought in the body-structure, and by variations those differences which are of germinal origin. That variation of germinal origin is a fact in organic nature is admitted on all hands, and that some variations are adaptive is also unquestioned. Transmissionists contend that modification in a particular direction in one generation is, through the transmission of the change in some way from the bodily tissues to the germinal cells, a source of variation in the same direction in the next generation. ”

“ If but from time to time, that is, if upon the average the poorest individuals, the bearers of the weakest determinants, are eliminated, the variational direction of the part in question, now reposing on germinal selection, must persist, and it will very slowly but very surely increase until further development is impeded by its inutility and personal selection {46}arrests the process, that is, ceases to eliminate the weaker individuals. ”

“ According to that theory every independently and hereditarily variable part is represented in the germ by a determinant, that is by a determinative group of vital units, whose size and power of assimilation correspond to the size and vigor of the part. These determinants multiply, as do all vital units, by growth and division, and necessarily they increase rapidly in every individual, and the more rapidly the greater the quantity of the germinal cells {37}the individual produces. ”

“ With all, as far as is at present known the germinal vesicle is the same; so that all organisms start from a common origin. If we look even to the two main divisions — namely, to the animal and vegetable kingdoms — certain low forms are so far intermediate in character that naturalists have disputed to which kingdom they should be referred. ”

“ The problem is first to be defined.
It is evident that all characters which make up a man or woman, or any other organism, must be either germinal or acquired. It is impossible to conceive of any other category. ”

“ Germander, jėr′man-dėr, n. a large genus of labiate herbs with aromatic, bitter, and stomachic properties. [Low L. germandra—Gr. chamandrya, chamaidrys—chamai, on the ground, drys, oak.]
Germanium, jėr-mā′ni-um, n. an element discovered in 1885 in argyrodite.
Germen, jėrm′en, n. a disused botanical synonym for Ovary (q.v.) — (Shak.) Germ′in.—adj. Germ′inal, pertaining to a germ. [See Germ.]
Germinal, zhār-mē-nal′, n. the seventh month of the French revolutionary calendar, March 21-April 19.
Germinate, jėrm′in-āt, v.i. to spring from a germ: to begin to grow.—v.t. to produce.—adj. ”

“ And while the breath of panic was thus blowing from one end of the plain to the other, Étienne was dwelling beneath the earth, in Jeanlin's burrow at the bottom of Réquillart. It was there that he was in hiding; no one believed him so near; the quiet audacity of that refuge, in the very mine, in that abandoned passage of the old pit, had baffled search. Above, the sloes and hawthorns growing among the fallen scaffolding of the steeple filled up the mouth of the hole. No one ventured down ”

“ Nor will those, who demand a demonstration of "how the biophores and determinants are constituted in every case, and must be arranged in the architecture of the germ-plasm." (O. Hertwig, loc. cit., p. 137) . As if any living being could have the temerity even so much as to guess at the actual ultimate phenomena in evolution and heredity! The whole question is a matter of symbols only, just as it is in the matter of "forces," "atoms," "ether undulations," etc., the only difference being that in biology we stumble much earlier upon the unknown than in physics. ”

“ Yes, it was these things which were passing along the road; it was the force of Nature herself, and they were receiving the terrible wind of it in their faces.
A great cry rose, dominating the Marseillaise:
"Bread! bread! bread!"
Lucie and Jeanne pressed themselves against Madame Hennebeau, who was almost fainting; while Négrel placed himself before them as though to protect them by his body. Was the old social order cracking this very evening? And what they saw immediately after completed their stupefaction. ”

“ Thus, I think, may be explained how personal selection imparts the initial impulse to processes in the germ-plasm, which, when they are once set agoing, persist of themselves in the same direction, and are, therefore, in no need of the continued supplementary help of personal selection, as directed exclusively to a definite part. ”

“ We should know probably how it comes to pass that the constitutional predisposition (group of determinants) of a single organ is intensified by selection, but the flood of objections against the theory of selection touching its inability to modify many parts at once would not be repressed by such knowledge. The initial impulse conditioning the independent maintenance of the useful direction of variation in the germ-plasm must rather be sought {45}in the utility of the modification itself, and this also seems to me intelligible from the side of the theory. ”

“ He sprang to his feet and beheld Gervase Germyn.
“Good evening, friend,” said Germyn. “You work late. I was visiting some old friends that lie under the stones here, having a word with him or him that I have known, a remembered jest with one, a snatch of old song with another—who knows what? And here are you at the like business. And who, pray, is your friend?”
“Master Germyn,” replied Thomas stiffly, “an idle man may talk to dead men, if he will: a sexton has other business with them. ”

“ The operation of pangenesis depended on the posited existence of unobservable units that Darwin called “gemmules,” tiny granules that were thrown off by individual cells and then circulated through the body. They had, however, an affinity for each other, which led to their aggregation in the reproductive organs or in parthenogenetic buds. They could remain latent for years, until an organism reached a certain stage of development, or for generations, until they encountered other gemmules to which they bore some special relationship. ”

“ No lives were lost," said Linden, "and no cattle were burnt; the crops are all destroyed, it is true; but in place of that a new life has risen out of the ashes." And he held out his sound hand to Gertrude.
"Oh, ta, ta!" murmured Uncle Henry, helping himself hurriedly to ham and to butter. "I tell you, children, travelling is a great deal too hard work, and if it were not for the lobsters in Heligoland and the eel-soup in Hamburg, then--but, Gertrude, you are laughing and crying at the same time! ”

“ THE CONTINUITY OF THE GERM-PLASM AS THE
FOUNDATION OF A THEORY OF HEREDITY. Introduction. When we see that, in the higher organisms, the smallest structural details, and the most minute peculiarities of bodily and mental disposition, are transmitted from one generation to another; when we find in all species of plants and animals a thousand characteristic peculiarities of structure continued unchanged through long series of generations; when we even see them in many cases unchanged throughout whole geological periods ”

“ The passing of the soul may not have occupied a second, as we reckon time, and yet, as "The Dream of Gerontius" suggests, the soul, sensitive and vital, may live through what might seem to be a hundred years. As soon as it appears that the soul has departed, the priest says:
"Subvenite, Sancti Dei, occurrite Angeli Domini, [5] Suscipientes animam ejus, Offerentes eam in conspectu Altissimi." [4]
This prayer dwells last in the ears of Gerontius. He has slept for a moment, refreshed by the Church, and he awakes to find himself free. ”

“ Now, with beings produced by gemmation,—and this, differently from sexual reproduction, may occur at any period of growth,—if there were places for the support of many individuals at some one stage of development, the simplest plan would be that they should be multiplied by gemmation at that stage, and not that they should first retrograde in their development to an earlier or simpler structure, which might not be fitted for the surrounding conditions. ”

“ Their development depends on their union with other partially developed, or nascent cells which precede them in the regular course of growth. Why I use the term union will be seen when we discuss the direct action of pollen on the tissues of the mother-plant. Gemmules are supposed to be thrown off by every unit, not only during the adult state, but during each stage of development of every organism ”

“ At rare intervals a breath of air from the south passed lazily along, sweeping the ground, one of those enervating, lifeless winds that blow upon the senses and fan the breath of desire into a flame. With no knowledge whence it came, Germinie felt over her whole body a sensation like the tickling of the down on a ripe peach against the skin. ”

“ Gerontius is yet in the body, and the rime, used solemnly, marks a difference—which has a delicate symbolism—between his utterances in the body and his utterances when his soul has left the body. What we call blank verse is used by the Spirit—rime disappears, but the rhythm remains the same. Using verse-notation, we find five accented notes in each line, if we consider the lines at all. There are two quarter-notes in each bar, which may be written as
[12] (p. 25.) Gerontius dreams that he is dying. He has not strength to pray. ”