Pollinium

“ Polygonal reactions, such as writing or speaking, exceed both simple reflexes and bulbo-medullary associated acts in complexity; they are to all appearance spontaneous and in a certain measure intellectual, but they are neither free nor conscious—attributes that distinguish the functions of the centre O, the seat of the personal, conscious, voluntary, responsible ego. The polygon consists of receptive sensory centres for hearing, vision, and general sensibility, and of transmitting motor centres for speaking, writing, and various body movements. ”

“ In summer, I have seen arms begin to sprout out twenty-four hours after the operation, and the new head perfected in every respect in a few days.
'Each of those parts thus become a perfect Polypus, performs absolutely all its functions. It creeps, it eats, it grows, and it multiplies; and all that, as much as a Polypus which never had been cut.
'In whatever place the body of a Polypus is cut, whether in the middle, or more or less near the head, or the posterior part, the experiment has always the same success. ”

“ From this, we advance to the nerve centre,—the brain,—to which the nerves of sensibility run up, and from which the nerves of motion come forth. Here also there is identity in the nature of the organ, while there is variety in its size, with more or less complicated plans of arrangement, according to the extent of the nerve system of which it is the central organ. Still keeping to the human body for illustration, we may find in the most complex organism known to us illustration of what holds good in the main so far as essential structure is concerned. ”

“ Another important fact shewn by embryology is that the central nervous system, and percipient portion of the organs of special sense, are often formed from the same part of the primitive epidermis. Thus, in ourselves and in other vertebrate animals the sensitive part of the eye, known as the retina, is formed from two lateral lobes of the front part of the primitive brain. The crystalline lens and cornea of the eye are, however, subsequently formed from the skin. ”

“ A spinal column may be a uniform solid axis, or a highly diversified segmented axis. A limb may be an arm, or a leg, a wing, or a paddle. In every case the anatomist recognizes a specific type. He assigns the uniformities to the uniformity of the substance thus variously shaped, under a history which has been similar; the diversities he assigns to the various conditions under which the processes of growth have been determined. He never expects a muscular tissue to develop into a skeleton, a nervous tissue into a gland, an osseous tissue into a sensory organ. ”

“ Those nerves, which serve the senses, principally arise from that part of the brain, which is lodged in the head; and those, which serve the purposes of muscular motion, principally arise from that part of the brain, which is lodged in the neck and back, and which is erroneously called the spinal marrow. The ultimate fibrils of these nerves terminate in the immediate organs of sense and muscular fibres, and if a ligature be put on any part of their passage from the head or spine, all motion and perception cease in the parts beneath the ligature. ”

“ If any one who may not just like an actual dissection, will look at one of Quain's 'Plates of the Bones, Muscles, and Nerves of the Human Body,' he will see that, growing as it were out of the walls of the stomach, there are, in our wonderful human machine, great bunches of nerves, called, by the medicals, the 'great ganglionic system,' and he will observe that these nerves are in intimate and inseparable connection with the spinal cord, and the brain. ”

“ This great receptive organ, so closely connected in function with the movements and adjustment of the postures of the head and eyes, and indeed of the whole body, is prominent in the co-ordination necessary for the equilibrium of the body, an essential part of the fundamental acts of progression, standing, &c. Yet neither structural nor functional connexion with any special region of the cortex has been traced as yet for the labyrinthine receptors. Perceptions of the position of the head and of the body are of course part of our habitual and everyday experience. ”

“ In the front part of the head are two organs, which appear to supplement, in some remarkable way, probably by touch-sensations, the power of vision, and also to possess other capabilities constituting a sense to which we have nothing strictly analogous. These organs are called antennæ. They spring from origins near together, at equal distances from the medial and anterior point of the head, and are connected, by distinct and somewhat large filaments, with the nerve matter forming the cephalic ganglia. ”

“ The nucleus of the heart is a compound muscular organ of this character, whose function is to impel the blood; muscular tissue undergoes important metamorphoses, becoming tendonous and osseous for a variety of mechanical purposes. Tendons are dermal in structure, and bones are sacs enclosing nuclei of osseous tissue. ”

“ In the case of the animate body, which has conscious particles acting on one another, it may be conscious of both cause and effect in the body, because the particles of the body are external to one another, and the ganglia, with their connecting fibrous nerves, constitute the organism by which the consciousness of the particles is ultimately transmitted to the cortex. ”

“ Whether we can with equal certitude affirm that never will a vertebrate be found in which by a transposition of the central nervous system the posterior and the anterior roots of the spinal-cord nerves will have interchanged functions, may perhaps be open to doubt, however improbable such a thing may be. ”

“ The nerves proper are all tubular cellates. In the lowest units they are cellate, and they are compounded as cellates. In the ganglia they are sacate, and are compounded as sacs. Certain of the ganglia have osseous protection as vertebrae, and every vertebra is a cellate structure as a bone with elaborate differentiation in morphology. The vertebrae that have united to form the cranium are extremely differentiated as morphologic elements, but the most extreme of morphologic elements is found in the organs of sense, every organ having a distinct form, and all preserving the cellate structure. ”

“ As we know, a child lives from the great field of dynamic consciousness established between the four poles of the dynamic psyche, two great poles of sympathy, two great poles of will. The solar plexus and the lumbar ganglion, great nerve-centers below the diaphragm, act as the dynamic origin of all consciousness in man, and are immediately polarized by the other two nerve-centers, the cardiac plexus and the thoracic ganglion above the diaphragm. ”

“ In these characters the nervous system of Planarians shows an interesting transition from the scattered plexus of Coelenterates to the segmental ganglia and sympathetic nervous system of Annelids.
Sense-organs.—These occur in the form of tactile organs, otocysts and eyes. The whole skin of many Planarians is sensitive, and amongst the ordinary locomotor cilia long stiff ones are found which it is natural to think are tactile organs. The head-end is often provided with specialized cells that appear to subserve the sense of touch and possibly of taste also. ”

“ We are led to distinguish the series σ, because it often happens that when we have executed the movements which correspond to these series σ of muscular sensations, the tactile sensations which are transmitted to us by the nerve of the finger that we have called the first finger, persist and are not altered by these movements. Experience alone tells us that and it alone could tell us.
If we have distinguished the series of muscular sensations S + S ́ formed by the union of two inverse series, it is because they preserve the totality of our impressions ”

“ Having seen the nature of the apparatus by which the other organs are put into communication with the ganglionic organs, and finally with the cortex through feeling impressions, it becomes necessary to exhibit the apparatus of the nervous organism which exists to connect the cortex and subordinate ganglia with the world external to the periphery of the body. ”

“ It will be interesting to know from the physiological stand-point whether it is necessary for the development of the brain that the spinal column should be erect, whether it is necessary for the formation of the spinal column, that the stomach should retain a certain position, and to know also how far the fixture of the plants is an impediment to the development of any nervous system in them. ”

“ The muscles, glands, nerves, and bones are more fully described in the diagram, which is drawn from a section adopted by that intelligent authority, Dr. Franz. The muscles move the eye towards the object; it centralizes upon every object, every letter of a book separately, but with such activity, that in a moment the eye has reported to the brain every object and colour in a room. The lachrymal glands supply all that lubricating moisture which prevents superficial injury to the organ in its active motion—the tears appear through the small orifices, and pass into the duct away. ”

“ For the sense of hearing there are two organs for gathering the impulses which are propagated through the atmosphere, but in each there are many nerve organs. They are also connected with the cortex by their fibers. The semicircular canals seem in man to convey only feelings, but in aquatic animals it is probable that they are true sense organs, and convey sense impressions brought to them through the medium of the water. The ear is the primordial or fundamental sense by which time is conveyed to the cortex. ”

“ Thus while the essentials are concomitant in every particle of matter they are also concomitant in every cell, in every organ, and in every body. If the expression may be permitted, nature reasons as men reason, abstractly, but is always cognizant that abstractions can be realized only in the concrete. Thus the mouth is one of the organs of the digestive system; but it also has ancillary organs of circulation, motility, reproduction and conception. ”

“ The observations, which I have made upon some kind of polype-beds, lead me to think, that what are called polypes, in those bodies, which are observed to come out of and return into the cells, are more than the heads of the animal. ”

“ Hepburn has pointed out to me, produce the median convexity of the entire popliteal region which we find in the fossil femur. In man the popliteal space becomes flattened by reason of the wide separation of the medial and lateral muscles in this region. ”

“ If we contemplate the interior of a skull, we shall at once perceive that the inner table has every where penetrated as far as it could into the recesses which open on the surface of the brain. Every convolution has hollowed out its corresponding mould in the vitreous table ”

“ Thus we have the digestive apparatus, the circulatory apparatus, the motor apparatus, the generative apparatus and the conceiving or thinking apparatus. These apparatuses are completely concomitant with one another; so that every organ of the body, whatever function it may perform, must also perform the other four functions in an ancillary manner. When we are considering an organ we are compelled to consider a dominant function with four ancillary functions; or it may be stated in another way: an organ cannot act but in a cooperative way with other organs. ”

“ Since, therefore, SOME of the states of some of the internal organs express themselves in the face, of course every organ of the body must do the same—the magnetic pole of the heart beginning in the chin. Those whose circulation is vigorous, have broad and rather prominent chins; while those who are small and narrow-chinned have feeble hearts ”

“ We always could say: the lobes are highly independent in action, but they are firmly married by this wonderful ligament—if it is a ligament. Even this comfort is now taken from us. Science has just rudely snatched away the corpus callosum. ‘The two lobes can get along without it,’ grunts science. ‘People have lived for years with no impairment of their brain power with a totally shrivelled corpus callosum.’ It is hard to keep pace with these cynicisms of science. ”

“ That which I have said and proved elsewhere in respect to the skeleton system may, with equal truth, be remarked of the nervous system—namely, that the question is not in how far does the limit of diversity extend through the condition of an evidently common analogy, but by what rule or law the uniform ens is rendered the diverse entity? The womb of anatomical science is pregnant of the true interpretation of the law of unity in variety ”

“ So early as 1845, while still at Zürich, he supplied what was as yet still lacking, the clear proof that nerve-fibres are continuous with nerve-cells, and so furnished the absolutely necessary basis for all sound speculations as to the actions of the central nervous system. ”

“ Hence it appears, that as the muscles have larger fibres intermixed with a smaller quantity of nervous medulla, the organ of vision has a greater quantity of nervous medulla intermixed with smaller fibres; and it is probable that the locomotive muscles, as well as the vascular ones, of microscopic animals have much greater tenuity than these of the retina. ”