Huxley’s own part, of protoplasm and protein; and what is said of the one being necessarily true of the other, it follows that Mr. Huxley admits the nature of protoplasm never to have been determined with exactness, and that, even in his eyes, the _lis_ is still _sub judice_. This admission is strengthened by the words, too, “If we use this term” (protein) “with such _caution_ as may properly arise out of our _comparative ignorance_ of the things for which it stands;” which entitle us to recommend, in consequence “of our _comparative ignorance_ of the things for which it stands,” “_caution_” in the use of the term protoplasm. In such a state of the case we cannot wonder that Mr. Huxley’s own conclusion here is: Therefore “all living matter is more or less albuminoid.” All living matter is more or less albuminoid! That, indeed, is the single conclusion of Mr. Huxley’s whole industry; but it is a conclusion that, far from requiring the intervention of protoplasm, had been reached long before the word itself had been, in this connection, used. It is in this way, then, that Mr. Huxley can be adduced in refutation of himself; and I think his resort to an epigram of Goethe’s for reduction of the powers of man to those of contraction, digestion, and reproduction, can be regarded as an admission to the same effect. The epigram runs thus:— “Warum treibt sich das Volk so, und schreit? Es will sich ernähren, Kinder zeugen, und die nähren so gut es vermag. Weiter bringt es kein Mensch, stell’ er sich wie er auch will.” That means, quite literally translated, “Why do the folks bustle and bawl? They want to feed themselves, get children, and then feed them as best they can; no man does more, let him do as he may.” This, really, is Mr. Huxley’s sole proof for his classification of the powers of man. Is it sufficient? Does it not apply rather to the birds of the air, the fish of the sea, and the beasts of the field, than to man? Did Newton only feed himself, beget children, and then feed them? Was it impossible for him to do any more, let him do as he might? And what we ask of Newton we may ask of all the rest. To elevate, therefore, the passing whim of mere literary _Laune_ into a cosmical axiom and a proof in place—this we cannot help adding to the other productions here in which Mr. Huxley appears against himself. But were it impossible either for him or us to point to these _lacunæ_, it would still be our right and our duty to refer to the present conditions of microscopic science in general as well as in particular, and to demur to the erection of its _dicta_, constituted as they yet are, into established columns and buttresses in support of any theory of life, material or other.