The soft slimy plasson of the body of the moneron is generally called “protoplasm,” and identified with the cellular matter of the ordinary plant and animal cells. But we must, to be accurate, distinguish between the plasson of the cytodes and the protoplasm of the cells. This distinction is of the utmost importance for the purposes of evolution. As I have often said, we must recognise two different stages of development in these “elementary organisms,” or plastids (“builders”), that represent the ultimate units of organic individuality. The earlier and lower stage are the unnucleated cytodes, the body of which consists of only one kind of albuminous matter—the homogeneous plasson or “formative matter.” The later and higher stage are the nucleated cells, in which we find a differentiation of the original plasson into two different formative substances—the caryoplasm of the nucleus and the cytoplasm of the body of the cell (cf. pp. 37 and 42). Fig.226. Chroococcus minor. Fig. 226—Chroococcus minor (_Nägeli_), magnified. A phytomoneron, the globular plastids of which secrete a gelatinous structureless membrane. The unnucleated globule of plasm (bluish-green in colour) increases by simple cleavage (_a–d_). The Monera are permanent cytodes. Their whole body consists of soft, structureless plasson. However carefully we examine it with our finest chemical reagents and most powerful microscopes, we can find no definite parts or no anatomic structure in it. Hence, the Monera are literally organisms without organs; in fact, from the philosophic point of view they are not organisms at all, since they have no organs. They can only be called organisms in the sense that they are capable of the vital functions of nutrition, reproduction, sensation, and movement. If we were to try to imagine the simplest possible organism, we should frame something like the moneron. The Monera that we find to-day in various forms fall into two groups according to the nature of their nutrition—the _ Phytomonera_ and the _Zoomonera_; from the physiological point of view, the former are the simplest specimens of the plant (_phyton_) kingdom, and the latter of the animal (_zoon_) world. The Phytomonera, especially in their simplest form, the Chromacea (_Phycochromacea_ or _Cyanophycea_), are the most primitive and the oldest of living organisms. The typical genus _ Chroococcus_ (Fig. 226) is represented by several fresh-water species, and often forms a very delicate bluish-green deposit on stones and wood in ponds and ditches. It consists of round, light green particles, from 1/7000 to 1/2500 of an inch in diameter. Fig.227. Aphanocapsa primordialis. Fig. 227—Aphanocapsa primordialis (_Nägeli_), magnified. A phytomoneron, the round plastids of which (bluish-green in colour) secrete a shapeless gelatinous mass; in this the unnucleated cytodes increase continually by simple cleavage.