Now that we have traversed the wonderful region of human embryology and are familiar with the principal parts of it, it will be well to look back on the way we have come, and forward to the further path to truth to which it has led us. We started from the simplest facts of ontogeny, or the development of the individual--from observations that we can repeat and verify by microscopic and anatomic study at any moment. The first and most important of these facts is that every man, like every other animal, begins his existence as a simple cell. This round ovum has the same characteristic form and origin as the ovum of any other mammal. From it is developed in the same manner in all the Placentals, by repeated cleavage, a multicellular blastula. This is converted into a gastrula, and this in turn into a blastocystis (or embryonic vesicle). The two strata of cells that compose its wall are the primary germinal layers, the skin-layer (ectoderm), and gut-layer (entoderm). This two-layered embryonic form is the ontogenetic reproduction of the extremely important phylogenetic stem-form of all the Metazoa, which we have called the Gastraea. As the human embryo passes through the gastrula-form like that of all the other Metazoa, we can trace its phylogenetic origin to the Gastraea. As we continued to follow the embryonic development of the two-layered structure, we saw that first a third, or middle layer (mesoderm), appears between the two primary layers; when this divides into two, we have the four secondary germinal layers. These have just the same composition and genetic significance in man as in all the other Vertebrates. From the skin-sense layer are developed the epidermis, the central nervous system, and the chief part of the sense-organs. The skin-fibre layer forms the corium and the motor organs--the skeleton and the muscular system. From the gut-fibre layer are developed the vascular system, the muscular wall of the gut, and the sexual glands. Finally, the gut-gland layer only forms the epithelium, or the inner cellular stratum of the mucous membrane of the alimentary canal and glands (lungs, liver, etc.).