CHAPTER VI.
Every organism a colony—What is a paradox?—An organ is an independent individual, and a dependent one—A branch of coral—A colony of polypes—The Siphonophora—Universal dependence—Youthful aspirings—Our interest in the youth of great men—Genius and labour—Cuvier’s college life; his appearance in youth; his arrival in Paris—Cuvier and Geoffrey St. Hilaire—Causes of Cuvier’s success—One of his early ambitions—M. le Baron—Omnia vincit labor—Conclusion.
That an animal Organism is made up of several distinct organs, and these the more numerous in proportion to the rank of the animal in the scale of beings, is one of those familiar facts which have their significance concealed from us by familiarity. But it is only necessary to express this fact in language slightly altered, and to say that an animal Organism is made up of several distinct individuals, and our attention is at once arrested. Doubtless, it has a paradoxical air to say so; but Natural History is full of paradoxes; and you are aware that a paradox is far from being necessarily an absurdity, as some inaccurate writers would lead us to suppose: the word meaning simply, “contrary to what is thought,”—a meaning by no means equivalent to “contrary to what is the fact.” It is paradoxical to call an animal an aggregate of individuals; but it is so because our thoughts are not very precise on the subject of individuality—one of the many abstractions which remain extremely vague. To justify this application of the word individual to every distinct organ would be difficult in ordinary speech, but in philosophy there is ample warrant for it.
An organ, in the physiological sense, is an instrument whereby certain functions are performed. In the morphological sense, it arises in a differentiation, or setting apart, of a particular portion of the body for the performance of particular functions—a group of cells, instead of being an exact repetition of all the other cells, takes on a difference and becomes distinguished from the rest as an organ.[5]
Combining these two meanings, we have the third, or philosophical sense of the word, which indicates that every organ is an individual existence, dependent more or less upon other organs for its maintenance and activity, yet biologically distinct. I do not mean that the heart will live independent of the body—at least, not for long, although it does continue to live and manifest its vital activity for some time after the animal’s death; and, in the cold-blooded animals, even after removal from the body. Nor do I mean that the legs of an animal will manifest vivacity after amputation; although even the legs of a man are not dead for some time after amputation; and the parts of some of the lower animals are often vigorously independent. Thus I have had the long tentacles of a Terebella (a marine worm) living and wriggling for a whole week after amputation.[6] In speaking of the independence of an organ, I must be understood to mean a very dependent independence: because, strictly speaking, absolute independence is nowhere to be found; and, in the case of an organ, it is of course dependent on other organs for the securing, preparing, and distributing of its necessary nutriment. The tentacles of my Terebella could find no nutriment, and they perished from the want of it, as the Terebella itself would have perished under like circumstances. The frog’s heart now beating on our table with such regular systole and diastole, as if it were pumping the blood through the living animal, gradually uses up all its force; and since this force is not replaced, the beatings gradually cease. A current of electricity will awaken its activity, for a time; but, at last, every stimulus will fail to elicit a response. The heart will then be dead, and decomposition will begin.
Dependent, therefore, every organ must be on some other organs. Let us see how it is also independent; and for this purpose we glance, as usual, at the simpler forms of Life to make the lesson easier. Here is a branch of coral, which you know to be in its living state a colony of polypes. Each of these multitudinous polypes is an individual, and each exactly resembles the other. But the whole colony has one nutritive fluid in common. They are all actively engaged in securing food, and the labours of each enrich all. It is animal Socialism of the purest kind—there are no rich and no poor, neither are there any idlers. Formerly, the coral-branch was regarded as one animal—an individual; and a tree was and is commonly regarded as one plant—an individual. But no zoologist now is unaware of the fact that each polype on the branch is a distinct individual, in spite of its connections with the rest; and philosophic botanists are agreed that the tree is a colony of individual plants—not one plant.
Fig. 20.
Campanularia (Magnified, and Natural Size).
Let us pass from the coral to the stem of some other polype, say a Campanularia. Here is the representation of such a stem, of the natural size, and beside it a tiny twig much magnified. You observe the ordinary polype issuing from one of the capsules, and expanding its coronal of tentacles in the water. The food it secures will pass along the digestive tract to each of the other capsules. Under the microscope, you may watch this oscillation of the food. But your eye detects a noticeable difference between this polype in its capsule, and the six semi-transparent masses in the second capsule: although the two capsules are obviously identical, they are not the same: a differentiation has taken place. Perhaps you think that six polypes are here crowding into one capsule? Error! If you watch with patience, or if you are impatient yet tolerably dexterous, you may press these six masses out, and then will observe them swim away, so many tiny jelly-fish. Not polypes at all, but jelly-fish, are in this capsule: and these in due time will produce polypes, like that one now waving its tentacles.
Having made this observation, it will naturally occur to you that the polype stem which bore such different capsules as are represented by these two, may perhaps be called a colony, but it is a colony of different individuals. While they have all one skeleton in common, nutrition in common, and respiration in common, they have at least one differentiation, or setting apart for a particular purpose, and that is, the reproductive capsule. This is an individual, as much as any of the others, but it is an individual that does nothing for the general good; it takes upon itself the care of the race, and becomes an “organ” for the community; the others feed it, and it is absolved from the labour of nutrition, as much as the arm or the brain of a man are.
From this case, let us pass to the group of jelly-fish called Siphonophora (siphonbearers) by naturalists, and we shall see this union of very different individualities into one inseparable colony still more strikingly exhibited: there are distinct individuals to feed the colony, individuals to float it through the water, individuals to act as feelers, and to keep certain parts distended with fluid, and finally reproductive individuals. All these are identical in origin, and differ only by slight differentiations.[7] Here we have obviously an approach to the more complex organism in which various distinct organs perform the several functions; only no one calls the Organism a colony.
The individuals composing one of these Siphonophora are so manifestly analogous to organs, that their individuality may, perhaps, be disputed, the more so as they do not live separately. But the gradations of separation are very fine. You would never hesitate to call a bee, or an ant, an individual, yet no bee or ant could exist if separated from its colony. So great is “the physiological division of labour,” which has taken place among these insects, that one cannot get food, another cannot feed itself, but it will fight for the community; another cannot work, but it will breed for the community; another cannot breed, but it will work. Each of these is little more than separated organs of the great insect-Organism; as the heart, stomach, and brain are united organs of the human-Organism. Remove one of these insects from the community, and it will soon perish, for its life is bound up with the whole.
And so it is everywhere; the dependence is universal:—
“Nothing in this world is single;
All things, by a law divine,
In one another’s being mingle.”
We are dependent on the air, the earth, the sunlight, the flowers, the plants, the animals, and all created things, directly or indirectly. Nor is the moral dependence less than the physical. We cannot isolate ourselves if we would. The thoughts of others, the sympathies of others, the needs of others,—these too make up our life; without these we should quickly perish.
It was a dream of the youth Cuvier, that a History of Nature might be written which would systematically display this universal interdependence. I know few parts of biography so interesting as those which show us great men in their early aspirings, when dreams of achievements vaster than the world has seen, fill their souls with energy to achieve the something they do afterwards achieve. It is, unhappily, too often but the ambition of youth we have to contemplate; and yet the knowledge that after-life brought with it less of hope, less of devotion, and less of generous self-sacrifice, renders these early days doubly interesting. Let the abatement of high hopes come when it may, the existence of an aspiration is itself important. I have been lately reading over again the letters of Cuvier when an obscure youth, and they have given me quite a new feeling with regard to him.
There is a good reason why novels always end with the marriage of the hero and heroine: our interest is always more excited by the struggles, than by the results of victory. So long as the lovers are unhappy, or apart, and are eager to vanquish obstacles, our sympathy is active; but no sooner are they happy, than we begin to look elsewhere, for other strugglers on whom to bestow our interest. It is the same with biography. We follow the hero through the early years of struggle with intense interest, and as long as he remains unsuccessful, baffled by rivals or neglected by the world, we stand by him and want him to succeed; but the day after he is recognized by the world our sympathy begins to slacken.
It is this which gives Cuvier’s Letters to Pfaff[8] their charm. I confess that, M. le Baron Cuvier, administrator, politician, academician, professor, dictator, has always had but a very tepid interest for me; probably because his career early became a continuous success, and Europe heaped rewards upon him; whereas, his unsuccessful rival, Geoffroy St. Hilaire, claims my sympathy to the close. If, however, M. le Baron is a somewhat dim figure in my biographical gallery, it is far otherwise with the youth Cuvier, as seen in his letters; and, as at this present moment there is nothing under our Microscope which can seduce us from the pleasant volume, suppose we let our “Studies” take a biographical direction.
“Genius,” says Carlyle, “means transcendent capacity for taking trouble, first of all.” There are many young gentlemen devoutly persuaded of their own genius, and yet candidly avowing their imperfect capacity for taking trouble, who will vehemently protest against this doctrine. Without discussing it here, let us say that genius, or no genius, success of any value is only to be purchased by immense labour; and in science, assuredly, no one will expect success without first paying this price. In Cuvier’s history may be seen what “capacity for taking trouble” was required before his success could be achieved; and this gives these Lettres à Pfaff a moral as well as an interest.
It was in the Rittersaal of the Academia Carolina of Stuttgardt that Pfaff, the once famous supporter of Volta, and in 1787, the fellow-student of Cuvier, first became personally acquainted with him. Although they had been three years together at the same university, the classification of students there adopted had prevented any personal acquaintance. Pupils were admitted at the age of nine, and commenced their studies with the classic languages. Thence they passed to the philosophical class, and from that they went to one of the four faculties: Law, Medicine, Administration, and Military Science. Each faculty, of course, was kept distinct; and as Pfaff was studying philosophy at the time Cuvier was occupied with the administrative sciences, they never met, the more so as the dormitories and hours of recreation were different. The academy was organized on military principles. The three hundred students were divided into six classes, two of which comprised the nobles, and the other four the bourgeoisie. Each of these classes had its own dormitory, and was placed under the charge of a captain, a lieutenant, and two inferior officers. These six classes in which the students were entered according to their age, size, and time of admission, were kept separate in their recreations, as in their studies. But those of the students who particularly distinguished themselves in the public examinations were raised to the rank of knights, and had a dormitory to themselves, besides dining at the same table with the young princes who were then studying at the university. Pfaff and Cuvier were raised to this dignity at the same time, and here commenced their friendship.
What a charm there is in school friendships, when youth is not less eager to communicate its plans and hopes, than to believe in the plans and hopes of others; when studies are pursued in common, opinions frankly interchanged, and the superiority of a friend is gladly acknowledged, even becoming a source of pride, instead of being, as in after years, a thorn in the side of friendship! This charm was felt by Cuvier and Pfaff, and a small circle of fellow-students who particularly devoted themselves to Natural History. They formed themselves into a society, of which Cuvier drew up the statutes and became the president. They read memoirs, and discussed discoveries with all the gravity of older societies, and even published, among themselves, a sort of Comptes Rendus. They made botanical, entomological, and geological excursions; and, still further to stimulate their zeal, Cuvier instituted an Order of Merit, painting himself the medallion: it represented a star, with the portrait of Linnæus in the centre, and between the rays various treasures of the animal and vegetable world. And do you think these boys were not proud when their president awarded them this medal for some happy observation of a new species, or some well-considered essay on a scientific question?
At this period Cuvier’s outward appearance was as unlike M. le Baron, as the grub is unlike the butterfly. Absorbed in his multifarious studies, he was careless about disguising the want of elegance in his aspect. His face was pale, very thin, and long, covered with freckles, and encircled by a shock of red hair. His physiognomy was severe and melancholy. He never played at any of the boys’ games, and seemed as insensible of all that was going on around him as a somnambulist. His eye seemed turned inwards; his thoughts moved amid problems and abstractions. Nothing could exceed the insatiable ardour of his intellect. Besides his special administrative studies, he gave himself to Botany, Zoology, Philosophy, Mathematics, and the history of literature. No work was too voluminous, or too heavy for him. He was reading all day long, and a great part of the night. “I remember well,” says Pfaff, “how he used to sit by my bedside going regularly through Bayle’s Dictionary. Falling asleep over my own book, I used to awake, after an hour or two, and find him motionless as a statue, bent over Bayle.” It was during these years that he laid the basis of that extensive erudition which distinguished his works in after life, and which is truly remarkable when we reflect that Cuvier was not in the least a bookworm, but was one of the most active workers, drawing his knowledge of details from direct inspection whenever it was possible, and not from the reports of others. It was here also that he preluded to his success as a professor, astonishing his friends and colleagues by the clearness of his exposition, which he rendered still more striking by his wonderful mastery with the pencil. One may safely say that there are few talents which are not available in Natural History; a talent for drawing is pre-eminently useful, since it not only enables a man to preserve observations of fugitive appearances, but sharpens his faculty of observation by the exercise it gives. Cuvier’s facile pencil was always employed: if he had nothing to draw for his own memoirs, or those of his colleagues, he amused himself with drawing insects as presents to the young ladies of his acquaintance—an entomologist’s gallantry, which never became more sentimental.
In 1788, that is in his nineteenth year, Cuvier quitted Stuttgardt, and became tutor in a nobleman’s family in Normandy, where he remained till 1795, when he was discovered by the Abbé Tessier, who wrote to Parmentier, “I have just found a pearl in the dunghill of Normandy;” to Jussieu he wrote—“Remember it was I who gave Delambre to the academy; in another department this also will be a Delambre.” Geoffroy St. Hilaire, already professor at the Jardin des Plantes, though younger than Cuvier, was shown some of Cuvier’s manuscripts, which filled him with such enthusiasm that he wrote to him, “Come and fill the place of Linnæus here; come and be another legislator of natural history.” Cuvier came, and Geoffroy stood aside to let his great rival be seen.
Goethe, as I have elsewhere remarked, has noticed the curious coincidence of the three great zoologists successively opening to their rivals the path to distinction: Buffon called Daubenton to aid him; Daubenton called Geoffroy; and Geoffroy called Cuvier. Goethe further notices that there was the same radical opposition in the tendencies of Buffon and Daubenton as in those of Geoffroy and Cuvier—the opposition of the synthetical and the analytical mind. Yet this opposition did not prevent mutual esteem and lasting regard. Geoffroy and Cuvier were both young, and had in common ambition, love of science, and the freshness of unformed convictions. For, alas! it is unhappily too true, that just as the free communicativeness of youth gives place to the jealous reserve of manhood, and the youth who would only be too pleased to tell all his thoughts and all his discoveries to a companion, would in after years let his dearest friend first see a discovery in an official publication; so, likewise, in the early days of immature speculation, before convictions have crystalized enough to present their sharp angles of opposition, friends may discuss and interchange ideas without temper. Geoffroy and Cuvier knew no jealousy then. In after years it was otherwise.
Geoffroy had a position—he shared it with his friend; he had books and collections—they were open to his rival; he had a lodging in the museum—it was shared between them. Daubenton, older and more worldly wise, warned Geoffroy against this zeal in fostering a formidable rival; and one day placed before him a copy of Lafontaine open at the fable of The Bitch and her Neighbour. But Geoffroy was not to be daunted, and probably felt himself strong enough to hold his own. And so the two happy, active youths pursued their studies together, wrote memoirs conjointly, discussed, dissected, speculated together, and “never sat down to breakfast without having made a fresh discovery,” as Cuvier said, truly enough, for to them every step taken was a discovery.
Cuvier became almost immediately famous on his arrival at Paris, and his career henceforward was one uninterrupted success. Those who wish to gain some insight into the causes of this success should read the letters to Pfaff, which indicate the passionate patience of his studies during the years 1788-1795, passed in obscurity on the Norman coast. Every animal he can lay hands on is dissected with the greatest care, and drawings are made of every detail of interest. Every work that is published of any note in his way is read, analyzed, and commented on. Lavoisier’s new system of chemistry finds in him an ardent disciple. Kielmeyer’s lectures open new vistas to him. The marvels of marine life, in those days so little thought of, he studies with persevering minuteness, and with admirable success. He dissects the cuttlefish, and makes his drawings of it with its own ink. He notes minute characters with the patience of a species-monger, whose sole ambition is to affix his name to some trifling variation of a common form; yet with this minuteness of detail he unites the largeness of view necessary to a comparative anatomist.
“Your reflections on the differences between animals and plants,” he writes, “in the passage to which I previously referred, will be the more agreeable to me because I am at present working out a new plan of a general natural history. I think we ought carefully to seek out the relation of all existences with the rest of nature, and above all, to show their part in the economy of the great All. In this work I should desire that the investigator should start from the simplest things, such as air and water, and after having spoken of their influence on the whole, he should pass gradually to the compound minerals, from these to plants, and so on; and that at each stage he should ascertain the exact degree of composition, or, which is the same thing, the number of properties it presents over and above those of the preceding stage, the necessary effects of these properties, and their usefulness in creation. Such a work is yet to be executed. The two works of Aristotle, De Historia Animalium, and De Partibus Animalium, which I admire more each time that I read them, contain a part of what I desire, namely, the comparison of species, and many of the general results. It is, indeed, the first scientific essay at a natural history. For this reason it is necessarily incomplete, contains many inaccuracies, and is too far removed from a knowledge of physical laws.” He passes on from Aristotle to Pliny, Theophrastus, Discorides, Aldovrandus, Gesner, Gaspar Bauhin, and Ray, rapidly sketching the history of natural history as a science; and concluding with this criticism on these attempts at a nomenclature which neglected real science:—“These are the dictionaries of natural history; but when will the language be spoken?”
No one who reads these letters attentively, will be surprised at the young Cuvier’s taking eminent rank among the men of science in France; and Pfaff, on arriving in Paris six years afterwards, found his old fellow-student had become “a personage.” The change in Cuvier’s appearance was very striking. He was then at his maturity, and might pass for a handsome man. His shock of red hair was now cut and trimmed in Parisian style; his countenance beamed with health and satisfaction; his expression was lively and engaging; and although the slight tinge of melancholy which was natural to him had not wholly disappeared, yet the fire and vivacity of his genius overcame it. His dress was that of the fashion of the day, not without a little affectation. Yet his life was simple, and wholly devoted to science. He had a lodging in the Jardin des Plantes, and was waited on by an old housekeeper, like any other simple professor.
On Pfaff’s subsequent visit, things were changed. Instead of the old housekeeper, the door was opened by a lackey in grand livery. Instead of asking for “Citizen Cuvier,” he inquired for Monsieur Cuvier; whereupon, the lackey politely asked, whether he wished to see M. le Baron Cuvier, or M. Fréderic, his brother? “I soon found where I was,” continues Pfaff. “It was the baron, separated from me by that immense interval of thirty years, and by those high dignities which an empire offers to the ambition of men.” He found the baron almost exclusively interested in politics, and scarcely giving a thought to science. The “preparations” and “injections” which Pfaff had brought with him from Germany, as a present to Cuvier, were scarcely looked at, and were set aside with an indifferent “that’s good,” and “very fine;” much to Pfaff’s distress, who doubtless thought the fate of the Martignac ministry an extremely small subject of interest compared with these injections of the lymphatics.
But it is not my purpose to paint Cuvier in his later years. It is to the studies of his youth that I would call your attention, to read there, once again, the important lesson that nothing of any solid value can be achieved without entire devotion. Nothing is earned without sweat of the brow. Even the artist must labour intensely. What is called “inspiration” will create no works, but only irradiate works with felicitous flashes; and even inspiration mostly comes in moments of exaltation produced by intense work of the mind. In science, incessant and enlightened labour is necessary, even to the smallest success. Labour is not all; but without it, genius is nothing.
With this homily, dear reader, may be closed our First Series of Studies; to be resumed hereafter, let me hope, with as much willingness on your part as desire to interest you on mine.