These tools of the second degree are either picked up ready-made, or are manufactured directly by the body, as being torn or bitten into shape, or as stones picked up to throw at prey or at an enemy.

Tools of the third degree are made by the instrumentality of tools of the second and first degrees; as, for example, chipped flint, arrow-heads, &c.

Tools of the fourth degree are made by those of the third, second, and first.  They consist of the simpler compound instruments that yet require to be worked by hand, as hammers, spades, and even hand flour-mills.

Tools of the fifth degree are made by the help of those of the fourth, third, second, and first.  They are compounded of many tools, worked, it may be, by steam or water and requiring no constant contact with the body.

But each one of these tools of the fifth degree was made in the first instance by the sole instrumentality of the four preceding kinds of tool.  They must all be linked on to protoplasm, which is the one original tool-maker, but which can only make the tools that are more remote from itself by the help of those that are nearer, that is to say, it can only work when it has suitable tools to work with, and when it is allowed to use them in its own way.  There can be no direct communication between protoplasm and a steam-engine; there may be and often is direct communication between machines of even the fifth order and those of the first, as when an engine-man turns a cock, or repairs something with his own hands if he has nothing better to work with.  But put a hammer, for example, to a piece of protoplasm, and the protoplasm will no more know what to do with it than we should be able to saw a piece of wood in two without a saw.  Even protoplasm from the hand of a carpenter who has been handling hammers all his life would be hopelessly put off its stroke if not allowed to work in its usual way but put bare up against a hammer; it would make a slimy mess and then dry up; still there can be no doubt (so at least those who uphold protoplasm as the one living substance would say) that the closer a machine can be got to protoplasm and the more permanent the connection, the more living it appears to be, or at any rate the more does it appear to be endowed with spontaneous and reasoning energy, so long, of course, as the closeness is of a kind which protoplasm understands and is familiar with.  This, they say, is why we do not like using any implement or tool with gloves on, for these impose a barrier between the tool and its true connection with protoplasm by means of the nervous system.  For the same reason we put gloves on when we box so as to bar the connection.