LORENZ OKEN; EHRENBERG. I 23 



moment when the earth's metamorphosis was at an end, and at the moment when 

 the planet succeeded in so bringing together and identifying all the elementary- 

 processes, that they were all together or at one and the same time in every point. — 

 This origin of the organic primary bodies I designate generatio originaria, creation. — 

 But infusorial vesicles can also originate by mere division of larger organic carcases, 

 and these can again originate as well through the combination of these secondary 

 as of the primitive vesicles, or as it were by coagulation only. I nominate this 

 generation generatio aquivoca. — There are only two kinds of generation in the world, 

 the creation proper and the propagation that is sequent thereupon, or the ge?teratio 

 origiriaria and secondaria. — No organism has been consequently created of larger 

 size than an infusorial point. No organism is, nor has one ever been, created, 

 which is not microscopic. Whatever is larger has not been created, but developed." 



Wild, fanciful, and bordering on the very verge of " idiotic inspiration," 

 as Oken's utterances in connection with the above and kindred physiological 

 problems have been most generally pronounced, our wondering admiration 

 must, so far as the present subject-matter is concerned, certainly be 

 accorded to the creations of this most original and master mind. Notwith- 

 standing the inability to reconcile his views of the constant recurrent 

 or spontaneous generation of Infusoria out of inorganic matter with our 

 present more perfected knowledge of the vital phenomena of the class, his 

 conception of the morphologic value and significance of the infusorial body 

 with relation to organic life in general, and compound or tissue-forming 

 organisms in particular, has certainly anticipated in a most clear and striking 

 manner the views expounded as original by many eminent physiologists 

 who have succeeded him. Giving Oken his due, to him most certainly must 

 be accredited the origination of the cellular theory subsequently introduced 

 by Schleiden and Schwann ; for what otherwise than the equivalents of cells, 

 the ultimate factors of all organic bodies as recognized at the present date, 

 are Oken's " first organic points," or " mucous primary vesicles " } By his 

 comparison of the infusorian body with such a simple mucus-vesicle or cell, 

 he anticipates again that conception of the same adopted by Von Siebold 

 and Kolliker, and confirmed by the most recent investigation, while in his 

 interpretation of all higher organisms as compound agglomerations of 

 infusorial bodies, or their equivalents, and in his declaration that organic 

 life must have originated with these simple infusorial types, out of which 

 again by a process of development, and 7wt through independent creation, 

 the higher forms have been constructed, is most naturally foreshadowed 

 that grand doctrine of evolution with which the names of Lamarck and 

 Darwin are so honourably associated. 



Returning to the more legitimate subject of discussion, that of "spon- 

 taneous generation," notice must now be taken of the arguments advanced 

 by the leading and contemporary partisans of the opposite or panspermist 

 persuasion. Ehrenberg, one of the most ardent espousers of this latter cause, 

 based his objections to the spontaneous form of reproduction on the many 

 new facts concerning the organography of the Infusoria elicited through 

 his special investigations, and which included, in his own estimation, the 

 discovery of reproductive organs and the production of ova corresponding 



