have been a crude understanding by the atomists, who 

 assumed a mechanical composition of the visible 

 world from pre-existing atoms. Nothing organic could 

 ever actually originate and disappear, but only its 

 form of existence is changed .... The materialistic 

 existence of the organism . . . always changes according 

 to the positive idea constituting its essences; the 

 point is to geometric physics what the infusoria is 

 to the organism. 23 



He continued: 



Just as the meaning of figures does not depend on the 

 constituent points but on a combination, so the essence 

 of any organism does not consist of infusoria but is 

 a reflection of ideas discussed here. 



A strange opinion, accepted as true, is that all 

 living organisms originate from ova or eggs (omne 

 vivura ex ovo) ; Oken proved satisfactorily that every 

 living organism originates from a living organism. 



Of physiological problems, birth is the most 

 important, most difficult, and the one causing the most 

 scientific curiosity . . . but, perceiving the subject 

 from only one side, it is not possible to understand it 

 appropriately. One light, Naturphilosophie, has driven 

 away the darkness, and if not illuminated by it, it 

 would be impossible to see this subject. Although many 

 people have discussed theories of the evolutionists, 

 panspermists, and epigeneticists, nothing but contra- 

 dictions and disproofs have resulted. 24 



As was recognized, Vellanskii rejected preformation 

 ("the theory of evolutionists, panspermists") as well as 

 epigenesis. Preformation in the form of ovism and animalculism 

 had no supporters at the beginning of the nineteenth century 

 after Wolff had proved, in the second half of the eighteenth 

 century, the absence of preformation in fertilized eggs. Yet 



23. Ibid ., p. 405. 



24. Ibid., pp. 405 - 406 



154 



