102 



THE PHENOMENON OF 



and suggestive, on the whole in a manner of little use, 

 because deficient in firm morphological foundations.* 



Schultz's theory of Rejuvenescence makes strikingly 

 prominent the difference between animal and vegetable 

 Rejuvenescence : animals repeat, as Schultz expresses it,f 

 the contrast of living and dying, the unity of which forms 

 the Rejuvenescence, in all their internal organs, and there 

 thereby undergo continuous dissolution and reformation, 

 the effete parts being at the same time cast off like a 

 husk. Plants, on the contrary, never rejuvenise an 

 internal organ once completed, but repeat the contrast of 

 living and dying only in their outer members, advancing 

 constantly beyond the completed structures to new pro- 

 ductions. This peculiarity lies in the nature of vegetable 

 growth, which goes on solely by repetition of the same 

 parts, by Anaphytosis. For Schultz to combat the theory 

 of metamorphosis, as he does, by this doctrine of the 

 anaphytosis of plants, is an inconceivable contradiction, 

 cutting off all purpose or aim from the doctrine itself. 

 The doctrine of anaphytosis, which is characterised as the 

 theory of the constant self-rejuvenescence of plants 

 through living repetition of the same parts, aiming at 

 the object of demonstrating the laws of this repetition 

 characterising the whole growth of plants, cannot really 

 stand in contradiction with the theory of metamorphosis of 

 plants, which, in like manner, leads back to the original 

 likeness of the vegetable parts or organs repeating them- 

 selves in various forms. :j: Since the links or members of 

 the Rejuvenescence of the plant {Anaphjta) are not 

 exactly of similar character as they succeed one another, 



* This is not the place to carry this out further by demonstration of the 

 morphologioal errors in the said works ; the botanist accustomed to mor- 

 phological researches finds proof of the above assertion in every paragraph, 

 e. g., in § 34, where leaves in leaf-axils, and buds in branch-axils of forked 

 stems, are spoken of. See also the critique of Mohl, in the ' Botanische 

 Zeitung,' 1843, p. 667. 



f Die Lehre von der Anaphytose, 89. 



+ " The plant represents the most vai-ied shapes by modifications of a 

 single organ." Goethe, 'Metamoi-ph.,' § 3. 



