320 The Origin of Infusoria. 



THE OKIGIN OF INFUSOKIA. 



In a recent address on physiology, delivered before the British 

 Medical Association, Dr. Sharpey said, " In the physiology of 

 reproduction, the old question of spontaneous generation has 

 been lately revived and submitted to further discussion ; but, as 

 I think, has been satisfactorily answered in the negative, and 

 especially through the admirable researches of M. Pasteur. 

 That most able and accomplished inquirer has not only proved 

 the non-appearance of infusorial organisms when adequate 

 means are taken to exclude their germs, but he has succeeded 

 in actually demonstrating the presence of such germinal spores 

 in the atmosphere. Air was made to pass through a tube filled 

 with gun-cotton, taken from a sample proved to be free from 

 foreign admixture. The cotton was then dissolved in ether or 

 chloroform, and the sporules of algee and other small organisms 

 which had been entangled in their passage, were found in the 

 liquid." In a former article, on the " Conditions of Infu- 

 sorial Life,' - ' we gave a faithful account of the real state of this 

 singular controversy, which is decidedly misrepresented by Dr. 

 Sharpey's remarks. In the first place, it is not fair to M. 

 Pouchet, the leader of the heterogenists, whose opinions we by 

 no means espouse, to treat the contest which is eagerly pursued 

 in France, and which has extended to America, as merely a re- 

 vival of the old dispute about " spontaneous generation." The 

 details of M. Pouchet' s views will be found in his own work, 

 Heterogenie, or in the article to which we have referred, and we 

 do not intend to re-examine them now ; suffice it to say that 

 he reduces all generation to one principle, and conceives repro- 

 duction by eggs (orthogenesis) , and reproduction without eggs 

 (heterogenesis), to be the result of the same laws operating under 

 different conditions. "If," says M. Pouchet, "a, Supreme 

 Being, whose unity is revealed in every part of the globe, has 

 presided eternally and universally over all the phenomena that 

 have been exhibited on its surface, and if it has pleased him to 

 people the earth with tribes of animals and of plants that have 

 succeeded one another, why not repeat to-day what has occurred 

 in former epochs, for as P. Gorini observes, spontaneous genera- 

 tion is not a greater marvel than normal reproduction." M. 

 Pouchet affirms in another passage that the same " Creative 

 Will " which originally caused physical matter to assume living 

 form, without the previous intervention of sexual elements, 

 operates still. Thus both physiologically and theologically the 

 modern controversy differs from the old, and it is only repre- 

 sented otherwise by those who would rather smother it under 

 evil associations, than patiently wait for a result that can only 

 be reached by much labour and thought. 



