Page 34 - Ethel D. Hume - Bešam ili Paster: Izgubljeno poglavlje u istoriji biologije
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A BABEL OF THEORIES                   31

     magically alive, although structurally deficient. Imagina-
     tion played more part in such a theory than deduction
     from tangible evidence. Thus we find that the physician,
     Bichat, who made a name for himself in science before he
     died in 1802, at the early age of 31, could not accept such
     an explanation and declared the living parts of a living
     being to be the organs formed of the tissues.
       A great step was gained when Virchow thought he saw
     the cell in the process of being built up, that is, structured,
     and thus jumped to the conclusion that it is self-existent
     and the unit of life, from which proceed all organised
     forms of developed beings.
       But here a difficulty arose, for the cell proved as transi-
     tory  as any other anatomical element.    Thus many
     scientists returned to the belief in primordial structureless
     matter, and opinion oscillated between the views held by
     cellularists and protoplasmists, as the opposing factions
     were designated.   Utter confusion reigned among the
     conflicting theories which struggled to explain how a
     purely chemical compound, or mixture of such com-
     pounds, could be regarded as living, and all sorts ofpowers
     of modification and transformation were ascribed to it,
     with which we need not concern ourselves.
       Instead, let us consider the second problem that faced
     Bechamp and Pasteur when they started work, namely,
     whether this mysterious living substance, which went by so
     many names, could arise independently, or whether pre-
     existmg^life is always responsible.  It is hard to realise,
     nowadays, the heated controversy that raged in the past
     around this perplexing mystery. The opposing camps of
     thought were mainly divided into the followers of two
     eighteenth-century priests, Needham, who claimed that
     heat was sufficient to produce animalcule from putres-
     cible matter, and Spallanzani, who denied their appear-
     ance in hermetically sealed vessels. The first were named
      Sponteparists from their belief that organised life is in a
     constant state of emergence from chemical sources, while
     the second were named Panspermists from their theory of
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