"In order to express my thought on the subject of spontaneous generation, I have only to repeat here what I have already said in a report which I have had to make on this question; that is to say, that in proportion as our means of investigation become more perfect, it will be found that the cases of supposed spontaneous generation must be necessarily classed with the cases of ordinary physiological generation. This is what the works of M. Balbiani and of MM. Coste and Gerbe have recently proved in reference to the infusory animalcula."
These latter works, especially those of M. Balbiani, [Footnote 108] completely overturn the basis of the doctrine of spontaneous generation. Those infusory animalcula which were supposed to be produced by a silent self-formation are really produced by sexual generation, and those germs floating in the atmosphere are real eggs, the laying of which M. Balbiani discovered.
[Footnote 108: Balbiani "Sur l'Existence d'une Reproduction sexuelle chez les Infusoires.">[
Nevertheless, spontaneous generation has still some decided partisans. Some, like Messrs. Pouchet and Jolly, still believe the theory as savants. The observations which they trusted in affirming spontaneous generation or ovulation still preserve their value for them. It is not easy to give up one's ideas and works. The children of our mind are often dearer to us than the offspring of our blood. It requires a species of heroism for a savant to immolate what he has conceived with labor, protected and defended against all assailers. But besides these illusions and attachments which may be respected, interested passion arose and transformed into aggression and violent quarrel the peaceful discussions of science. The Origin of Life, [Footnote 109] such is the title of a recent publication on spontaneous generation; such is the problem which those who nowadays maintain a cause scientifically lost pretend to resolve.
[Footnote 109: L'Origine de la Vie: Histoire de la Question des Générations spontanées. Par le docteur George Pennetier, avec une préface par le docteur Pouchet.]
The origin of life! Observe the general meaning of the terms; there is question of life in itself, of the essence of all living beings. Human life is a particular case of this general problem; the solution of both is the same. Behind the animalcula and their spontaneous apparition is man. The higher origin, the high aspirations, the predestined end of which man thought he had the right to feel proud—all these vanish like vain dreams and puffs of pride in presence of the origin of primary life through the energy of matter alone. It alone is the true creator, the only cause, and it alone contains our end; beyond it there is nothing; science shows it, at least that science which places spontaneous generation at the top of its conceptions. The importance of the consequences explains the reason why the partisans of materialism have been so ardent in defence of their principles. If a simple problem of chemistry had no more proofs in its favor than the theory of spontaneous generation, no savant worthy of the name would have maintained it or founded on so fragile a basis a multitude of scientific deductions. But there was question of the order and constitution of the world, of the reason, of the being of every creature, and hence the proofs seemed good and sufficient to a materialism which calls itself scientific and experimental. An aggressive polemic represented even as enemies of progress, as retrograde spirits, all those who rejected errors to which too easy a popularity had been given.
IV.
Spontaneous generation gave materialism a point of departure at once rash and weak; bold if one looked behind, almost miserable if one looked ahead! What efforts to draw out of some rudimentary animalcula the regular development of the whole animal kingdom, man included—that being who thinks and wills, who is conscious of its acts and liberty, who possesses the notion of good and evil, who aspires after the true and the beautiful, who feels himself as cause and admits other causes in nature! How can the abyss which separates those two extremities of living creation be bridged? What omnipotence will be able to produce from these infusoria the prodigious number, the infinite variety of those animated beings, all those living species which, no matter how profoundly or how far the world may be investigated, are almost like each other, as it were immutable in their precipitate succession, stationary even in motion!