The fungoid origin of disease, and spontaneous generation / by Jabez Hogg.

  • Hogg, Jabez, 1817-1899.
Date:
[1871]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The fungoid origin of disease, and spontaneous generation / by Jabez Hogg. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    fying power possessed we can limit; that even unmelted iron is said to flow : when, on the other hand, the power of determining the velocity of bodies diminishes with the magnifying power, so that distance and magnitude itself are required to make us sensible of the rate at which comets travel, even if not of the presence of the atoms of matter en masse which form their nebulosities, so that neither one nor the other could be seen if close to us, any more than electricity or uncondensed steam. When, I repeat, our perceptions in these respects remain so finite, how can anyone come forward with the assertion that there is such a thing as “ spontaneous generation,” based upon the presence of ani- malcules which, produced under any circumstances, may be, and pro- bably are, far more complicated in their structure, and therefore higher in the scale of organic development, than a host of living beings with whose forms even we have as yet no means of becoming cognizant ? Progressive knowledge may lead the human mind to the beginning of vitality, to the quickening power of matter and its processes, but until this is reached, it seems to me premature to assume as a fact that there is such a power as spontaneous generation. With reference to the next point in your paper, the transformation of the protoplasm of the vegetable cell into amoeboid forms, who shall limit the extent to which such forms may not penetrate into and live passively in the protoplasm of both animal and vegetable cells, until a favourable opportunity arrives for their further development ? I, of course, include in the amoeboid forms, the Myxogostres, now called by Du Bary “ Myxozoa.” Just before leaving Bombay, I found the brown stains in some cotton which was submitted to me for microscopical examination, to arise from the development of a mycelium originating in cells or germs of a mycetozoon, which were probably introduced into the cell of the cotton fibre when fresh, and which, on the moisture of the cotton during exposure to the rainy monsoon finding the vitality of its host extinct, naturally appropriated its protoplasm, and produced, while growing, the stains mentioned and consequent injury to the staple. I am glad that we are at one accord as to the origin of protozoa in the cells of organized beings. It appears to me that Dr. Hicks is in the same zone (so to write) of investigation in this respect as I was before I renounced my opinion of the “fancied” transformation of the vegetable protoplasm into amoeboid animalcules. It was only after studying the mycelizoa fungi that I began to see the unlimitable extent to which such beings com- mencing their existence and even feeding themselves up to maturity, might enter into, and develop themselves upon the remains of their dead or dying host. The contents of the root-like extremities, filamentous mycelium, and pin-head-like capsules of the Mucoridece may issue, when their cellulose covering is ruptured, in the form of amoeboid cells (that is, of course, as regards the sporidia before they are capsuled), and so creep away. Then the Mucoridce are closely allied to the Myxogostres or Mycetozoa; and here no doubt the protoplasm of the Mucor-cell or fila-