Further observations on the unity of structure in the animal kingdom, and on congenital anomalies, including 'hermaphrodites' : with some remarks on embryology, as facilitating animal nomenclature, classification, and the study of comparative anatomy / by Martin Barry.

  • Barry, M. (Martin), 1802-1855.
Date:
[1837]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Further observations on the unity of structure in the animal kingdom, and on congenital anomalies, including 'hermaphrodites' : with some remarks on embryology, as facilitating animal nomenclature, classification, and the study of comparative anatomy / by Martin Barry. 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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    Besides these arguments, there are others ; but it is by no means needful to bring forward more. We briefly recapitulate those now advanced. 1 stly, There does not exist a scale of structure, differing in degree alone. Hdly, Individualities cannot be laid aside. 3dly, There exist permanent structures among the so-called “ lower” animals, not met with in the embryonal phases of any of the “ higher.” 4thly, There are many phases of the “ higher” animals, cor- responding to which, we do not find any permanent structures among the “ lower.” 4thly. No structure peculiarly characterizing any one set of animals in the perfect state, makes its appearance even in the embryonal life of any other. Lastly, The sum of the innate susceptibilities of structure is not the same in any two germs. It has been said,* that “ the assertion is nothing more than that Man, as Man, has once in the progress of his development, been upon that grade upon which the several classes beneath him remain stationary in the progressive development of the en- tire animal kingdom.” But even thus qualified, it is by no means true. Man, in the progress of his development, is not upon that grade on which any other animals remain stationary, unless the latter belong to the same type as man-f-: and even then the resemblance would relate to certain parts only, because each order, family, genus, species, variety, sex, and individual, has its own peculiarities, which are repeated in the structure of no other animal. When the great Meckel said, “ the higher animal in its de- velopment, passes through essentially the lower and permanent grades ; by which periodical differences, and differences between classes, may be brought together J he evidently meant no more, than that there occurred in the development of a single • Burmeister’s Entomology, translated by Shuckard, 8vo, 1830, p. 419. t We admit, indeed, that the whole animal kingdom has essentially the same fundamental or merely animal form; but from this there is an imme- diate diveryence. (See Fig. 12, p. 4.) X System der Vergleichenden Anatotnie ; erster Theil, S. 396. Halle, 1821.