Skip to main content
Log in

The romantic programme and the reception of cell theory in Britain

  • Published:
Journal of the History of Biology Aims and scope Submit manuscript

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

References

  1. “Review of J.Müller, Handbuch der Physiologie des Menschen für Vorlesungen,” Brit. For. Med. Rev. 5 (1838), 75–116; quotation on pp. 82–84. (The Handbuch was originally published in two volumes by J. Hölscher, Koblenz: 1833–1837.)

    Google Scholar 

  2. Ibid., p. 84.

  3. J.Müller, Handbuch der Physiologie des Menschen für Vorlesungen,” Brit. For. Med. Rev. 5 (1838), pp. 85–86.

    Google Scholar 

  4. Ibid., p. 89.

  5. G.Valentin, Handbuch der Entwickelungsgeschichte des Menschen, (Berlin: August Rücker, 1835), p. 573.

    Google Scholar 

  6. G.Valentin, Handbuch der Entwickelungsgeschichte des Menschen, (Berlin: August Rücker, 1835), pp. vii-viii.

    Google Scholar 

  7. G.Valentin, Handbuch der Entwickelungsgeschichte des Menschen, (Berlin: August Rücker, 1835), pp. 573–574.

    Google Scholar 

  8. G.Valentin, Handbuch der Entwickelungsgeschichte des Menschen, (Berlin: August Rücker, 1835), p. 581. See also p. 587.

    Google Scholar 

  9. For a general discussion see Alexander Gode-vonAesch, Natural Science in German Romanticism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1941). For more detailed discussions of the impact of romantic ideas upon German biology see Timothy Lenoir, “The Göttingen School and the Development of Transcendental Naturphilosophie in the Romantic Era,” Stud. Hist. Biol., 5 (1981), 111–205; idem, “Teleology without Regrets. The Transformation of physiology in Germany: 1790–1847,” Stud. Hist. Phil. Sci., 12 (1981), 293–354.

    Google Scholar 

  10. The doctrine of parallelism is discussed in E. S.Russell, Form and Function: A Contribution to the History of Animal Morphology (London: John Murray, 1916), pp. 72 ff.; Stephen Jay Gould, Ontogeny and Phylogeny (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press, Harvard University Press, 1977), esp. chap. 3.

    Google Scholar 

  11. See WalterPagel, “The Speculative Basis of Modern Pathology: Jahn, Virchow, and the Philosophy of Pathology,” Bull. Hist. Med., 18 (1945), 1–43.

    Google Scholar 

  12. Carl FriedrichHeusinger, System der Histologie (Eisenach: J. F. Bärecke, 1822), p. 19.

    Google Scholar 

  13. JohannesMüller, Ueber den feinen Bau und die Formen der krankhaften Geschwülste (Berlin: G. Reimer, 1838), p. 8.

    Google Scholar 

  14. JohannesMüller, Ueber den feinen Bau und die Formen der krankhaften Geschwülste (Berlin: G. Reimer, 1838), pp. 1–2. See also R. Rössle, “Die pathologische Anatomie des Johannes Müller,” Sudhoff's Arch., 22 (1929), 24–47, esp. pp. 29–30; Rudolf Virchow, “Johannes Müller, the Physiologist: An Eloge Pronounced in the Hall of the University of Berlin,” Edinburgh Med. J., 4 (1858–9), 425–463, 527–544, esp. pp. 539–540. The attempt to draw parallels between embryological and oncological phenomena is discussed in L. J. Rather, The Genesis of Cancer: A Study in the History of Ideas (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978), pp. 77–78; and Frederick B. Churchill, “Rudolf Virchow and the Pathologist's Criteria for the Inheritance of Acquired Characteristics,” J. Hist. Med., 31 (1976), 117–148, esp. pp. 123–132.

    Google Scholar 

  15. “Review of Müller's Handbuch,” p. 77.

  16. “Review of R.Owen, Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Invertebrate Animals,” Edinburgh Med. Surg. J., 61 (1844) 195–200; quotation on p. 196.

    Google Scholar 

  17. RichardOwen, Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Invertebrate Animals (London: Longman, 1843), pp. 5–6.

    Google Scholar 

  18. RichardOwen, Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Vertebrate Animals. Part 1: Fishes (London: Longman, 1846), pp. 2–3.

    Google Scholar 

  19. Carl FriedrichHeusinger: System der Histologie (Eisenach: J. F. Bärecke, 1822), p. 10.

    Google Scholar 

  20. Quoted in J. V.Pickstone, ‘Absorption and Osmosis: French Physiology and Physics in the Early Nineteenth Century,” Physiologist, 20 (1977), 30–37; quotation on p. 33. See also Michael Gross, “The Lessened Locus of Feelings: A Transformation in French Physiology in the Early Nineteenth Century,” J. Hist. Biol., 12 (1979), 231–271, especially pp. 258–262.

    Google Scholar 

  21. R. D.Grainger, “Microscopic Researches in Anatomy,” London Med. Gazette, n. s. 1 (1842–3), 167–172; quotation on p. 168. Richard Dugard Grainger (1801–1865) was a surgeon who in 1823 took over from his brother the private medical school on Webb Street, London. He closed the establishment in 1842, when St. Thomas's Hospital appointed him lecturer in general anatomy and physiology. One of the original 300 Fellows of the Royal College of Surgeons, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1837. Grainger published works on general anatomy and on the physiological antomy of the nervous system.

    Google Scholar 

  22. Richard DugardGrainger, Observations on the Cultivation of Organic Science (London: Samuel Highley, 1848), p. 29.

    Google Scholar 

  23. MartinBarry, “Further Observations on the Unity of Structure in the Animal Kingdom, and on the Congenital Anomalies, including ‘Hermaphrodites’; with some Remarks on Embryology, as Facilitating Animal Nomenclature, Classification, and the Study of Comparative Antomy,” Edinburgh New Phil. J., 22 (1837), 345–364; quotation on p. 363. Martin Barry (1802–1855) studied medicine at Edinburgh, Paris, Heidelberg, Berlin, and London. He was a member of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and received his doctorate in medicine in 1833. He lectured on physiology at St. Thomas's Hospital, London, in 1852 and became House Surgeon to the Royal Maternity Hospital, Edinburgh, in 1853. On the roots of German embryology in romanticism see Owsei Temkin, “German Concepts of Ontogeny and History around 1800,” in idem, The Double Face of Janus, and Other Essays in the History of Medicine (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1977), pp. 373–389; Bernard Balan, L'Ordre et le temps: l'anatomie comparée et l'histoire des vivants au XIX e siècle (Paris: J. Vrin, 1979), pp. 246–251.

    Google Scholar 

  24. RichardOwen, Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Vertebrate Animals. Part 1: Fishes (London: Longman, 1846), p. 367.

    Google Scholar 

  25. WilliamSharpey, “Anatomy and Physiology: Introductory Lecture,” Lancet, 1 (1840–1), 73–78, 142–147, 281–284, 425–428, 489–492; quotations on pp. 428, 491. William Sharpey (1802–1880) studied anatomy in Edinburgh, Paris, and Germany before becoming professor of anatomy and physiology at London in 1836, a post he held for 38 years.

    Google Scholar 

  26. Lenoir, “Teleology without Regrets,” p. 313.

  27. See JosephSchiller, Physiology and Classification: Historical Relations (Paris: Maloine, 1980), pp. 61–63. For a contemporary summary of this literature see Karl Friedrich Burdach et al., Die Physiologie als Erfahrungswissenschaft, 6 vols. (Leipzig: Leopold Voss, 1828–40), II, 407–408.

    Google Scholar 

  28. John V.Pickstone, “Globules and Coagula: Concepts of Tissue Formation in the Early Nineteenth Century,” J. Hist. Med., 28 (1973), 336–356. Some writers preferred the notion that fibres, rather than globules, were the primitive tissue element; however, this was more true of medical authors than of the “biological” thinkers under discussion here. See L. J. Rather, “Some Relations between Eighteenth-Century Fiber Theory and Nineteenth-Century Cell Theory,” Clio Medica, 4 (1969), 191–202.

    Google Scholar 

  29. See Balan, L'Ordre et le temps, pp. 226–228.

  30. [Thomas SouthwoodSmith], “Life and Organization,” West. Rev., 7 (1827), 208–226; quotation on p. 212. Thomas Southwood Smith (1788–1861) entered the Edinburgh Medical School in 1812, and received his M. D. degree in 1816. He combined the profession of medicine with the Unitarian ministry and was active in sanitary reform and efforts to improve the conditions of the poor. A founding member of the Useful Knowledge Society, he published popular works on physiology.

    Google Scholar 

  31. [Thomas SouthwoodSmith], “Life and Organization,” West. Rev., 7 (1827), pp. 217–218.

    Google Scholar 

  32. Ibid., pp. 219, 225–226.

  33. Ibid., p. 226.

  34. TheodorSchwann, Microscopical Researches into the Accordance in the Structure and Growth of Animals and Plants, trans. Henry Smith (London: Sydenham Society, 1847), pp. x, 2, 34, 191, 196–197.

    Google Scholar 

  35. RichardOwen, Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Vertebrate Animals. Part 1: Fishes (London: Longman, 1846), pp. 25–26.

    Google Scholar 

  36. RichardOwen, Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Vertebrate Animals. Part 1: Fishes (London: Longman, 1846), p. 30. See also William Sharpey, “On a Peculiar Motion excited in Fluids by the Surfaces of Certain Animals”, Edinburgh Med. Surg. J., 34 (1830), 113–122; idem, “Account of the Discovery by Purkinje and Valentin of Ciliary Motions in Reptiles and Warm-Blooded Animals; with Remarks and Additional Experiments”, Edinburgh New Phil. J., 19 (1835), 114–129. For a discussion of the significance of ciliary motion see Mikulâs Teich, “Purkyně and Valentin on Ciliary Motion: An Early Investigation in Morphological Physiology”, Brit. J. Hist. Sci., 5 (1970), 168–177.

    Google Scholar 

  37. RichardOwen, Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Vertebrate Animals. Part 1: Fishes (London: Longman, 1846), p. 46.

    Google Scholar 

  38. RichardOwen, Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Vertebrate Animals. Part 1: Fishes (London: Longman, 1846), pp. 362, 365–366.

    Google Scholar 

  39. RichardOwen, Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Vertebrate Animals. Part 1: Fishes (London: Longman, 1846), p. 370.

    Google Scholar 

  40. RichardOwen, Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Vertebrate Animals. Part 1: Fishes (London: Longman, 1846), p. 368. See also Owen, Lectures on the Vertebrate Animals, pp. 10–11.

    Google Scholar 

  41. On von Baer see Russell, Form and Function, chap. 9.

  42. Karl ErnstvonBaer, Uber Entwickelungsgeschichte der Thiere (Königsberg: Bornträger, 1828), p. 223.

    Google Scholar 

  43. See Lenoir, “Teleology without Regrets”, pp. 329–330.

  44. DovOspovat, “The Influence of Karl Ernst von Baer's Embryology, 1828–1859: A Reappraisal in the Light of Richard Owen's and William B. Carpenter's ‘Palaentological Application of Von Baer's Law’”, J. Hist. Biol., 9 (1976), 1–28.

    Google Scholar 

  45. MartinBarry, “On the Unity of Structure in the Animal Kingdom”, Edinburgh New Phil. J., 22 (1837), 116–141; quotation on p. 118.

    Google Scholar 

  46. MartinBarry, “On the Unity of Structure in the Animal Kingdom”, Edinburgh New Phil. J., 22 (1837), pp. 121–122 (all italics are in the original unless otherwise stated).

    Google Scholar 

  47. MartinBarry, “On the Unity of Structure in the Animal Kingdom”, Edinburgh New Phil. J., 22 (1837), pp. 126–127.

    Google Scholar 

  48. William B.Carpenter, “On the Unity of Function in Organized Beings”, Edinburgh New Phil. J., 23 (1837), 92–114; quotation on p. 99.

    Google Scholar 

  49. Ibid., p. 100.

  50. Ibid., p. 101.

  51. William B.Carpenter, “On the Unity of Function in Organized Beings”, Edinburgh New Phil. J., 23 (1837), pp. 103–104, 106; Schwann, Microscopical Researches, p. x.

    Google Scholar 

  52. William B.Carpenter, “On the Unity of Function in Organized Beings”, Edinburgh New Phil. J., 23 (1837), pp. 111–113.

    Google Scholar 

  53. [William B.Carpenter], “Review of Mikroscopische Untersuchungen über die Uebereinstimmung in der Struktur und dem Wachstum der Thiere und Pflanzen”, Brit. For. Med. Rev., 9 (1840), 495–528; quotation on p. 495.

    Google Scholar 

  54. Ibid., p. 526.

  55. See ArthurHughes, A History of Cytology (London and New York: Abelard-Schuman, 1959), pp. 6–11.

    Google Scholar 

  56. Churchill, “Rudolf Virchow”, p. 122; see also Rather, Genesis of Cancer, p. 77.

  57. See LudwigFleck, Genesis and Development of a Scientific Idea (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1979) for an extended demonstration of the dependence of observation on prior assumptions and training.

    Google Scholar 

  58. R. D.Grainger, ‘Microscopic Researches in Anatomy”, London Med. Gazette, n. s. 1 (1842–3), pp. 167–168.

    Google Scholar 

  59. JohnQuekett, Lectures on Histology, Delivered at the Royal College of Surgeons of England, in the Sessions 1850–51 (London: Hippolyte Bailliere, 1852), pp. 2–3.

    Google Scholar 

  60. William B.Carpenter, A Manual of Physiology, Including Physiological Anatomy for the Use of the Medical Student (London: John Churchill, 1846), pp. 17–18.

    Google Scholar 

  61. William B.Carpenter, The Microscope and Its Revelations (London: John Churchill, 1856), p. 13.

    Google Scholar 

  62. William B.Carpenter, A Manual of Physiology, Including Physiological Anatomy for the Use of the Medical Student (London: John Churchill, 1846), p. 26.

    Google Scholar 

  63. William B.Carpenter, A Manual of Physiology, Including Physiological Anatomy for the Use of the Medical Student (London: John Churchill, 1846), p. 31.

    Google Scholar 

  64. William B.Carpenter, A Manual of Physiology, Including Physiological Anatomy for the Use of the Medical Student (London: John Churchill, 1946), p. 123.

    Google Scholar 

  65. William B.Carpenter, A Manual of Physiology, Including Physiological Anatomy for the Use of the Medical Student (London: John Churchill, 1846), pp. 407–408.

    Google Scholar 

  66. On the early history of neurone theory see ArmandoAndreoli, Zur geschichtlichen Entwicklung der Neuronen-Theorie (Basel: Benno Schwabe, 1961), pp. 9–11; Edwin Clarke and C. D. O'Malley, The Human Brain and Spinal Cord: An Historical Study Illustrated by Writings from Antiquity to the Twentieth Century (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1968), pp. 39–42.

    Google Scholar 

  67. “The Scientific Value of the Microscope,” Prospective Rev., 6 (1850), 1–47; quotation on pp. 42–43. The author of this anonymous review was probably William Carpenter.

  68. William B.Carpenter, The Microscope and Its Revelations (London: John Churchill, 1856), p. 28.

    Google Scholar 

  69. See EverettMendelsohn, “Physical Models and Physiological Concepts: Explanation in Nineteenth-Century Biology,” Brit. J. Hist. Sci., 2 (1965), 201–219; idem, “Cell Theory and the Development of General Physiology,” Arch. Int. Scis., 16 (1963), 419–429. For a general discussion of nineteenth-century attempts to find a histological basis for functions see K. E. Rothschuh, “Von der Histomorphologie zur Histophysiologie,” in V. Kruta, ed., J. E. Purkyně, 1787–1869 (Brno: Universita Jan Evangelisty Purkinjě, 1971), pp. 197–211.

    Google Scholar 

  70. R. D. Grainger, “Gland,” in R. B. Todd, ed., Cyclopaedia of Anatomy and Physiology, 2 (1839), 480–494; quotation on pp. 481–482. Grainger refers to the French translation of Meckel's work on general anatomy: J.-F. Meckel, Manuel d'anatomie génerale, descriptive et pathologique, trans. A. J. L. Jourdan and G. Breschet, 3 vols. (Paris: J. B. Baillière, 1825), I, 515.

  71. Sharpey's career is discussed in D. W.Taylor, “The Life and Teaching of William Sharpey (1802–1880) ‘Father of Modern Physiology’ in Britain,” Med. Hist., 15 (1971), 126–153, 241–259.

    Google Scholar 

  72. Quoted ibid., p. 150.

  73. See, for example, John Phillips Potter, Lectures on Anatomy and Physiology, 1836–7 [by William Sharpey], University College London MSS (hereafter UCL MSS), MS. ADD. 285/1, pp. 7, 116–118.

  74. Taylor, “Life of Sharpey,” p. 152.

  75. Müller's ideas were readily available to English readers after 1839 via a précis and commentary by Samuel Solly on Müller's major work on glands: John [sic] Müller, The Intimate Structure of Secreting Glands, trans. S. Solly (London: Joseph Butler, 1839).

    Google Scholar 

  76. Potter, Lectures on Anatomy and Physiology, pp. 165–167.

  77. Notes on Lectures on Physiology, 1842–3 by William Sharpey, UCL MSS, MS. ADD. 278., pp. 73–75.

  78. Joseph Lister, Notes of William Sharpey's Lectures on Physiology, delivered at University College London, 1849, Wellcome Institute Library, p. 133. Sharpey's views on secretion were published in JonesQuain, Elements of Anatomy, ed. RichardQuain and WilliamSharpey, 2 vols. (London: Taylor, Walton, and Maberly, 1848), I, ccxcvii-cccvii.

    Google Scholar 

  79. JamesPaget, “Report on the Results Obtained by the Use of the Microscope in the Study of Human Anatomy and Physiology. Part I,” Brit. For. Med. Rev., 14 (1842), 259–296; quotation on p. 292.

    Google Scholar 

  80. See J.Henle, Allgemeine Anatomie. Lehre von den Mischungs und Formebestandtheilen des menschlichen Körpers (Leipzig: Leopold Voss, 1841), pp. 821, 890–891.

    Google Scholar 

  81. Grainger, “Microscopic Researches,” p. 170. For Goodsir's views on secretion see John Goodsir, “The Structure and Function of the Intestinal Villi,” reprinted in his Anatomical Memoirs, ed. William Turner, 2 vols. (Edinburgh: Adam and Charles Black, 1868), II, 393–402.

  82. L. S.Jacyna, “John Goodsir and the Making of Cellular Reality,” J. Hist. Biol., 16 (1983), 75–99.

    Google Scholar 

  83. William B.Carpenter, “Report on the Results Obtained by the Use of the Microscope in the Study of Anatomy and Physiology. Part II. On the Origin and Function of Cell,” Brit. For. Med. Rev., 15 (1843), 259–281; quotation on p. 279.

    Google Scholar 

  84. William B.Carpenter, A Manual of Physiology, Including Physiological Anatomy for the Use of the Medical Student (London: John Churchill, 1846), pp. 408–410.

    Google Scholar 

  85. ThomasWilliam, “On the Physiology of Cells,” Guy's Hosp. Repts., 4 (1846), 273–331; quotation on pp. 278–279. Thomas Williams (1819–1865) entered Guy's Hospital as a student in 1837, and received his M.D. degree at London University in 1840. He held the post of tutor at Guy's and was one of the earliest microscopists to work at the hospital. He joined Grainger's Webb Street school around 1843; when it closed he went into practice in South Wales.

    Google Scholar 

  86. ThomasWilliams, “On the Physiology of Cells,” Guy's Hosp. Repts., 4 (1846), pp. 275–276.

    Google Scholar 

  87. ThomasWilliams, “On the Physiology of Cells,” Guy's Hosp. Repts., 4, (1846), pp. 276–277. fig. 1.

    Google Scholar 

  88. Ibid., p. 279.

  89. ThomasWilliams, “On the Physiology of Cells,” Guy's Hosp. Repts., 4 (1846), pp. 320–321.

    Google Scholar 

  90. Ibid., p. 322.

  91. Sharpey, “Anatomy and Physiology,” p. 491.

  92. Edward Ballard, Notes of Lectures on Anatomy and Physiology at University College London, 1840-1 [by William Sharpey], 2 vols., UCL MSS, MS. ADD. 286/1-2, I, 10.

  93. Thomas Hodgkin (1798–1866) studied medicine at Guy's Hospital and in Paris and Edinburgh, where he graduated with an M.D. in 1823. In 1825 he was appointed curator of the Museum of Pathology at Guy's; he also gave lectures in pathology at the hospital. Hodgkin was a member of the senate of London University from 1837 to his death. He gradually dropped out of practice and devoted most of his time to philanthropic activities. For a brief account of his career see MichaelRose, Curator of the Dead: Thomas Hodgkin (1798–1866) (London: Peter Owen, 1981).

    Google Scholar 

  94. ThomasHodgkin, “The History of an Unusually-Formed Placenta, and Imperfect Foetus, and of Similar Examples of Monstrous Productions,” Guy's Hosp. Repts., 1 (1836), 218–226; quotation on pp. 224–225.

    Google Scholar 

  95. Balan, L'Ordre et le temps, p. 225.

  96. G.Andral, Précis d'anatomie pathologique, 2 vols., (Paris: Chez Gabon, 1829), I, 233–236.

    Google Scholar 

  97. ThomasHodgkin, “On the Anatomical Characters of some Adventitious Structures,” Medico-Chirurg. Trans., 15 (1829), 265–338; quotation on p. 265.

    Google Scholar 

  98. ThomasHodgkin, “On the Anatomical Characters of some Adventitious Structures,” Medico-Chirurg. Trans., 15, (1829), pp. 275–292.

    Google Scholar 

  99. ThomasHodgkin, “On the Anatomical Characters of some Adventitious Structures,” Medico-Chirurg. Trans., 15 (1829), pp. 293–294, 322.

    Google Scholar 

  100. ThomasHodgkin, “Review of ‘On the Anatomical Characters of some Adventitious Structures’,” Edinburgh Med. Surg. J., 34 (1830), 164–174; quotation on p. 174.

    Google Scholar 

  101. RobertCarswell, Pathological Anatomy: Illustrations of the Elementary Forms of Disease (London: Longman, 1838), fasc. x, pp. 8–9.

    Google Scholar 

  102. ThomasHodgkin, “On the Anatomical Characters of some Adventitious Structures, being an Attempt to Point out the Relation between the Microscopic Characters and those which are discernible by the Naked Eye,” Medico-Chirurg. Trans., 26 (1843), 242–285; quotation on pp. 257–258.

    Google Scholar 

  103. On Müller's oncology see Rather, Genesis of Cancer, pp. 88–90.

  104. ThomasHodgkin, “On the Anatomical Characters of some Adventitious Structures, being an Attempt to Point out the Relation between the Microscopic Characters and those which are discernible by the Naked Eye,” Medico-Chirurg. Trans., 26 (1843), pp. 245–246.

    Google Scholar 

  105. Ibid., p. 257.

  106. Ibid., p. 263.

  107. ThomasHodgkin, “On the Anatomical Characters of some Adventitious Structures, being an Attempt to Point out the Relation between the Microscopic Characters and those which are discernible by the Naked Eye,” Medico-Chirurg. Trans., 26 (1843), pp. 267–268, 274. Hodgkin refers to Martin Barry, “Researches in Embryology. Third Series: A Contribution to the Physiology of Cells,” Phil. Trans. pt. 1 (1840), 529–593.

    Google Scholar 

  108. ThomasHodgkin, “On the Anatomical Characters of some Adventitious Structures, being an Attempt to Point out the Relation between the Microscopic Characters and those which are discernible by the Naked Eye,” Medico-Chirurg. Trans., 26 (1843), pp. 283–284.

    Google Scholar 

  109. Carpenter, “On the Unity of Function,” p. 92.

  110. MartinBarry, “Further Observations on the Unity of Structure in the Animal Kingdom, and on the Congenital Anomalies, including ‘Hermaphrodites’; with some Remarks on Embryology, as Facilitating Animal Nomenclature, Classification, and the Study of Comparative Anatomy,” Edinburgh New Phil. J., 22 (1837), pp. 73–74.

    Google Scholar 

  111. Richard DugardGrainger, Observations on the Cultivation of Organic Science (London: Samuel Highley, 1848), p. 7.

    Google Scholar 

  112. William B.Carpenter, A Manual of Physiology, Including Physiological Anatomy for the Use of the Medical Student (London: John Churchill, 1846), pp. 14–16.

    Google Scholar 

  113. William B.Carpenter, A Manual of Physiology, Including Physiological Anatomy for the Use of the Medical Student (London: John Churchill, 1846), pp. 17–18.

    Google Scholar 

  114. [JohnForbes], “Review of William Carpenter's Manual of Physiology,” Brit. For. Med. Rev., 21 (1846), 480–483; quotation on p. 482.

    Google Scholar 

  115. “Scientific Value of the Microscope,” pp. 45–46.

  116. See DovOspovat, “Perfect Adaptation and Teleological Explanation: Approaches to the Problem of the History of Life in the Mid-Nineteenth Century,” Stud. Hist. Biol., 2 (1978), 33–56.

    Google Scholar 

  117. See L. S.Jacyna, “Principles of General Physiology: The Comparative Dimension to British Neuroscience in the 1830s and 1840s,” Stud. Hist. Biol., 7 (1984), 47–92; esp. pp. 60–68.

    Google Scholar 

  118. Richard D.French, “Some Problems and Sources in the Foundations of Modern Physiology,” Hist. Sci., 10 (1971), 28–55; quotation on pp. 28–29.

    Google Scholar 

  119. RichardOwen, Lectures on the Comparative Anatomy and Physiology of the Vertebrate Animals. Part 1: Fishes (London: Longman, 1846), pp. 362, 4.

    Google Scholar 

  120. Sharpey, “Anatomy and Physiology,” p. 75.

  121. M. JeannePeterson, The Medical Profession in Mid-Victorian London (Berkeley and London: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 149–154.

    Google Scholar 

  122. Owen to Paget, 29 June 1849, Paget MSS, Wellcome Institute Library, ff. 365–370; quotations on ff. 365–366, 367–368.

  123. L. S.Jacyna, “Images of John Hunter in the Nineteenth Century,” Hist. Sci. (1983), 21 (1983), 85–108.

    Google Scholar 

  124. M. JeannePeterson, The Medical Profession in Mid-Victorian London (Berkeley and London: University of California Press, 1978), pp. 150–151.

    Google Scholar 

  125. MartinBarry, “Further Observations on the Unity of Structure in the Animal Kingdom, and on the Congenital Anomalies, including ‘Hermaphrodites’; with some Remarks on Embryology, as Facilitating Animal Nomenclature, Classification, and the Study of Comparative Anatomy,“ Edinburgh New Phil. J. 22 (1837), pp. 75–76.

    Google Scholar 

  126. MartinBarry, “Further Observations on the Unity of Structure in the Animal Kingdom, and on the Congenital Anomalies, including ‘Hermaphrodites’; with some Remarks on Embryology, as Facilitating Animal Nomenclature, Classification, and the Study of Comparative Anatomy,” Edinburgh New Phil. J., 22 (1837), pp. 76–77.

    Google Scholar 

  127. Forbes, “Review of Carpenter's Manual of Physiology,” p. 482.

  128. Richard DugardGrainger, Observations on the Cultivation of Organic Science (London: Samuel Highley, 1848), pp. 46–47, 57.

    Google Scholar 

  129. MartinBarry, “Further Observations on the Unity of Structure in the Animal Kingdom, and on the Congenital Anomalies, including ‘Hermaphrodites’; with some Remarks on Embryology, as Facilitating Animal Nomenclature, Classification, and the Study of Comparative Anatomy,” Edinburgh New Phil. J., 22 (1837), pp. 362–364.

    Google Scholar 

  130. William B.Carpenter, A Manual of Physiology, Including Physiological Anatony for the Use of the Medical Student (London: John Churchill, 1848), pp. v-vi.

    Google Scholar 

  131. [JohnForbes], “Review of William Carpenter's Manual of Physiology,” Brit. For. Med. Rev., 21 (1846), pp. 480–481.

    Google Scholar 

  132. Lois N.Magner, A History of the Life Sciences (New York and Basel: Marcel Dekker, 1979), p. 214.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Jacyna, L.S. The romantic programme and the reception of cell theory in Britain. J Hist Biol 17, 13–48 (1984). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00397501

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00397501

Keywords

Navigation