of the subject, in which Wolff is heralded as its founder, and the one central figure prior to Pander and Von Baer.
The embryological work of Wolff's great predecessors Harvey and Malpighi has been passed over too lightly. Although these men have received ample recognition in closely related fields of investigation, their insight into those mysterious events which culminate in the formation of a new animal has been rarely appreciated. Now and then a few writers, as Brooks and Whitman, have pointed out the great worth of Harvey's work in embryology, but fewer have spoken for Malpighi in this connection. Koelliker, it is true, in his address at the unveiling of the statue of Malpighi, in his native town of Crevalcuore, in 1894, gives him well-merited recognition as the founder of embryology, and Sir Michael Foster has written in a similar vein in his delightful 'Lectures on the History of Physiology.'
However great was Harvey's work in embryology, I venture to say that Malpighi's was greater when considered as a piece of observation. Harvey's work is more philosophical; he discusses the nature of development and shows unusual powers as an accurate reasoner. But that part of his treatise devoted to observation is far less extensive and exact than Malpighi's, and throughout his lengthy discussions he has the flavor of the ancients.
Malpighi's work, on the other hand, flavors more of the moderns. In terse descriptions, and with many sketches, he shows the changes in the hen's egg from the close of the first day of development onwards.
It is a noteworthy fact that, at the period in which he lived, Malpighi could so successfully curb the tendency to indulge in wordy disquisitions, and that he was satisfied to observe carefully, and tell his story in a simple way. This quality of mind can not be too much admired. As Emerson has said: "I am impressed with the fact that the greatest thing a human soul ever does in this world is to see something and tell what it saw in a plain way. Hundreds of people can talk for one who can think, but thousands can think for one who can see. To see clearly is poetry, philosophy and religion all in one." But 'to see' here means to interpret as well as to observe. Harvey was also an original observer, but, in embryology, not in so eminent a degree as Malpighi.[1] Could, we have had the insight of Harvey united to the observing powers of Malpighi, we should have had an almost perfect combination.
Although there were observers in the field of embryology before
- ↑ Notwithstanding the deserved praise of Malpighi as an observer, it may be remarked, in passing, that he was not the leader of his period in pure observation and description. Swammerdam showed even greater powers for critical and finished work in this direction. (See 'Malpighi, Swammerdam, and Leeuwenhoek,' Pop. Sci. Mo., April. 1901.
