Full Idea
Schelling made the image of the 'organism' central to his conception of nature, arguing that merely mechanical processes could never produce 'life' (as a self-producing, self-sustaining, self-directing process).
Gist of Idea
Schelling made organisms central to nature, because mere mechanism could never produce them
Source
report of Friedrich Schelling (Outline of a System of the Philosophy of Nature [1799]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 08
Book Reference
Pinkard,Terry: 'German Philosophy 1760-1860' [CUP 2002], p.204
A Reaction
At that date this seems a reasonable claim, but subsequent biochemistry has undermined it.