use the word miracle in a sense
peculiar to himself.
[45] _Jenaer Literaturzeitung_, January 3, 1874. In this number there is
a notice by Doctor Haeckel of two books,--_Descendenzlehre und
Darwinismus_, von Oscar Schmidt, Leipzig, 1873; and _Die Fortschritte
des Darwinismus_, von J. W. Spengel, Coeln and Leipzig, 1874; in which he
says: "Erstens, um in Sachen der Descendenz-Theorie mitreden zu koennen,
ein gewisser Grad von tieferer biologischer (sowohl morphologischer als
physiologischer) Bildung unentbehrlich, den die meistzen von jenen
Auctoren (the opposers of the theory) nicht besitzen. Zweitens ist fuer
ein klares und zutreffendes Urtheil in diesem Sachen eine ruecksichtslose
Hingabe an vernunftgemaesse Erkenntniss und eine dadurch bedingte
Resignation auf uralte, liebgewordene und tief vererbte Vorurtheile
erforderlich, zu welcher sich die wenigsten entschliesen koennen."
[46] In his _Natuerlische Schoepfungsgeschichte_, Haeckel is still more
exclusive. When he comes to answer the objections to the evolution, or,
as he commonly calls it, the descendence theory, he dismisses the
objections derived from religion, as unworthy of notice, with the remark
that all Glaube ist Aberglaube; all faith is superstition. The
objections from _a priori_, or intuitive truths, are disposed of in an
equally summary manner, by denying that there are any such truths, and
asserting that all our knowledge is from the senses. The objection that
so many distinguished naturalists reject the theory, he considers more
at length. First, many have grown old in another way of thinking and
cannot be expected to change. Second, many are collectors of facts,
without studying their relations, or are destitute of the genius for
generalization. No amount of material makes a building. Others, again,
are specialists. It is not enough that a man should be versed in one
department; he must be at home in all: in Botany, Zooelogy, Comparative
Anatomy, Biology, Geology, and Palaeontology. He must be able to survey
the whole field. Fourthly, and mainly, naturalists are generally
lamentably deficient in philosophical culture and in a philosophical
spirit. "The immovable edifice of the true, monistic science, or what is
the same thing, natural science, can only arise through the most
intimate interaction and mutual interpenetration of philosophy and
observation (Philosophie und Empirie)." pp. 638-641. It is only a select
few, therefore, of learned and phil
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