PRINCIPLE OF METAMORPHOSED SYMMETRY 469 



clear and connected code of such laws, we may refer to cne law, at 

 least, which appears to be of genuine authority and validity ; and which 

 is worthy our attention as an example of a properly organical or phy- 

 siological principle, distinct from all mechanical, chemical, or other 

 physical forces; and such as cannot even be conceived to be resolvable 

 into those. I speak of the tendency which produces such results 

 as have been brought together in recent speculations upon Mor- 

 phology. 



It may perhaps be regarded as indicating how peculiar are the prin- 

 ciples of organic life, and how far removed from any mere mechanical 

 action, that the leading idea in these speculations was first strongly 

 and effectively apprehended, not by a laborious experimenter and rea- 

 soner, but by a man of singularly brilliant and creative fancy ; not by 

 a mathematician or chemist, but by a poet. And we may add further, 

 that this poet had already shown himself incapable of rightly appre- 

 hending the relation of physical facts to their principles; and had, in 

 trying his powers on such subjects, exhibited a signal instance of the 

 ineffectual and perverse operation of the method of philosophizing to 

 which the constitution of his mind led him. The person of whom we 

 speak, is John Wolfgang Gothe, who is held, by the unanimous voice 

 of Europe, to have been one of the greatest poets of our own, or of any 

 time, and whose Doctrine of Colors we have already had to describe, 

 in the History of Optics, as an entire failure. Yet his views on the 

 laws which connect the forms of plants into one simple system, have 

 been generally accepted and followed up. We might almost be led to 

 think that this writer's poetical endowments had contributed to this 

 scientific discovery ; the love of beauty of form, by fixing the attention 

 upon the symmetry of plants ; and the creative habit of thought, by 

 making constant developement of a familiar process. 1 



"We may quote some of the poet's own verses as an illustration of his feel 

 zigs on this subject. They are addressed to a lady. 



Dich verwirret, geliebte, die tausendfaltige mischung 



Dieses blumengewiihls iiber dem garten umher 

 Viele namen horest du an, und immer verdranget, 



Mit barbarischem klang, einer den andern im ohr. 

 Alle gestalten sind ahlich und keine gleichet der andern ; 



Und so deutet das chor auf ein geheimes gesetz, 

 Auf ein heiliges rathseL ! konnte ich dich, liebliche freundinn, 



Ueberliefern so gleich gliicklich das losende wort. 



