SKETCH OF MATTHIAS JACOB SCHLEIDEN. 261 



show how it is intimately connected with all the leading problems of 

 philosophy and the natural sciences." Beginning with an account of 

 the structure of plants as revealed by the eye and the microscope, he 

 recognizes the labors of Mohl, Nageli, Payen, and others, and even has 

 the courage to admit that they have damaged his own theory of the 

 genesis of cells. The discussion of the nutritive elements of plants 

 gives him occasion to do justice to Hales, De Saussure, Boussingault, 

 and Liebig, his long-time adversary. Then, from applied botany, he 

 passes to the two sciences which were quite new at the time, of botan- 

 ical geography and paleontology ; and he concludes with a chapter in 

 which the whole subject receives an sesthetical treatment. 



Before this work appeared, however, Schleiden, discouraged by the 

 success of the assaults upon his pet theories, had suffered a loss of con- 

 fidence in himself and of relish for pure botany. His last work in pure 

 science was a note on the fructification of the Rhizocarps, published 

 in 1846; the "Zeitschrift fur wissenschaftliche Botanik" ("Journal 

 of Scientific Botany "), which he, with Nageli, had founded in 1844, 

 ceased to appear at the same time. 



After completing the third edition of the " Grundziige " in 1850, 

 the failure to modify or improve which in any essential particular 

 emphasizes his loss of relish for the pursuit, Schleiden withdrew al- 

 most entirely from the arena of scientific botany. He turned his 

 attention to anthropology ; and, finally, in 1862, resigned his chair of 

 botany at Jena, whence he repaired to Dresden. "Still, however, 

 the old halo wavered around his head," and he was called to the Uni- 

 versity of Dorpat, as Professor of Botany and Anthropology, with the 

 rank of a Russian councilor of state. He was not permitted to stay 

 long there, however ; for, being accustomed to express himself too 

 freely on ecclesiastical subjects in his public addresses, he soon 

 raised a strong party against himself, and was obliged to resign his 

 second professorship in 1864. From this time till the end of his 

 life he resided by turns at Dresden, Frankfort-on-the-Main, Wiesba- 

 den, and again at Frankfort, where he died on the 23d of June, 1881. 

 Death surprised him while he was engaged upon a work on the horse, 

 one of three monographs in which he designed to illustrate the influ- 

 ence of natural agents upon civilization, choosing as examples from 

 each of the three kingdoms salt, the rose, and the horse. The two 

 of these treatises which we possess are models of their kind. 



The character of Schleiden may be read in his writings. Ardent 

 and enthusiastic, he never praised or blamed by halves ; but, in his 

 most animated polemics, there appears a sincere and disinterested con- 

 viction that commands respect. To the end of his life he retained a 

 degree of youthfulness in his thought and style. He had the imagina- 

 tion of a poet, with the scientific spirit to guide it ; and instead of 

 being carried away, or letting his readers be carried away, in his 

 flights, he is constantly calling them back to reality and reason. He 



