288 Theories of Evolution and Creation 



reports of a local natural history society. Essentially the 

 same discoveries, however, by essentially the same methods, 

 were subsequently made by at least three individual investi- 

 gators experimenting with many different types of plants 

 and animals — de Vries in Holland, Correns in Germany, 

 and Tschermak in Austria. Curiously enough, these inde- 

 pendent investigators, who in searching the literature of 

 the subject also discovered the earlier work of Mendel, an- 

 nounced their findings almost simultaneously at the end of 

 the Nineteenth Century. 



Sources of Opposition 



It is not at all surprising that the doctrine of evolution 

 has met with frantic opposition and violent denunciation 

 from many sources. Even among the professional scientists 

 of fifty years ago the Darwinian proposal was often received 

 with condemnation on the ground that it upset things too 

 much. At one of the annual meetings of the German as- 

 sociation of scientists and physicians The Origin of Species 

 was debated by Rudolf Virchow, the founder of scientific 

 pathology, and Ernst Haeckel, the protagonist of the " re- 

 capitulation theory." Virchow did not feel the necessity 

 of dissecting Darwin's theories on their merits. It is indeed 

 doubtful whether there were at that time a score of men in 

 the whole world sufficiently conversant with the essential 

 facts to discuss Darwinism critically. Virchow at any rate 

 considered that he had adequately disposed of the new heresy 

 by warning the world that the adoption of these pernicious 

 teachings would lead straight to socialism! The young 

 Haeckel, on his part, full of enthusiasm for the new gospel, 

 resorted to precisely the same methods. The best he could 

 say in support of Darwinism was a logical demonstration of 

 the thesis that unless we all adopt this view of the world 

 and of life, nothing can save us from socialism! Again we 

 see an attempt to approach a problem scientifically — that 

 is, through the rational treatment of ascertained facts — 



