II THE HISTORY OF BIOLOGY 



designed a map of the world and even to have made a celestial globe of spheri- 

 cal form, with the earth suspended in the centre of the circular vault. Living 

 beings he conceives as having evolv.ed through a kind of primordial pro- 

 creation in the mud which formerly covered the earth. Thus, first there 

 arose animals and plants, and then human beings, who, originally formed 

 like fishes, lived in the water, but afterwards cast off their fish-skin, went 

 up on dry land and thenceforth lived there. We see, then, that Anaximander 

 produced a complete theory of evolution, childishly clumsy, it is true, but 

 interesting for the audacity with which he deduced his conclusions from 

 his premisses. Nor is he afraid of letting the world-process continue into in- 

 finity; the present universe has been preceded by others, which were evolved 

 out of the primordial element and returned once more to it, and so it will 

 always continue. We should not go too far, however, in making a comparison 

 between the ancient Ionian's theory of creation and the evolution theory of 

 our own day. An attempt has been made to prove him a predecessor to Dar- 

 win on the ground of his above-mentioned conceptions of the origin of 

 man. This is an entirely unhistorical view of the matter, although an easily 

 accountable one; highly debatable theories have always sought for direct 

 predecessors as far back in time as possible. Anaximander's theory of the 

 origin of man is in reality most reminiscent of his fellow-countrymen's 

 legends of autochthonism — ■ stories of how men were born of the earth they 

 lived on, which was one of the very popular myths of these periods of migra- 

 tion of peoples, whereby they sought to justify their title to the country 

 they possessed on, as it were, semi-natural, semi-divine grounds. But if we 

 must exercise caution in gauging the speculations of Anaximander by modern 

 standards, they at any rate are worthy of our high admiration. Natural re- 

 search in our own day endeavours to discover an explanation, based on a nat- 

 ural connexion of causes, of the origin of things and of the variations they 

 present, and the philosopher who was the first to realize the necessity of 

 such a natural explanation and who worked it out, although incompletely, 

 must be regarded in all ages as one of the pioneers of human thought. The 

 religious-poetical myths of the creation, which up to that time had had to 

 serve amongst the Greeks, as in the East, for an explanation of the cosmos, 

 became from this time part of the sphere of poetry and the life of religious 

 faith, while scientific research went on building upon the foundations laid 

 down by Anaximander. 



Among his contemporaries Anaximander enjoyed a high reputation, and 

 several of his disciples are mentioned in history. In his native city his work 

 was carried on by Anaximenes, who chose air for his principle and considered 

 that this not only enveloped the world, but also penetrated living beings 

 and represented their life-principle. Shortly after his death the city of Miletus 

 was ravaged by the Persians and razed to the ground (494 b.c), and with 



