CHAPTER XIV 



HAECKEL AND MONISM 



ERNST Heinrich Haeckel was born at Potsdam in 1834. His father had 

 taken part as a volunteer in the Prussian War of Independence against 

 Napoleon, and afterwards, having adopted a public career, he ad- 

 vanced to the rank of " Regierungsrat." His mother was the daughter of a 

 Civil Servant, who had been dismissed from his post and arrested for having 

 opposed the French conqueror. His parents' home, in spite of its bureau- 

 cratic character, had nevertheless preserved the liberal-minded traditions of 

 earlier times and the literary interests acquired in the days of greatness of 

 the German world of letters. Young Ernst received his school education in 

 a provincial gymnasium, where, as he himself says, mathematics were neg- 

 lected for philosophy and the classical languages. Even when grown up, 

 he still enjoyed reading Homer in the original and throughout his life de- 

 lighted in interlarding his writings with Greek terms. His greatest pleasure, 

 however, he found in nature, both in reality and in poetry; he was a keen 

 botanist and at the same time read Goethe's works, Humboldt's travels, 

 and Schleiden's popular writings. He was especially interested in Schlei- 

 den and was very anxious to go to Jena in order to be trained as a botanist 

 under him. After he had matriculated, in 1851, however, his father insisted 

 upon his going to Wiirzburg to study medicine. He spent two years there 

 and, in spite of his dislike for professional studies, devoted himself with 

 interest to anatomy and histology under KoUiker and to pathology under 

 Virchow. He then spent one year in Berlin studying under J. Miiller, whom 

 he regarded as his true master and who inspired him with a love for marine 

 research, particularly in regard to the lower animals. Having been for some 

 time assistant to Virchow, he went on an expedition to the Mediterranean 

 at the suggestion of Kolliker and Gegenbaur and collected at Messina ma- 

 terial for his first important work. Die Radiolarien, which resulted in his 

 being called, upon the recommendation of Gegenbaur, to the chair of zool- 

 ogy at Jena in i86i. There he worked until his resignation, in 1909, after 

 which he lived for another ten years, continuing his literary work until 

 he died, in 1919. 



The life which falls within these dates is without doubt one of the most 

 remarkable during the epoch just closed; there are not many personalities 

 who have so powerfully influenced the development of human culture — 



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