484 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 
his conception of “species,” he sententiously replied: “A 
species is a thought of the Creator.” To this thoroughly theis- 
tic conception he joined the scientific deduction which he had 
already been led to draw, that the animal species of each 
geological age, or even stratum, were different from those pre- 
ceding and following, and also unconnected by natural deriva- 
tion. And his very last published works reiterated his stead- 
fast conviction that “there is no evidence of a direct descent 
of later from earlier species in the geological succession of an- 
imals.” Indeed, so far as we know, he would not even admit 
that such “ thoughts of the Creator” as these might have been 
actualized in the natural course of events. If he had ac- 
cepted such a view, and if he had himself apprehended and 
developed in his own way the now wellnigh assured signifi- 
cance of some of his early and pregnant generalizations, the 
history of the doctrine of development would have been differ- 
ent from what it is, a different spirit and another name would 
have been prominent in it, and Agassiz would not have passed 
away while fighting what he felt to be —at least for the 
present — a losing battle. It is possible that the “ whirligig 
of time” may still “bring in his revenges,” but not very 
probable. 
Much to his credit, it may be said that a good share of 
Agassiz’s invincible aversion to evolution may be traced to 
the spirit in which it was taken up by his early associate Vogt, 
and, indeed, by most of the German school then and since, 
which justly offended both his scientific and his religious 
sense. Agassiz always “thought nobly of the soul,” and 
could in no way approve either materialistic or agnostic opin- 
ions. The idealistic turn of his mind was doubtless confirmed 
in his student days at Munich,. whither he and his friend 
Braun resorted after one session at Heidelberg, and where 
both devotedly attended the lectures of Schelling, —then in 
his later glory, — and of Oken, whose ‘ Natur-Philosophie ” 
was then in the ascendant. Although fascinated and inspired 
by Oken’s & priori biology (built upon morphological ideas 
which had not yet been established but had, in part, been 
rightly divined), the two young naturalists were not carried 
