192 HAECKEL 



form into a rubbish -heap of bits of marble. 

 Chemistry would still further break up these bits 

 of marble into the chemical elements of which 

 every block of marble is ultimately composed. 

 The "form" would disappear altogether. But in 

 this case the form means the Venus of Milo. 

 We see at once that we need another branch of 

 science and investigation besides anatomy and 

 chemistry: we need a morphology, or science of 

 the complete form in which the block of marble 

 is moulded into the Venus of Milo. In the case of 

 our work of art, morphology would be identical with 

 aesthetics, or at least with a branch of it. There 

 can be no doubt that the first and most imperative 

 need for the establishment of a special science of 

 morphology arises from artistic and aesthetic 

 feelings. It is not without significance that it 

 was founded by the poet Goethe, and elaborated 

 with such great success in the nineteenth century 

 by the born artist Haeckel. However, that does 

 not prevent the analogy of the Venus of Milo, 

 which happens to be a creation of human art, 

 being applied equally to every individualised form 

 in nature, to every crystal, plant, and animal. 

 Goethe himself immediately transferred his mor- 

 phology into the province of botany with such 

 vigour that the term is still regarded, in its 

 narrower sense, as a technical botanical expression. 

 It extends, however, to the whole world in so 

 far as its contents come before us in " forms." 

 When Haeckel adopted the term he deliberately 

 restricted it, in harmony with the general definition, 



