PROFESSOR VIRCHOW AND EVOLUTION. 633 
their own way. I, however, owe him a great deal, and am 
also in honor bound to acknowledge the debt. Few, per- 
haps, who are privileged to come into contact with that 
illustrious man have shown him a sturdier front than I 
have, or in discussing modern science have more frequently 
withstood him. But I could see that his contention at 
bottom always was that the human soul has claims and 
yearnings which physical science cannot satisfy. England 
to come will assuredly thank him for his affirmation of the 
ethical and ideal side of human nature. Be this as it may, 
at the period now reached in my story the feeling referred 
to was indefinitely strengthened, my whole life being at 
the same time rendered more earnest, resolute, and labo- 
rious by the writings of Carlyle. Others also ministered to 
this result. Emerson kindled me, while Fichte power- 
fully stirred my moral pulse.* In this relation I cared 
little for political theories or philosophic systems, but a 
great deal for tlie propagated life and strength of pure and 
powerful minds. In tnv later schooldays, under a clever 
teacher, some knowledge of mathematics and physics had 
been picked up: my stock of both was, however, scanty, 
and I resolved to augment it. But it was really with the 
view of learning whether mathematics and physics could 
help me in other spheres, rather than with the desire of 
acquiring distinction in either science, that I ventured, iu 
1848, to break the continuity of my life, and devote the 
meager funds then at my disposal to the study of science 
in Germany. 
But science soon fascinated me on its own account. To 
carry it duly and honestly out, moral qualities were in- 
cessantly invoked. There was no room allowed for insin- 
cerity no room even for carelessness. The edifice of 
science had been raised by men who had unswervingly 
followed the truth as it is in nature; and in doing so had 
often sacrificed interests which are usually potent in this 
world. Among these rationalistic men of Germany I 
found conscientiousness in work as much insisted on as it 
could be among theologians. And why, since they had 
not the rewards or penalties of the theologian to offer to 
* The reader will find in the seventeenth lecture of Fjchte's 
course on the " Characteristics of the Present Age " a sample of the 
vital power of this philosopher. 
