ON THE MORPHOLOGICAL VIEW OF NATURE. 219 



ous branches of natural science, and which can be best 

 characterised by the term morphology. 1 The word was is. 



Morphology 



first applied only to plants, then also to animals, and defined, 

 later still to crystals and minerals. The words quoted 

 above refer to the forms of inanimate nature, to crystals. 

 In all these cases we have to do with definite individual 

 objects, which can be removed from their surroundings 

 and examined in the laboratory. There is, however, no 

 reason why a study of the actual forms of nature on 

 a large scale, such as the physiognomy of landscape, the 

 configuration of mountains and valleys, the shapes of 

 glaciers, the actual distribution of land and water on our 

 globe, the stratification of rocks, the formation of clouds, 

 and many other things, should not all be comprised under 

 the term, the morphological view of nature. And con- 

 ceived in this larger sense, the study of nature as a whole 

 and in its separate parts had at the end of the eighteenth 

 century already made very important progress. In fact, 

 natural history had, in the course of that century, gradu- 

 ally emerged from the previous epoch, that of the purely 

 systematic and classificatory attempts, which aimed at 

 giving inventories, collecting specimens, and classifying 

 natural objects, naming, describing, and identifying them. 

 The interest of the latter was a practical one, frequently 



1 In the ' Legons sur les Phe"no- 

 menes de la Vie communs aux 

 Animaux et aux Ve'ge'taux,' a 

 work which did so much to break 

 down the older division of the 

 sciences which deal with animals 

 and vegetables separately, Claude 

 Bernard says (p. 333 of vol. i., 

 1885) : " Dans un autre equilibre 

 cosmique, la morphologic vitale 

 serait autre. Je pense, en un mot, 



qu'il existe virtuellement dans la 

 nature un nombre infini de formes 

 vivantes que nous ne connaissons 

 pas. Ces formes vivantes seraient 

 en quelque sorte dormantes ou 

 expectantes. . . . II en est ainsi 

 des corps nouveaux que forment 

 les chimistes ; ils ne les cre"ent pas, 

 ils e'taient virtuellement possibles 

 dans les lois de la nature." 



