REFLECTIONS AND CONCLUSION. 379 



struments of precision which we now possess, but 

 they had a keenness of perception and a faculty for 

 getting at the heart of things, which probably have 

 never been equaled and certainly never surpassed. 

 At times, indeed, their intuition amounted almost to 

 divination, and instead of being simple votaries of 

 science, the philosophers of those days were rather 

 its prophets. 



Teachings of Greek Philosophers. 



No one can read of the achievements of Aristotle, 

 or recall his marvelous anticipations of modern dis- 

 coveries, without feeling that it was he who sup- 

 plied the germs of what subsequently became such 

 large and beautiful growths. As one of the greatest, 

 if not the greatest, of the world's intellects, he ac- 

 complished not only actually, but proleptically, far 

 more than is usually attributed to him, especially in 

 all that concerns the now famous theory of Evolu- 

 tion. He had, it is true, received aid and suggestions 

 from his predecessors, the lonians, Eleatics and 

 Pythagoreans ; he had found a stimulus in the specu- 

 lations of Heraclitus, Empedocles, Democritus and 

 Anaxagoras ; but his own researches and his remark- 

 able powers of generalization, enabled him to elimi- 

 nate what was erroneous in their views, and develop 

 what was true, in such a way that his success in this 

 respect has ever remained a matter of wonder. 



I have already alluded to the teachings of the 

 old Ionian schools regarding the origin of the inor- 

 ganic and organic worlds, and exhibited a few of 

 the many striking analogies which exist between 



