NEWSPAPER CONTROVERSIES 51 



Hooker. But Darwin's letter saying a word in his own defence, 

 while attacking the ' monstrous article ' on Heterogeny (the 

 author of which was Owen himself), only brought forth another 

 skilful appeal to popular prejudice (see C.D. iii. 17-23, and 

 M:L. i. 242). 



The whole thing was utterly repugnant to Hooker, who 

 wrote (May 1863) : 



I cannot abide this lugging of science before the public 

 in Times and Athenceum, and implore you, my dear fellow, 

 not to do so again. Owen's answer to you is triumphant 

 in the eyes of the public (whom you wish to enlighten) as 

 Manchester's over Natal. The only party that gains by these 

 discussions is the proprietor of the paper ; the only one 

 that loses every way is the maintainer of truth. Science 

 will be much more respected if it keeps its discussions within 

 its own circle. 



Similarly, when in 1864 Professor Kolliker 1 wrote a review of 

 the ' Origin,' entirely misconceiving several of Darwin's main 

 positions, and Darwin was strongly inclined to reply, Hooker 

 wrote (September 5) : 



I did not mean that it was beneath your dignity or really 

 below the dignity of your subject to answer Kolliker, but 

 what I think is, that when such subjects are dragged into 

 periodicals for discussion the public are apt to form a low 

 opinion of them and their disputants. The subject is a 



certain of his striking homologies, as in cell development and the relations of 

 heat and light, this kind of transcendentalism was a matter of vague suggestion, 

 not of solid science. With some limitations, Oken's ideas were taken up by 

 Richard Owen in his theory of the archetype and the doctrine that the skull is 

 a virtu.' 1 repetition of certain vertebrae. But in his method of claiming to be 

 the discoverer of the true theory Owen placed himself in a very equivocal 

 position. 



1 Rudolph Albert von Kolliker (1817-1901 ?), anatomist and embryologist. 

 He studied natural sciences at Zurich, Bonn, and Berlin, and was appointed 

 Professor of Physiology and Comparative Anatomy at Zurich in 1845, and in 

 1847 took the chair of Anatomy at Wurzburg. Among his principal works is 

 his Handbuch der Gewebelehre des Menschen, Die Siphonophora oder Schwimm- 

 polypen von Messina, the Challenger Report on Pennatulida, and Entwickelungs- 

 geschichte des Menschen u. d. hoheren Thiere. In association with Von Siebold* 

 he started the Zeitschrift fur Wissenschaftliche Zoologie, and in 1858 published 

 with E. Pelikan Physiologischtoxikologische Untersuchung uber die Wirkung 

 des alkoholischen Extractes der Tanghinia venenifera. 



