GOETHE. 117 



With the word Species, we reach the most important 

 point in our account of Goethe's theory of nature ; if 

 indeed we have not .already unquestionably proved that 

 he can in no way be regarded as a true precursor 

 of Darwin. Darwin and his adherents maintain the 

 variability of the so-called vegetal and animal species. 

 The question is simply whether Goethe was or was 

 not, like his contemporary Lamarck, convinced of this 

 mutability. If he says on one occasion that "from 

 the seed, plants are developed, ever diverging and 

 variously determining the mutual relations of their 

 parts," this is ambiguous in itself; it may refer either 

 to the origin of new species, or to the variability of 

 species by nature immutable. Another time he speaks 

 of the " purpose of Nature " in the horse. 



I can find but one single passage in Goethe's writings 

 in which there is a question of an actual transformation 

 of a creature, if not into a new species, at least into a 

 very marked and persistent variety. In 1820, a Dr. 

 Korte gave a description of a primaeval bull found in 

 the neighbourhood of Halberstadt, and instituted com- 

 parisons and reflections, how under the influence of 

 domestication our highly modified cattle had been 

 evolved from the former. This relic, and another in 

 Thuringia (1821), which latter specimen was obtained 

 by him for the Museum at Jena, gave him an oppor- 

 tunity of coinciding with Korte, and of illustrating by an 

 actual incident, the possibility of this doubtless easy 

 transformation. 



But from this to the transformation of species there 

 is still a long way, and Goethe did not traverse it. We 

 have just seen that the idea of deriving single animals 



