44 AMONG THE GREEKS. 



required for an initiatory start, as compared with more advanced 

 departments of theory, will acknowledge what I have achieved 

 and pardon what I have left for others to accomplish." 



In the Physics and in the Natural History of 

 Animals, are contained Aristotle's views of Nature 

 and his remarkable observations upon the plant 

 and animal kingdoms. He was thoroughly versed 

 in old Greek philosophy, and begins many of his 

 treatises with a history of opinion, after the modern 

 German fashion. He frequently quotes and dis- 

 cusses the opinions of Empedocles, Parmenides, 

 Democritus, Heraclitus, Anaxagoras, and others. 

 He undoubtedly inherited his taste for science from 

 the line of physicians upon his father's side, perhaps 

 from the Asclepiads, who are said to have practised 

 dissection. He was attracted to natural history by 

 his boyhood life upon the seashore, and the main 

 parts of his ideas upon Evolution were evidently 

 drawn from his own observations upon the grada- 

 tions between marine plants and the lower and 

 higher forms of marine animals. , He wa s the first 

 to conceive of a genetic series, and his conception 

 of a single chain of evolution from the polyps to 

 man was never fully replaced until the beginning 

 of this century. It appeared over and over again 

 in different guises. In all his philosophy of Nature, 

 Aristotle was guided partly by his preconceived 

 opinions derived from Plato and Socrates, and 

 partly by convictions derived from his own obser- 

 vations upon the wonderful order and perfection 



