216 



SCIENTIFIC THOUGHT. 



37. 

 Biology 

 grown out 

 of science 

 and philo- 

 sophy com- 

 bined. 



sical sciences have been most affected by the spirit of 

 Kant's philosophy, which has ineradicably engrained in 

 the German mind the necessity of a criticism of the 

 principles of knowledge. Ever and anon some of the 

 most brilliant intellects in mathematics and science have 

 reverted to the same problems, and, on the whole, they 

 have confirmed the position taken up by Kant a cen- 

 tury ago. 



It was thus under the influence of the exact methods 

 of experiment and calculation taught by the great French 

 school in the beginning of the century, and at the same 

 time through the philosophical spirit peculiar to German 

 science, that in the middle of the century the different 

 sciences which deal with the phenomena of life and con- 

 sciousness were remodelled. The great science of biology, 

 based upon mechanical principles, was thus created, and 

 the results gained in it brilliantly applied to the reorgan- 

 isation of the medical profession. But this great reform 

 does not belong exclusively to one great name ; it is the 

 work of a long line of thinkers : nor can I conceive that 

 the exclusive employment of the methods of exact re- 

 search would have so effectually brought it about, unaided 

 by the philosophical, historical, and critical spirit which 

 formed the peculiar characteristic of German thought 

 before the exact methods had been generally introduced. 

 And just because this reform required to be effected from 

 so many different beginnings, and gradually elaborated 

 and defended before it became firmly established, do the 

 modern sciences of physiology and pathology deserve to 

 be termed pre-eminently German sciences ; for no other 



