THE EVOLUTION IDEA 155 



admired also by Kielmeyer, and he undoubtedly 

 exercised great influence upon Goethe. Isidore 

 St. Hilaire pays him a high tribute, and speaks 

 at length of the admiration felt for Schelling in 

 France ; he places him midway between the gen- 

 eral philosopher, typified by the more metaphysi- 

 cal writers, and the philosopher of natural ob- 

 jects, such as Geoffroy St. Hilaire. Schelling 

 independently arrived at the conclusion of Kiel- 

 meyer that all the functions of life are but the 

 diverse modifications of a single force. 



We here meet with a natural culmination of 

 the progress of the evolution idea among the 

 natural philosophers, caused by the departure of 

 Schelling and Herder from induction and ob- 

 servation. 



Schelling's method was purely deductive, and 

 he sought in deduction the main sources of 

 human knowledge. At the point of empiricism, 

 where according to Cuvier, science ends, he held 

 that true science begins. By this he meant, that 

 if the human reason can question and answer 

 upon its own existence and upon its relations to 

 the Creator, it can also answer upon all creation ; 

 it can comprehend and reconstruct the order of 

 the universe. "To philosophize upon Nature, it is 

 to create Nature." 



Because the hypothesis springs from the mind 

 and is merely tested by experiment, he places the 



