FROM LAMARCK TO ST. HILAIRE 273 



lows: "These structures, which in lower organ- 

 isms are developed in stronger measure, and in 

 man, in spite of his higher organism, are not 

 wholly lost." It was this interpretation, as a 

 working hypothesis, which led to Goethe's most 

 brilliant achievement in comparative anatomy 

 above described, namely, his prediction of the 

 discovery of intermaxillary bones in man. This 

 raised a storm of opposition among contem- 

 porary anatomists which now seems hardly cred- 

 ible, in spite of which Goethe succeeded in veri- 

 fying his prediction. 



Thus, Goethe stepped from observation to 

 generahzation and from generalization to the 

 working hypothesis, which he turned into use as 

 the guide to fresh research. He advanced upon 

 the truly modern scientific method; yet he al- 

 ways preserved the proper balance between ob- 

 servation and generalization. He said that if he 

 had once held Kant's conception of lineal descent 

 or filiation, as deduced by reason, and could have 

 undertaken lines of inquiry, nothing would have 

 prevented him from carrying out its proofs. 



He was superior to all of his three contem- 

 poraries — Lamarck, St. Hilaire, and Trevira- 

 nus — in his realization that certain problems 

 were very far from solution; in a work, written 

 in 1794-95 but not published until long after- 

 ward, he remarked that "the question for future 



