58 Life and Matter [chap. Hi 



ledge of existence would seem to be 

 demanded for the success of any such 

 most ambitious attempt ; but, though 

 none of us may hope to achieve it, many 

 may strive to make some contribution 

 towards the great end ; and those who think 

 they have such a contribution to make, or 

 such a revelation entrusted to them, are 

 bound to express it to the best of their 

 ability, and leave it to their contemporaries 

 and successors to assimilate such portions of 

 it as are true, and to develop it further. 

 From this point of view Professor Haeckel 

 is no doubt amply justified in his writings ; 

 but, unfortunately, it appears to me that 

 although he has been borne forward on the 

 advancing wave of monistic philosophy, he 

 has, in its specification, attempted such pre- 

 cision of materialistic detail, and subjected 

 it to so narrow and limited a view of the 

 totality of experience, that the progress of 

 thought has left him, as well as his great 

 English exemplar, Herbert Spencer, some- 

 what high and dry, belated and stranded by 



