DOGMATIC METHODS OF TEACHING. 85 



any closer discussion of this specialist question, as I 

 felt not even approximately capable of solving it, and 

 I believe, in fact, that none but skilled and experienced 

 practical teachers can undertake the solution of it with 

 any success. 



For Virchow these specialist difficulties seem not to 

 exist; he regards my reticence as a mere " postponement 

 of the task," and he answers in the following astonish- 

 ing sentences : " If the theory of descent is as certain 

 as Herr Haeckel assumes, then we must demand 

 for it is a necessary consequence that it shall be 

 taught in schools. How is it conceivable that a 

 doctrine of such importance, which must effect such a 

 total revolution in all our mental consciousness, which 

 directly tends to create a new kind of religion, should 

 not be included in the school scheme of instruc- 

 tion ? How is it possible that such a revelation, 

 shall I say should be in any measure suppressed, 

 or that the promulgation of the greatest and most im- 

 portant advance which has been made in our views 

 during the present century should be left to the dis- 

 cretion of schoolmasters ? Ay, gentlemen, that would 

 indeed be a renunciation of the hardest kind, and 

 practically it could never be carried out ! Every 

 schoolmaster who assumes this doctrine for himself 

 will involuntarily teach it, how can it be otherwise ? " 



