Place of Definition, etc., m Philosophical Biology 129 



pects of living nature are striking indeed, once one 

 comes to study his works with the point in mind. I 

 have searched, vainly, both in his own writings and in 

 those of several professed followers of his, for evidence 

 that the conceptions organism and organic, with the 

 meaning these terms have to every genuine natural 

 history biologist, enter in any definite and positive 

 fashion into his philosophy. And here is the point that 

 ought to arrest the attention of scientific men, indeed 

 of all thoughtful persons : So far as concerns this vital 

 matter the Nietzschean school is in strict accord with 

 the "habits of philosophying," now dominant in 

 biology. 



Listen to this, one of Nietzsche's "Apophthegms and 

 Darts" occurring in the "Twilight of the Idols": 



"I mistrust all systematizers and avoid them. The 

 will to system is a lack of rectitude." 



What a familiar sound this has to those who, from 

 being at home in the discussions of recent speculative 

 biology, have had dinned in their ears the doctrine that 

 systematic zoology and botany are old-fashioned, child- 

 ish and insignificant. Of course any one even moder- 

 ately acquainted with Nietzsche's writings knows that 

 what he was aiming at primarily in inveighing against 

 systems was the systems of traditional philosophy. 

 And undoubtedly, as Miigge remarks : "many have been 

 drawn to him for this very reason." Presumably most 

 persons, be they scientists or philosophers, be they 



