64 HAECKEL 



with a certain steady and unerring independence 



of character. He made little noise, but he never 



swerved from his aim. What he accomplished 



with all these qualities, in many other provinces 



besides Darwinism, cannot be told here. It may 



be read in the history of zoology. He had, as far 



as such a thing was possible, a restful influence 



of the most useful character on Haeckel. If we 



imagine what Darwinism would have become in 



the nineteenth century in the hands of such men 



as Gegenbaur, without Haeckel, we can appreciate 



the difference in temperament between the two 



men. With Gegenbaur evolution was always a 



splendid new technical instrument that no layman 



must touch for fear of spoiling it. With Haeckel 



it became a devouring wave, that will one day, 



perhaps, give its name to the century. In other 



natures these differences might have led to open 



conflict. But Haeckel and Gegenbaur show us 



that, like so many of our supposed ^'differences," 



they can at least live together in perfect accord 



in the freshest years of life, each bearing fruit in 



its kind. 



• • • • • 



When we find Haeckel intimate in this way with 

 Gegenbaur, his senior by eight years, we realise 

 how close he was at that time to the whole of the 

 Wiirtzburg circle. The two generations were not 

 yet sharply divided, as they subsequently were. 

 Most of them fought either with or against him at 

 a later date, but they belonged, at all events, to 

 the same stratum. But the split between the two 



