GROWTH OF IDEAS 265 



probability, were delighted to find these issues 

 decisively established by the plain facts of science. 

 On the other hand, those who would have none of 

 Haeckel's philosophy now felt compelled, in view 

 of this dreadful work, to call these alleged facts of 

 science themselves into question. In face of this 

 hostility it was some disadvantage that the History 

 of Creation contained a vast amount of technical 

 material (such as the genealogical trees, the Dar- 

 winian laws, the explanation of the facts of embry- 

 ology, &c.) that could only be presented summarily 

 in it, while the proper technical description and 

 justification of them was buried in the thick 

 volumes of the Morphology, Haeckel said, over 

 and over again, that a certain thing had been so 

 fully established by him scientifically in the other 

 work that he was now at liberty to take it as a 

 fact ; and he accordingly built it up as such with- 

 out prejudice into the compact structure of the 

 popular work. Eeaders who wanted to go further 

 into the discussion of these facts had to look up the 

 relevant passages in the larger book. But the 

 great bulk of his opponents — amongst whom we 

 must count even many professional scientists — had 

 never read the two volumes of the Morphology. 

 They merely took the brief statement in the History 

 of Creation^ which was really little more than a 

 reference, and made a violent attack on the ^' fact " 

 it was said to convey. ' 



This led to a great deal of confusion. As in this 

 case a controversy over some petty zoological 

 detail was always a '' struggle about God," and so 



