266 HAECKEL 



agitated the opponent down to the most secret folds 

 of his philosophy, the usual consequences did not 

 fail to put in an appearance. Haeckel was branded 

 and calumniated personally. There has never 

 been any apostle in the world that some sect or 

 other has not decried as a rogue and evil-doer, 

 simply because he was an apostle. Wherever 

 Haeckel has made use of any material that did 

 not seem to be absolutely sound in every respect, 

 he was not simply accused of making a mistake, 

 not even of ignorance, but the whole thing has 

 been put down at once to dishonesty and the 

 worst type of bad faith. 



One should bear in mind how very generally 

 pioneer work of this kind is liable to err. Further, 

 in the History of Creation there is the danger 

 involved in the popular presentation of the results 

 of scientific research. Any man who has written 

 popular works, or delivered lectures to the general 

 public, knows what this means. There is little 

 common measure between them. The truths of 

 science are in a state of constant flux ; it is of their 

 essence to be so. To fish out a piece from this 

 stream, fix it, and magnify it for the public with a 

 broad beam of light, really amounts in principle to 

 an alteration of it ; it is putting a certain pressure 

 on things, and giving them an arbitrary shape. 

 The work of popularising truths is so holy a thing 

 in its aim that this risk has to be run. We must 

 take things as they are. We have two alternatives : 

 either not to popularise at all, or to take the 

 apparatus with all its defects. We can diminish 



