THE STKUCTUKE OF MAN 



INTRODUCTION 



SOME thirty-four years have elapsed since the publication of 

 Charles Darwin's work On the Origin of Species ly Means of 

 Natural Selection. A short period of time, and yet important 

 enough to throw into the shade all previous centuries, so profound 

 is the significance of the results obtained in it, in the field of 

 Natural Science. 



Darwin's book brought about a reformation not only of 

 Zoology, but of our whole knowledge of surrounding Nature. It 

 marked, in fact, the commencement of a new epoch, and of a new 

 cosmology. This has been said so often and demonstrated so 

 thoroughly, that the topic need not be further enlarged upon 

 here. I cannot, however, refrain from briefly sketching the 

 condition of the natural sciences during the last two centuries, 

 since it is only on such a background that a correct picture of 

 the enormous transformation which has since been effected in the 

 intellectual life of all cultured nations can be obtained. 



In spite of the great discoveries made, in the sixteenth and 

 seventeenth centuries, by such men as Kepler, Newton, Harvey, 

 Schwammerdam, Malpighi, and Leeuwenhoeck, the Aristotelian 

 philosophy, which had been stirred to new life at the period of the 

 Reformation, was universally accepted. Its exegetical principle 

 rested on the assumption of the existence of an intelligent design, 

 to which the phenomena of nature were subordinated. The 

 teleological speculations which arose out of it, and the resulting 

 anthropocentric and anthropomorphic cosmology, outlived the 

 centuries named. Indeed, in spite of all progress in science, they 

 continued to count many of their most brilliant advocates among 

 distinguished scientific men, even into the fifties of the present 

 century. This philosophy was deeply rooted in human vanity, 

 .v B 



I 



