x THE PROBLEM OF EVOLUTION 



Philharmonic Hall had been engaged by my agents 

 in Berlin for the days mentioned in the syllabus, 

 whereas the dissolution took place on December 13th. 

 It is therefore quite impossible that the Jesuits 

 should have had any previous knowledge of the 

 new political combination, and yet Dr. David 

 v. Hansemann, who was formerly Rudolf Virchow's 

 assistant, contributed to the Vossische Zeitung of 

 February 26th, 1907, an article signed with his 

 name, and entitled ' Quidquid id est, timeo Danaos 

 et dona f erentes ! ' From it I quote the following 

 passage : 



' Herr Wasmann is, in fact, the branch smeared with bird- 

 lime which is designed to catch a multitude of bullfinches, 

 who set the tone of public opinion. People are to be in- 

 duced to believe that men who have such liberal opinions 

 cannot possibly constitute a public danger. I will even go 

 so far as to express the opinion that the Jesuit Order did 

 not send Herr Wasmann here with this general inten- 

 tion, but that the actual political situation suggested to 

 the Jesuits the idea of despatching him to Berlin at this 

 particular time. Apparently he brings with him a gift, a 

 form of scientific enlightenment, a gift intended to serve 

 as an intellectual bribe, giving men an impulse in a direc- 

 tion to which hitherto most energetic resistance has been 

 offered. By means of this wooden horse, the Jesuits hope 

 to gain a footing in the land in which, above all others, the 

 freedom of science has been most highly respected. We 

 shall fare as did the Trojans of old. If this gift brings our 

 enemies into the country, they will do their utmost to take 

 root and to exert their injurious influence with the reckless 

 tendency to destruction which characterises them, just as 

 did the Greeks in Troy. Therefore again I say : Quidquid 

 id est, timeo Danaos et dona f erentes ! ' 



