LUCRETIUS AND HAECKEL 1 25 



will probably be profitable to take up first four phases of attack which 

 we may conveniently treat as preparatory, although Lucretius does not 

 so distinguish them from the three phases which we shall consider later. 



I. Examination of Metempsychosis* 



Lucretius: "Again if the nature of the soul is immortal and makes 

 its way into our body at the time of birth, why are we unable to remem- 

 ber besides the time already gone, and why do we retain no traces 

 of past actions? If the power of the mind has been so completely 

 changed, that all remembrance of past things is lost, that methinks 

 differs not widely from death; therefore you must admit that the soul 

 which was before has perished and that which now is has been formed. "^ 



Haeckel: "As Plato postulated an eternal life before as well as after 

 this temporary association [of body and soul], he must be classed as an 

 adherent of 'metempsychosis' or transmigration of souls; the soul 

 existed as such, or as an 'eternal idea, ' before it entered into a human 

 body. When it quits one body it seeks such other as is most suited 

 to its character for its habitation. The souls of bloody tyrants pass 

 into the bodies of wolves and vultures, those of virtuous toilers migrate 

 into the bodies of bees and ants, and so forth. The childish naivete 

 of this Platonic morality is obvious; on closer examination his views 

 are found to be absolutely incompatible with the scientific truth which 

 we owe to modern anatomy, physiology, histology, and ontogeny; 

 we mention them only because, in spite of their absurdity, they have 

 had a profound influence on thought and culture. "^ 



II. Examination of some Theories of Psychogenesis 



Lucretius: "Again if the quickened power of the mind is wont 

 to be put into us after our body is fully formed, at the instant of our 

 birth and our crossing the threshold of life, it ought, agreeably to this, 

 to live, not in such a way as to seem to have grown with the body and 

 together with its members within the blood, but as in a den apart by 

 and to itself: the very contrary of what undoubted fact teaches; for 



» This has been the subject of some of the finest Lucretian poetry, and any reader will be well repaid 

 both poetically and philosophically if he will renew his acquaintance with De R. N., Ill, 830-870. 

 ' De R. N., Ill, 670-678; c/. Ill, 740-77S- 

 3 WR., 197. Metempsychosis is again dismissed as a myth by Haeckel on p. 135. 



