GOETHE. 



107 



of a higher research unknown to the pure systematizers. 

 Goethe elaborated this idea in his own mind on the basis 

 of a certainly remarkable special knowledge of organic 

 matter, and undeniably reached the threshold of the solu- 

 tion. That his scientific activity was a necessary effusion 

 of his nature, I have demonstrated in the treatises here 

 cited. Additional evidence has been given by Helmholtz 

 and Virchow. 



Goethe's notes on his position towards nature, and his 

 researches, comprise a period of more than fifty years. 

 About the year 1780, there appears, under the title of 

 " Die Natur," a sort of Hymn to Nature, concluding with 

 the beautiful words which make him seem a pure 

 Pantheist: " She placed me in it; she will also lead me 

 forth; I trust myself to her. She may dispose of me. 

 She will not hate her work. I spake not of her. No, 

 whatever is true and whatever is false, she spake it all. 

 All is her fault, and all is her merit." And shortly be- 

 fore his death, in March, 1832, he threw his whole soul 

 into the scientific controversy as to the different methods 

 of the investigation of nature and the fundamental prin- 

 ciples of study, which rose high in the midst of the 

 French Academy between the two renowned representa- 

 tives of the inductive and deductive tendencies, Cuvier 

 and Geofifroy St. Hilaire. What Goethe here laid down 

 in the evening of his days, is a sort of scientific profes- 

 sion of faith, and it inspires the greatest admiration to 

 behold the venerable octogenarian standing on the pin- 

 nacle of time, and above all parties, with the same prin- 

 ciples which with his own powers he had framed for 

 himself five-and-forty years before, in the prime of man- 

 hood. 



