THE WONDERS OF LIFE 



parallelism of Wundt or the psycho-monism of more 

 recent phj^siologists, which in the end issues in a com- 

 plete dualism of body and mind. It is otherwise 

 with practical idealism. When this presents the sym- 

 bols or ideals of a personal God, an immortal soul, 

 and the free-will as ethical stimuli, and uses them for 

 their pedagogical worth in the education of the young, 

 it may have a good influence for a time, which is in- 

 dependent of their theoretical untenability. 



The many branches of biology which have been 

 developed independently in the course of the nineteenth 

 century ought to remain in touch with one another, and 

 co-operate with a clear apprehension of their task, if 

 they are to attain their high purpose of framing a 

 unified science embracing the^ whole field of organic 

 life. Unfortunately, this common aim is often lost 

 sight of in the specialization of study; the philosophical 

 task is neglected in favor of the empirical. The con- 

 fusion that has ensued makes it desirable to tietermine 

 the mutual positions of the various biological disciplines. 

 I went into this somewhat fully in my academic speech 

 on the development and aim of zoology in 1869. But 

 as this essay is little known, I will briefly resume the 

 chief points of it. 



In correspondence with the long-established distinc- 

 tion between the plant and the animal, the two chief 

 branches of biology, zoology and botany, have developed 

 side by side, and are represented by two different chairs 

 in the universities. Independently of these, there arose 

 at the very beginning of scientific activity that field of 

 inquiry which deals with human life in all its aspects — . 

 the anthropological disciplines and the so-called "mental 

 sciences" (history, philology, psychology, etc.). Since 

 the theory of descent has proved man's origin from 

 vertebrate ancestors, and thus anthropology has been 

 recognized as a part of zoology, we have begun to im- 



92 



