view of the results of research during the last forty years 

 any one can assert this as a "certain historical fact" and 

 can still wish to be credited with honest conviction and love 

 of truth, there remains, to adopt Haeckel's own expression, 

 but one explanation for this psychological enigma, namely, 

 intellectual marasmus senilis, which may very easily have 

 set in with a man of sixty-six, who himself complains (p. 7) 

 of "divers warnings of approaching age." 



Thus, the anthropological part of the "Weltraetsel" 

 contains nothing new; always the same old story, the same 

 threadbare assertions without a shred of evidence to cor- 

 roborate them. 



The remaining parts also contain various scientific as- 

 sertions, which are proposed as facts without being such, 

 but these parts do not immediately pertain to our theme. 

 Suffice it to say that, after reading Haeckel's "Weltraetsel," 

 one would be led to think that there is no question of a 

 "deathbed of Darwinism," but that on the contrary Dar- 

 winism, as remodeled by Haeckel, is more in the ascendant 

 to-day than ever. Let us judge of its prestige by the recep- 

 tion accorded the "Weltraetsel." 



One unaltered edition after the other, thousand after 

 thousand, the book is given to the public. Hence it must 

 meet with approval. It does indeed meet with approval, 

 but the question is, from whom? Immature college and 

 university students will doubtless receive it with rever- 

 ential awe, just as they received the "Natural History of 

 Creation" twenty-five years ago. Bebel accepts the book 



108 



