THE *' GENERAL MORPHOLOGY" 207 



reformed philosophy that Haeckel gave to the 

 world. This becomes clearer at every step we take 

 in his work. 



The first book has determined the method that 

 leads to morphology, the science of forms. The 

 second has ranged the organic forms — protists, 

 plants, and animals — over against the inorganic or 

 " dead'' forms, as far as this is possible from the 

 new evolutionary point of view. We feel that the 

 third book will pass on to Darwin, and explain the 

 world of organic forms by the Darwinian laws of 

 evolution. Then the programme would be carried 

 out in its main features. 



But Haeckel writes two whole books before he 

 comes to this, and they are, perhaps, the most 

 characteristic in the work. He only *' adopted*' 

 the theory of evolution in the sense that he applied 

 it far more thoroughly than Darwin to practical 

 problems. In these two books he is entirely him- 

 self. They are, at the same time, the most diffi- 

 cult in the work. Even to-day they place him on 

 a lofty and lonely height apart from the great and 

 strenuous controversy over Darwinism. I believe 

 that the time will yet come that will fully appre- 

 ciate these books. Through them Haeckel will 

 play a part in philosophy of which we have at 

 present no prevision. 



There is a word that is inseparable from the 

 word *' form " — individuality. Morphology, which 

 does not analyse, but studies the form-unities as a 

 whole in the sense of Goethe's definition, comes 

 from the nature of things to deal with the indi- 



