OUTLINE OF BIOLOGICAL PROGRESS Il 
Alexander the Great. Like other scholars of his time, he 
covered a wide range of subjects; we have mention, indeed, 
of about three hundred works of his composition, many of 
which are lost. He wrote on philosophy, metaphysics, psy- 
chology, politics, rhetoric, etc., but it was in the domain of 
natural history that he attained absolute pre-eminence. 
His Position in the Development of Science.—It is mani- 
festly unjust to measure Aristotle by present standards; we 
must keep always in mind that he was a pioneer, and that 
he lived in an early day of science, when errors and crudities 
were to be expected. His greatest claim to eminence in the 
history of science is that he conceived the things of importance 
and that he adopted the right method in trying to advance 
the knowledge of the natural universe. In his program 
of studies he says: “ First we must understand the phenomena 
of animals; then assign their causes; and, finally, speak of 
their generation.” His position in natural history is fre- 
quently misunderstood. One of the most recent writers on 
the history of science, Henry Smith Williams, pictures him 
entirely as a great classifier, and as the founder of systematic 
zoélogy. While it is true that he was the founder of sys- 
tematic zodlogy, as such he did not do his greatest service 
to natural history, nor does the disposition to classify repre- 
sent his dominant activity. In all his work classification is 
made incidental and subservient to more important considera - 
tions. His observations upon structure and development, 
and his anticipation of the idea of organic evolution, are the 
ones upon which his great fame rests. He is not to be remem- 
bered as a man of the type of Linnzus; rather is he the fore- 
runner of those men who looked deeper than Linnzus into 
the structure and development of animal life—the mor- 
phologists. 
Particular mention of his classification of animals will 
be found in the chapter on Linnzus, while in what follows 
