At the Deathbed of Darwinism: A Series of PapersDennert, Eberhard
Philosophy
At the Deathbed of Darwinism: A Series of Papers
Dennert, Eberhard
Evolution; Natural selection
regarding the "Thoughts," betray his inability to understand the book.
But as I stated in the preface it was a difficult book to read and
understand. It is obviously not reading matter for shallow minds. I
refer Schmidt to the biography of Romanes, published by his wife, (The
Life and Letters of G. J. Romanes, London, Longmans, Green & Co.,
1898), where he will find Romanes' religious development described by a
well-informed hand. This development began as early as 1878, hence
during the time of his intimate friendship with Darwin. In this book on
pages 372 and 378 Schmidt will also find the words in which,
_before_ his death, Romanes begged that, if he were personally
unable to publish the "Thoughts," they should be given to his friend
Canon Gore after his own death. But why waste so many words on Mr.
Schmidt, for since all these things must be doubly disagreeable and
painful to him and Haeckel, he will very probably resort without delay
to personal insinuation and accuse Mrs. Romanes of forgery.
To us, however, who thoroughly appreciate the situation, it is a matter
of great moment that of one of the few really eminent naturalists, to
whom Haeckel thought to be able to lay full and exclusive claim, for
the last twenty years of his life should have been moving towards the
Christian faith in his eager search for truth and should die not a
monist, but a convinced Christian. Neither did he die an old man, to
whom the adherents of monism would certainly have the effrontery to
impute feeble-mindedness, but at the early age of forty-six years. Nor
was his a sudden deathbed conversion--an impression which Schmidt
attempts to create (p. 62) in order to be able with H. Heine to
relegate the conversion to the domain of pathology--but followed after
many years of diligent and honest study and research. The other point
of which we must treat here, is the manner in which, after the example
of Dr. Reh, Schmidt attempts in the "Umschau" to exonerate Haeckel in
the matter of the "History of the three cliches." To begin with, it is
at the very least dishonest on the part of Schmidt to say that, "in
default of scientific arguments, theological adversaries have for the
last thirty years been using it as the basis of their attacks." That is
untrue, the "theological adversaries" have not had knowledge of it for
that length of time. On the contrary Haeckel's own scientific
colleagues were the first to discover and publish the matter some time
in the seventies, and in consequence excluded Haeckel from their
circle. Why does Schmidt not mention here the names of Ruetimeyer, His,
and Semper? Furthermore Schmidt writes as if Haeckel had satisfied his
colleagues in the matter of his forgery by declaring soon after (1870)
that he had been "guilty of a very ill-considered act of folly." Why
does Schmidt not mention the fact that the weighty attacks of His (Our
Bodily Form and the Physiological Problem of its Origin, Leipzig, 1875)
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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