Until a short time ago it was believed that the derivation of man’s life from inferior stages of animal life would not be difficult to prove; but at present, while many still adhere to the theory that man has developed from the brute, the conviction is steadily gaining ground that it cannot be scientifically proved and that it becomes more and more difficult to disprove man’s higher origin. Unable to withstand the force of facts, one hypothesis gives place to another: what had to be found could not be found, living or extinct links between the brute and man refused to appear anywhere, and those which people thought they had found, turned out to be unsuitable. _Kohlbrugge_ concludes his criticism of the recent theories of the evolution of the body of man from lower animals with the confession: “The above summary is enough to convince everybody that we do not know anything distinct about the great problem of evolution; we have not yet seen its face. All must be done over again” (Die Morpholog. Abstammung des Menschen, 1908, 88). _Virchow_ said at the anthropological congress of Vienna, 1889: “When we met at Innsbruck twenty years ago Darwinism had just finished its first triumphal march through the world, and my friend _Vogt_ became its ardent champion. We have searched in vain for the missing link connecting man directly with the ape.” What has become of those anatomic-morphologic links between man and beast, the _pithecanthropus erectus_, the man dug out at Neandertal, Spy, Schipka, La Naulette, and Krapina, and shown with great confidence to the world? What has become of the prehistoric man, said to belong to the glacial period of Europe, and to have ranked far below the present man? _J. Kohlmann_ writes: “I wish to state that I thoroughly adhere to the theory of evolution, but my own experience has led me to the result that man has not changed his racial characteristics since the glacial period. He appears on the soil of Europe physically complete, and there is no ape-man to be found” (apud _Ranke_, Ibid. 480). Prof. _Branco_, director of the Palæontological Institute of Berlin, says: “Palæontology tells us nothing about the missing link. This science knows of no ancestors of man” (at the 5th international Zoological Congress, 1901, _Wasmann_, Die mod. Biolog. 3, p. 488). And the palæontologist _Zittel_ says: “The missing link between man and ape, though a postulate of the theory of evolution, has not been found” (_Ranke_, l. c. 504). _E. Grosse_ concludes his studies on evolution with the significant words: “I began this book with the intention of writing a history of the evolution of the family, and I finish it convinced that at present the writing of that history is impossible for me or for anybody else” (Die Formen der Familie, 1896, Vorwort).