Here
under follows the transcription of chapter 9B2 of Houston Stewart
Chamberlain's The
Foundations of the 19th Century, 2nd ed., published by John Lane,
The
Bodley Head, 1912.
CONTENTS
|
293
2. SCIENCE (From Roger Bacon to
Lavoisier)
OUR
SCIENTIFIC METHODS
The difference between science and the raw material of knowledge, which
is supplied by discovery, has already been pointed out, and I refer the
reader to the discussion on p.
236; I also called attention to the boundary-line between science
and
philosophy. The fact that sharp distinguishing-lines can never be drawn
without some arbitrary differentiation does not in any way invalidate
the
principle of separation. Even the sciences, that is, our new Teutonic
scientific
methods, have taught us another lesson. Leibniz might for all that
again
adopt the so-called law of continuity and carry it to its extreme
consequences;
in practice we dispense with metaphysical proof, for even experience
shows
us on all sides a gradual merging and blending. * But in order to build
up science we must distinguish, and the correct differentiation is that
which holds good in practice. Nature, of course, knows no such
separation;
that does not matter; nature knows no science either; it is
differentiation
in the material supplied by nature, followed by reuniting according to
humanly comprehensible principles, that in general forms science.
- Dich im
Unendlichen
zu finden,
- Musst
unterscheiden
und dann verbinden. †
*
Naturally
I am at this moment leaving the purely mathematical out of account: for
in that sphere it was certainly a remarkable, epoch-making achievement,
so to transform the idea of the Continuous and “to separate it from the
geometrical conception, that we could use it for purposes of
calculation“
(Gerhardt: Geschichte der Mathematik in Deutschland, 1877, p.
144).
† To comprehend the Infinite, you must distinguish and then unite.
294 SCIENCE
That is why I
appealed
to Bichat at the beginning of this section. If the classification of
tissues
which he taught had been revealed by nature as classification, it would
have been known from the earliest times; but this is far from being the
case, for the distinctions proposed by Bichat have been considerably
modified
since; as a matter of fact, we find everywhere transitional stages
between
the kinds of tissue, some of them perfectly obvious, others which
reveal
themselves only to minuter observation; and thus thoughtful
investigators
have been forced to experiment, till they were able to fix the exact
point
where the needs of the human intellect and respect for the facts of
nature
harmoniously counterbalance each other. This point can be determined —
not, it is true, at once, but by practical experience; for in its
methods
science is guided by two considerations, it has to store up as capital
what is known, and it has to see that this capital bears interest in
the
form of new knowledge. It is by this standard that the work of a Bichat
is measured; for here, as elsewhere, genius does not invent, it does
not
create out of nothing, but shapes what is present. As Homer moulded the
popular poetry, so Bichat gave shape to anatomy; and the same method is
necessary in every department of knowledge. *
This purely
methodological
remark, meant only to justify my own procedure, has obviously brought
us
to the heart of the subject; indeed I think we have already unwittingly
laid our finger upon the central point.
I have already
pointed
out that, while the Hellenes may be superior to us as theorists, they
are
certainly inferior as observers. Now theorising and systematising is
nothing
else than the shaping work of science. If we do not shape — that is to
say, if we do not theorise and
* See
vol. i. p. 42 f. The
suffix
schaft
in Wissenschaft (science) denotes to order, to form (Eng.
shape);
science, therefore, means the shaping of the Known.
295 SCIENCE
systematise —
we can only assimilate a minimum of knowledge; it flows through our
brain
as through a sieve. However, the process of shaping is not without its
drawbacks; for, as pointed out in Bichat's case, this shaping is
essentially
human, that is, in reference to nature it is a mere one-sided and
inadequate
beginning. The natural sciences * themselves reveal the nullity of the
gross anthropomorphism of all the Hegels in the world. It is not true
that
the human intellect can adequately grasp phenomena; the sciences prove
the contrary; every one whose mind has been trained in the school of
observation
knows that. Even the much profounder conception of a Paracelsus, who
called
surrounding nature the “outer man,“ may, it is true, attract us from
the
point of view of philosophy, but it will be found to be,
scientifically,
of little use; for whenever I have to deal with empirical facts, my
innermost
heart is a muscle and my thought the function of a grey and white mass
encased within a skull: so far as the life of my inner personality is
concerned,
this is all just as “external“ as any of those stars, whose light,
according
to Wm. Herschel, requires two million years to reach my eye. If then
nature
is perhaps in a certain sense an “outer man,“ as Paracelsus and after
him
Goethe say, that, from the purely scientific point of view, brings her
not one inch nearer to me and to my circumscribed and specifically
human
understanding; for man too is merely an “external.“
- Nichts ist
drinnen,
nichts ist draussen:
- Denn was
innen, das
ist aussen. †
Hence all scientific systematising and theorising is a fitting and
adapting;
of course it is as accurate as
* I have already pointed out that all genuine science is natural
science
(p. 237 f.).
† Nothing is within, nothing is without: for what is within is without.
296
SCIENCE
possible, but
never quite free from error, and, above all, it is always a humanly
tinted
rendering, translating, interpreting. The Hellene did not know this.
Unrivalled
as a modeller, in science too he demanded the Faultless, the perfectly
Rounded, and thus barred in his own face the door that led to knowledge
of nature. True observation becomes impossible as soon as man marches
forward
with one-sided human demands; the example of the great Aristotle should
warn us against that. Nothing will convince us more thoroughly on this
point than the study of mathematics; here at once we observe what
hampered
the Hellenes and what has aided us. The achievements of the Hellenes in
geometry are known to all; but it is very interesting to notice how the
triumphant progress of their mathematical investigation encountered an
insurmountable obstacle in its further development. Hoefer calls
attention
to the nature of this obstacle by pointing out that a Greek
mathematician
never tolerated an “approximately“: for him the proof of the
proposition
had to be absolutely faultless or it was invalid; the conception that
two
magnitudes differing “infinitely“ little can in practice be regarded as
equal is something against which his whole nature would have revolted.
*
It is true that Archimedes in his investigations of the properties of
the
circle inevitably came upon results that could not be exactly
expressed,
but he then says simply, “greater than so much and less than so much“;
and he expresses no opinion about the irrational roots, which he had to
extract to get at his results. On the other hand, all modern
mathematics
with their almost incomprehensible achievements, are based, as we all
* Histoire des mathématiques, 4th ed. p. 206.
There
the reader will find an excellent example of how the Greek preferred
the
reductio
ad absurdum, which was not directly convincing, because purely
logical,
rather than follow the path of evident, strictly mathematical proof, in
which an “infinite approximation“ is regarded as equality.
297 SCIENCE
know, upon
calculations
with “infinitely near,“ that is, therefore, approximate values. By this
“Infinitesimal Calculus“ the broad impenetrable forest of irrational
numbers
that blocked our way at every step has been felled; * for the great
majority
of roots and of so-called “functions“ which occur in the measurement of
angles and curves come under this head. But for this introduction of
approximate
values our whole astronomy, geodesy, physics, mechanics and very
important
parts of our industry would be impossible. And how was this revolution
brought about? By boldly cutting a knot which is tied in the human
brain
alone. This knot could never have been untied. In this very province,
that
of mathematics, where everything seemed so transparent and free from
contradiction,
man had very soon reached the limit of his specific human
possibilities;
he saw quite well that nature does not trouble herself about what is
humanly
thinkable and unthinkable, and that the brain of the proud homo
sapiens
is inadequate to grasp and to express the very simplest thing — the
relation
of magnitudes to one another; but what did it matter? As we have seen,
the passion of the Teuton aimed rather at possession than at purely
formal
shaping; his shrewd observation of nature, his highly developed
receptivity
soon convinced him that the formal faultlessness of the image in the
mind
is absolutely no conditio sine qua non
* Irrational numbers are such as can never be expressed quite
accurately,
that is to say, in the language of arithmetic, such as contain an
irrational
fraction; among them there is a large number of the most important
quantities
that constantly occur in all calculations, e.g., the square
roots
of most numbers, the relation of the diagonals to the side of a square,
of the diameter of a circle to its circumference, &c. The latter
quantity,
the π of the mathematicians,
has already been calculated to two hundred decimal places; we might
calculate
it to two millions, it would still be only an approximation. This
simple
example will prove in a thoroughly tangible manner the organic
inadequacy
of the human intellect, its incapacity to express even quite simple
relations.
(See vol. i. p. 432
for
the contribution of the Indo-Aryans to the investigation of irrational
numbers.)
298 SCIENCE
for its
possession,
that is, in this case, for an understanding which is as comprehensive
as
possible. The important thing with the Greek was the respect of man for
himself and for his human nature; to cherish thoughts which were not
thinkable
in all parts seemed to him a crime against human nature; the Teuton, on
the other hand, had a much more vivid reverence for nature (in contrast
to man) than the Hellene, and moreover, like his Faust, he has never
been
afraid of contracts with the devil. And so he invented the imaginary
magnitudes,
that is, absolutely unthinkable quantities, the type of which is
x = √-1
In handbooks
they
are usually defined as “magnitudes that exist only in the imagination;“
it would be perhaps more correct to say, magnitudes which can occur
anywhere
except in the imagination, for man is incapable of conceiving them at
all.
Through this brilliant discovery of the Goths and Lombards of the
extreme
north of Italy * calculation received an unsuspected elasticity: the
absolutely
unthinkable henceforth served to determine the relations of concrete
facts,
which otherwise could not have been tackled. The complementary step was
soon taken: where one magnitude approaches “infinitely“ near to another
without ever reaching it, the gap was arbitrarily bridged, and over
this
bridge man marched from the sphere of the Impossible into the sphere of
the Possible. Thus, for example, the insoluble problems of the circle
were
solved by regarding the latter as a polygon with an “infinite“ number
of
sides, all therefore infinitely small. Pascal had already spoken
* Niccolo, called Tartaglia (i.e., the stutterer), of Brescia,
and
Cardanus of Milan; both flourished in the first half of the sixteenth
century.
But here, as in the case of the calculus, fluxions, &c., we can
hardly
name definite inventors, for the necessity of solving astronomical and
physical problems (which the geographical discoveries had propounded)
suggested
similar thoughts to the most various individuals.
299 SCIENCE
of magnitudes
which are “smaller than any given magnitude“ and had designated them quantités
négligeables; * but Newton and Leibniz went much further, in
that they systematically perfected calculation with these infinite
series
— the infinitesimal calculation to which I have referred. The advance
thus
made was simply incalculable; for the first time ever mathematics were
redeemed from rigidity to life, for the first time they were enabled to
analyse accurately not only motionless shape but also motion. Moreover,
irrational numbers were now, in a way, done away with, since we can
now,
when necessary, avoid them. But this was not all, an idea — the idea of
the Infinite — which had formerly been current only in philosophy, was
henceforth extended to mathematics and acted like an elixir which gave
them the strength to achieve unheard-of things. Just as it may happen
that
two magnitudes approach “infinitely“ near to each other, so it may also
happen that the one increases or decreases “infinitely,“ while the
other
remains constant: thus the infinitely great † and the infinitely small
— two absolutely inconceivable things — may now also become workable
components
of our calculations: we cannot think them, but we can use them, and
from
their use we derive concrete, pre-eminently practical results. Our
knowledge
of nature, our capacity even to approach many natural problems, rests
to
a very great extent upon this one daring, autocratic achievement. As
Carnot
says: “No other idea has supplied us with so simple and effectual means
of acquiring an accurate
* Saint-Beuve expresses the significant opinion that this daring man
“formed
in himself a second Frankish invasion of Gaul.“ In him the purely
Teutonic
spirit asserts itself once more against the Chaos of Peoples, that was
flooding France, and its chief organ, the Order of the Jesuits.
† The infinitely great is introduced into mathematics as unity divided
by an infinitely small number. Concerning this supposition Berkeley
remarks:
“It is shocking to good sense“: so it is, but it serves a practical
purpose
and that is the important thing.
300 SCIENCE
knowledge of
nature's
laws. * The ancients had said, Non entis nulla sunt praedicta
(Of
things that are not nothing can be said); but that which is not within
our head may well exist outside our head, and, vice versa,
things
which undoubtedly exist only in the human brain and are nevertheless
recognised
by us to be flagrantly “impossible“ may as instruments do us very good
service, enabling us defiantly to gain by roundabout ways a knowledge
which
is not directly available to human beings.
The character of this work forbids me to pursue this mathematical
discussion
further, though I am glad to have found an opportunity in this section
on Science to mention at the very beginning this chief organ of all
systematic
knowledge; we have seen that Leonardo even declared motion to be the
cause
of all life; he was soon followed by Descartes, who viewed matter
itself
as motion — everywhere the mechanical interpretation of empirical
facts,
which was emphasised in the last section, asserts itself! But mechanics
are an ocean over which the ship of mathematics alone can carry us.
Only
in so far as a science can be reduced to mathematical principles does
it
seem to us to be exact, and that because it is in so far strictly
mechanical
and consequently “navigable.“ “Nissuna humana investigatione si po
dimandare
vera scientia s'essa non passa per le matte-
* Réflexions sur la métaphysique du calcul
infinitésimal,
4th ed. 1860. This pamphlet of the famous
mathematician
is so perfectly clear that there is probably nothing quite like it on
this
subject, which, owing to the extremely contradictory nature of the
matter,
is not a little confused. As Carnot says, many mathematicians have
worked
with success in the field of infinitesimal calculation, without ever
acquiring
a clear conception of the thought which formed the basis of their
operations.
“Fortunately,“ he continues, “this has not detracted from the
fruitfulness
of the discovery: for there are certain fundamental ideas, which can
never
be grasped in all their clearness, and which nevertheless, as soon as
ever
some of their first results stand before us, open up to the human
intellect
a wide field, which it can investigate at leisure in all directions.“
301 SCIENCE
matiche
dimonstrationi,“
says Leonardo da Vinci; * and the voice of the Italian seer at the
beginning
of the sixteenth century is re-echoed by that of the German sage at the
opening of the nineteenth: “I assert that in every special theory of
nature
there can only be so much real science as is vouched for by
mathematics.“
†
With these remarks, however, as I hinted at the very outset, I have
been
keeping a more general purpose in view; I wished to reveal the peculiar
character not only of our mathematics but of our scientific method as a
whole; I hope I have succeeded. I can best draw the moral of what has
been
said by quoting a remark of Leibniz: “Rest can be regarded as an
infinitely
slow speed or as an infinitely great retardation, so that in any case
the
law of rest is to be considered merely as a special case within the
laws
of motion. Similarly we can regard two perfectly equal magnitudes as
unequal
(if it serves our purpose), by looking upon the inequality as
infinitely
small,“ &c. ‡ This statement expresses the
* Libro di pittura i. 1 (in
Heinrich
Ludwig's edition). I should like to call special attention to one of
the
remarks of the great man which bear on this point, No. 1158 in the
edition
of his writings by J. P. Richter (ii. 289): „Nessuna
certezza
delle scientie è‚ dove non si puó applicare una delle
scientie
matematiche e che non sono unite con esse matematiche.“
† Kant, Metaphysische Anfangsgründe der
Naturwissenschaft,
Preface.
‡ Letter to Bayle, July 1687 (quoted from Höfer, i. c. p. 482). I
do not know what Bayle's answer was. In his Dictionnaire I find
under Zeno a violent attack upon all mathematics: “Mathematics have one
fatal, immeasurable defect: they are in fact a mere chimera. The
mathematical
points, and consequently also the lines and surfaces of the
geometricians,
their spheres, axes, &c., are all abstractions which have never
possessed
a trace of reality; that is why these phantasies are even of less
importance
than those of the poets, for the latter invented nothing which is
intrinsically
impossible, like the mathematicians,“ &c. This abuse has no special
significance; but it calls our attention to the important fact that
mathematics,
not merely since Cardanus and Leibniz, but from all time, have drawn
their
strength from “imaginary“ or, more properly speaking, absolutely
inconceivable
magnitudes. When we think of it, the point according to Euclid's
definition
is no less inconceivable than √-1, Obviously
302
SCIENCE
fundamental
principle
of all Teutonic Science. Rest is, we must admit, not motion but its
very
opposite, just as equal magnitudes cannot be unequal: rather than have
recourse to such hypotheses the Hellene would have dashed his head
against
the wall; but in this the Teuton has, quite unconsciously, revealed a
deeper
insight into the essence of man's relation to nature. He desired to
know,
not only that which was purely and exclusively Human (like a Homer and
a Euclid), but on the contrary and above all that Nature which is
external
to man; * and here his passionate thirst for knowledge — that is, the
predominance
of his longing to learn, not of the need to shape — has caused him to
find
paths which have led him very much farther than any one of his
predecessors.
And these paths, as I remarked at the very beginning of this
discussion,
are those of shrewd adaptation to circumstances. Experience — that is,
exact, minute, indefatigable observation — supplies the broad immovable
foundation of Teutonic science, whether it be applied to philology,
chemistry
or anything else: the capacity of observation, the passionate
enthusiasm,
self-sacrifice and honesty with which it is pursued, are essential
features
of our race. Observation is the conscience of Teutonic science. Not
only
the professional natural scientist, not only the learned authority on
language
and the jurist investigate with painfully intent perception, even the
Franciscan
Roger Bacon spends his whole fortune in the cause of observation;
Leonardo
da Vinci preaches study of nature, observation, experiment and devotes
years of his life to sketching accurately the invisible inner anatomy
of
the human body (especially the vascular
our “exact knowledge“
is
a peculiar thing. The keenest criticism of our higher mathematics is
found
in Berkeley's The Analyst and A Defence of Free-thinking in
Mathematics.
* He aimed so intently at this that when his study was applied to man (see
Locke), he did his best to “objectivise“ himself, that is, to creep out
of his own skin and regard himself as a piece of “nature.“
303
SCIENCE
system);
Voltaire
is an astronomer; Rousseau a botanist; Hume gives his chief work, which
appeared a hundred and sixty years ago, the supplementary title, “An
Attempt
to introduce the Experimental Method into Philosophy“; Goethe's
admirable
and keen faculty of observation is well known, and Schiller begins his
career with a treatise on “The Sensitiveness of Nerves and the
Irritability
of Muscle,“ and calls upon us to study more industriously the
“mechanism
of the body,“ if we wish to come to a better understanding of the
“soul“!
But that which has been experienced cannot faithfully be fashioned into
Science, if man lays down the law instead of receiving it. The most
daring
capacities of his mind, its whole elasticity and the undaunted flight
of
fancy are pressed into the service of the Observed, in order that it
may
be classified as part of a human system of knowledge. Obedience on the
one hand towards experienced nature; autocracy on the other in
reference
to the human intellect: these are the hall-mark of Teutonic Science.
HELLENE
AND TEUTON
This then is the
foundation
upon which our theory and system are based; a brave building the chief
character of which lies in the fact that we are rather engineers than
architects.
Builders, indeed, we are, but our object is not so much beauty of
construction
nor perfection of shape that will finally satisfy the human mind but
the
establishment of a provisorium which enables us
to
gather new material for observation and to widen our knowledge. The
work
of an Aristotle acted like a brake upon science. Why was that? Because
this Hellenic master-mind brooked no delay in attaining its object,
because
he knew no peace till he saw before his eyes a finished, symmetrical,
absolutely
rational and humanly plausible dogmatic system. In logic final
304 SCIENCE
results
could be attained in this way, for there was a question of an
exclusively
human and exclusively formal science of universal validity within human
limits; on the other hand, even his politics and theory of art are much
less valid, because the law of the Hellenic intellect is here silently
presupposed to be essentially the law of the human intellect, an idea
which
is contrary to experience; in natural science — in spite of a wealth of
facts which often astonishes us — the absolutely predominating
principle
is, to draw the greatest number of hard and fast conclusions from the
smallest
number of observations. This is no question of idleness or of haste,
still
less of dilettantism, it is the presumption, first, that the
organisation
of man is quite adequate to grasp the organisation of nature, so that —
if I may so express it — one single hint suffices to enable us to
interpret
and survey correctly a whole complex of phenomena; secondly, that the
human
mind is not only adequate but also equivalent (equal not only in
compass
but equal also in value) to the principle or law, or whatever it may be
called, which reveals itself in nature as a whole. That is why the
human
mind is regarded without more ado as the central point from which we
may
not only with the greatest ease survey all nature, but also may trace
all
things from the cradle to the grave, that is to say, from their first
causes
to their supposed finality. This supposition is as erroneous as it is
simple:
our Teutonic science has from the first followed another course. Roger
Bacon, though he valued Aristotle highly, was just as earnest in the
thirteenth
century in the warnings he addressed to scientists against Aristotle
and
the whole Hellenic method which he personified, as Francis
Bacon
was three centuries later; * in this connection, the Re-
* Francis Bacon's decisive remark is in the Preface to the Instauratio
Magna, and is as follows: “Scientias non per arrogantiam in
humani
ingenii cellulis, sed submisse in mundo majore quaerat.“
305 SCIENCE
naissance was
fortunately only a passing sickness, and it was merely in the darkest
shadows
of the Church that the theology of the Stagirite henceforth continued
to
prolong a superfluous existence. To make the matter perfectly obvious,
let me employ a mathematical comparison: the science of the Hellene
was,
so to speak, a circle in the centre of which he himself stood. Teutonic
science, on the other hand, resembles an ellipse. At one of the two
foci
of the ellipse stands the human intellect, at the other an x of
which we know nothing. If the human intellect succeeds in a definite
case
in bringing its own focus near to the other, human science approaches
the
form of a circle; * but the ellipse is generally a very extended one:
on
the one side understanding penetrates very far into the sum of the
Known,
on the other it lies almost at the periphery. Frequently man stands
almost
alone with his focus (his humble torch!); with all his groping he
cannot
find the connection with the second focus, and thus arises a mere
parabola,
the sides of which, it is true, seem to approach each other in the far
distance, but without ever meeting, so that our theory gives us not a
closed
curve, but only the beginning of a curve, which is possible but in the
meantime incapable of being completed.
Our scientific procedure is obviously the negation of the Absolute.
That
was an acute and happy remark of Goethe's: “He who devotes himself to
nature
attempts to find the squaring of the circle.“
THE
NATURE OF OUR SYSTEMATISING
It is a matter of
course that a mathematical procedure cannot be applied to other
objects,
especially to the sciences of observation; I scarcely think it
necessary
to defend myself or others against such a misconception.
*
An
ellipse, the foci of which exactly coincide, is a circle.
306 SCIENCE
But if we know
how we have proceeded in mathematics, we also know what is to be
expected
in other spheres of knowledge; for the same intellect will proceed, if
not identically, since the subject renders this impossible, still
analogously.
Unconditional respect for nature (that is, for observation) and daring
originality in the application of the means with which the human
intellect
provides us for interpretation and elaboration: these are the
principles
which we again encounter everywhere. Attend a course of lectures on
systematic
botany: the neophyte will be astonished to hear the lecturer talk of
flowers
that do not exist and to see “diagrams“ of them on the blackboard;
these
are so-called types, purely “imaginary magnitudes,“ the assumption of
which
enables us to explain the structure of really existing flowers and to
demonstrate
the connection of the fundamental (from our human point of view
mechanical)
plan of structure in the special case with other related or divergent
plans.
Every one, no matter how inexperienced in science, must at once be
struck
by the purely human element in such a procedure. But do not suppose
that
what is thus taught is an absolutely artificial and arbitrary system;
the
very opposite is the case. Man had proceeded artificially and thereby
cut
off every possibility of acquiring new knowledge, so long as he
followed
Aristotle in classifying plants according to the non-existent principle
of a relative (so-called) “perfection,“ or according to the division,
solely
derived from human practice, into trees, shrubs, grasses and the like.
On the other hand, our modern diagrams, our imaginary flower-forms, all
the principles of our systematic botany, serve to bring home and to
make
clear to the human understanding true relations of nature at which we
have
arrived from thousands and thousands of faithful observations. The
artificiality
is conscious artificiality; as in mathematics,
307
SCIENCE
it is a
question
of “imaginary magnitudes,“ which help us, however, to approach nearer
and
nearer to the truth of nature, and to co-ordinate in our minds
countless
actual facts; this is the true function of science. With the Hellene,
on
the other hand, the foundation itself was thoroughly artificial,
anthropomorphic,
and it was this foundation which with simple unconsciousness was
regarded
as “nature.“ The rise of modern systematic botany provides indeed so
excellent
and intelligible an example of the Teutonic scientific method that I
wish
to give the reader a few more cardinal facts for his further
consideration.
Julius Sachs, the famous botanist, in describing the beginning of
botanical
science between the fourteenth and the seventeenth centuries, says that
no progress could be made so long as Aristotle's influence
predominated;
it is to the unlearned plant-collectors alone that the awakening of
genuine
science is due. Whoever was learned enough to understand Aristotle
“only
worked mischief in the natural history of plants.“ On the other hand,
the
authors of the first books on herbs did not give this a further
thought,
but collected with the greatest possible accuracy hundreds and
thousands
of individual descriptions of plants. History shows how in this way, in
the course of a few centuries, a new science arose, while the
philosophical
botany of Aristotle and Theophrastus led to no result worth mentioning.
* The first learned systematiser of importance, Caspar Bauhin of Basle
(second half of the sixteenth century), who frequently shows a lively
appreciation
of natural, that is structural, affinity, creates universal confusion
once
more, in that, under Aristotle's influence, he imagines himself to be
bound
to advance “from the most imperfect to the more and more perfect“ — as
if man possessed an organ to measure relative “perfection“ — and
* Geschichte der Botanik, 1875, p. 18.
308 SCIENCE
also in that
he
naturally (after the example of Aristotle) considers the large trees as
most perfect, the small grasses as most imperfect and more such
anthropomorphic
nonsense. * But the faithful collection of actual observations
continued,
and men at the same time endeavoured to systematise the enormously
growing
material in such a way as would adapt the system or classification to
the
needs of the human intellect and yet keep it as true to the facts of
nature
as possible. This is the salient point; thus arises the ellipse which
is
peculiar to us. The logical systematising comes last, not first, and we
are ready at any moment to throw our system overboard as we did our
gods
of old, for in very truth its only significance for us is a
“provisorium“,
a makeshift. The unlearned collectors and describers of herbs had
discovered
the natural affinities of plants by the trained eye, long before the
learned
proceeded to form systems. The reason is this: we base our science not
on logic, which is human and therefore limited, but on intuitive
perception,
on what we see and divine, as it were, by affinity with nature; which
moreover
is the reason why our scientific systems are so true to nature. The
Hellene
thought only of the needs of the human intellect; we, however, wished
to
get at nature and felt vaguely that we could never fathom her mystery,
never represent her own “system.“ Yet we were resolved to approximate
as
nearly as we could, and that by a path that would make ever greater
proximity
possible. That is why we rejected every purely artificial system, like
that of Linnaeus; it contains much that is correct, but leads us no
further.
In the meantime there rose up men like Tournefort, John Ray, Bernard de
Jussieu, Antoine Laurent de Jussieu, † and others who cannot be named
* Sachs, as above, p. 38.
† His fundamental work, Genera plantarum secundum ordines
naturales
disposita, appeared in 1774, just prior to
the
beginning of the nineteenth century.
309 SCIENCE
here, and
their
work proved the absolute impossibility of constructing the
classification
of plants, as derived from observation of nature, upon one anatomical
characteristic,
a plea which the human passion for simplification and the logical mania
wished to establish, and the best known and most successful example of
which is the system of Linnaeus. On the contrary, it became apparent
that
for sub-orders of different grades different, and for special plant
groups
special, characteristics must be chosen. Moreover, there was brought to
light a remarkable fact which was extremely important for the further
development
of science, viz., that, in reducing to a simple, logical, systematic
principle
the natural affinity of plants which is already recognised by quickened
observation, the general external habit — so sure an indication to the
expert — is of no use whatever, but that only characteristics from the
secret interior of the structure, and in fact mostly such as are
entirely
invisible to the naked eye are of any service. In flowering plants we
have
to take into account especially relations of the embryo, then relations
of the generative organs, connections between parts of the flower,
&c.;
in non-flowering plants the most invisible and seemingly most
unimportant
things, such as the rings on the sporangia of ferns, the teeth round
the
spore-capsules of mosses, &c. In this way nature has provided us
with
a clue by means of which it is possible to penetrate far into her
mystery.
What happened here deserves our close attention, for it teaches us much
concerning the historical development of our sciences. And so, even at
the risk of repeating myself, I must direct the attention of the reader
still more emphatically to what took place in systematic botany. By
faithful
and engrossing study of a very extensive material the eye of the
observer
had been quickened, and he was enabled to divine
310 SCIENCE
connections,
to
see them, as it were, with the eye, without, however, being able
accurately
to account for them and above all without being able to find a simple,
so to speak “mechanical,“ visible and demonstrable characteristic by
which
he might finally and convincingly prove the truth of his observation.
Every
child, for example, can — when its attention is aroused — distinguish
between
monocotyledons and dicotyledons; but it cannot give a reason for it,
cannot
point to a definite, sure distinguishing-mark. Obviously here (as
everywhere)
intuition is at the bottom of the matter. Regarding John Ray, the real
founder of modern systematic botany, his contemporary Antoine de
Jussieu
expressly tells us that he was engrossed in the external habit — plantae
facies exterior; * now it was this same John Ray who discovered the
importance of the cotyledons for a natural system of flowering plants,
and at the same time the simple and infallible anatomical
characteristic
to distinguish the monocotyledons from the dicotyledons. Hereby it was
proved that a hidden, mostly microscopically small anatomical
characteristic
was the essential thing by which the needs of the human intellect could
be brought into unison with the facts of nature. This led to further
discoveries
regarding the presence or absence of albumen in the seed, regarding the
position of the germ in the albumen, &c. These are all systematic
characteristics
of fundamental importance. Thus observation, united to intuition, had
first
dimly suggested the right solution; but man had to grope long before he
could draw his ellipse; for the other focus, the x, was
altogether
lacking. At last it was found (i.e., approximately found), but
not
where human reason would have sought it nor at the place which mere
intuition
would ever have reached: it was only after long
* From the quotation in Hooker's supplement to the English edition of
Le
Maout and Decaisne: System of Botany, 1873, p. 987.
311 SCIENCE
searching,
after
indefatigable comparison, that man at last hit upon the series of
anatomical
characteristics which are the criterion of a system in consonance with
nature. But note carefully what followed this discovery, for now and
now
only comes the decisive point, the point which reveals the incomparable
value of our scientific method. Now that man had, so to speak, come
upon
the track of nature, and with her help had drawn an approximately
correct
ellipse, he discovered hundreds and thousands of new facts, which all
the
“unscientific“ observation and all the intuition in the world would
never
have revealed to him. False analogies were seen to be false;
unsuspected
connections between things which appeared to be absolutely
heterogeneous
were irrefutably proved. In fact, man had now really created order.
This
order, it is true, was also artificial, at least it contained an
artificial
element, for man and nature are not synonymous; if we had the purely
“natural“
order before our eyes, we could do nothing with it, and Goethe's famous
remark, “Natural system is a contradiction,“ expresses in a nut-shell
all
the objections that can here be raised; but this human-artificial
order,
in contrast to that of Aristotle, was one in which man had made himself
as small as possible and retired into the background, while
endeavouring
to let nature speak, in so far as her voice can be understood. And this
principle is one which ensures progress; for in this way we gradually
learn
to understand the language of nature better. Every purely
logical-scientific
and every philosophically dogmatic theory forms an obstacle to science,
whereas every theory which has been drawn as accurately as possible
from
nature and is yet only accepted as provisional, contributes to the
advance
of both knowledge and science.
This one example drawn from systematic botany must stand for many. It
is
a well-known fact that systematising as a necessary organ for shaping
knowledge
extends over
312 SCIENCE
all
departments
of knowledge; even religions are now classified in orders, species and
categories. The victory of the method illustrated by botany forms in
every
sphere the backbone of the historical development of science between
1200
and 1800. In Physics, Chemistry, Physiology and in all related branches
the same principles are at work. All knowledge must finally be
systematised
before it becomes science; that is why we encounter systematising
everywhere
and at all times. Bichat's theory of tissue — which was the result of
anatomical
discoveries, and at the same time the source of new discoveries — is an
example, the exact analogy of which to John Ray's establishment of the
so-called system of plants, and to the further history of this study,
is
at once apparent. Everywhere we see painfully exact observation,
followed
by daring, creative, but not dogmatic theorising.
IDEA
AND THEORY
Before closing this section I should like to go a step farther,
otherwise
we should overlook an important point, one of those cardinal points
which
must serve to enable us to understand not only the history of our
science,
but also science itself as it exists in the nineteenth century. We must
penetrate somewhat deeper into the nature and value of scientific
theorising,
and we can best do this by referring to that incomparable instrument of
Teutonic science — the experiment. But it is merely a parenthesis, for
the experiment is peculiar only to some studies, while in this
connection
I must go down still deeper, in order to reveal certain cardinal
principles
of all more modern sciences.
The experiment is, in the first place, merely “methodical“ observation.
But it is at the same time theoretical observation. * Hence its right
application
calls for
* Kant says regarding experiment: “Reason only perceives what she
herself
brings
forth according to her own design, she must according to
313
SCIENCE
philosophical
reflection, otherwise it may easily happen that the result might be
that
the experiment rather than nature might speak. “An experiment which is
not preceded by a theory, i.e., an idea, stands in the same
relation
to natural investigation as jingling with a child's rattle does to
music,“
says Liebig, and in his brilliant fashion he compares the attempt to
calculation;
in both cases thoughts must precede. But how much caution is necessary
here! Aristotle had experimented with falling bodies; he certainly did
not lack acumen; but the “preceding theory“ made him observe falsely.
And
if we take up Galilei's Discorsi, the fictitious conversation
between
Simplicio, Sagredo and Salviati will convince us that in the discovery
of the true law of gravity conscientious observation, burdened with as
few prejudice as possible, had the lion's share in the work and that
the
real theories followed after rather than “preceded.“ We have here, I
think,
a confusion on the part of Liebig, and where so great a man, one who
has
deserved so well of science, is at fault, we may presume that true
understanding
can only be derived from the finest analysis. And such understanding is
all the more essential, as it and it alone enables us to grasp the
significance
of genius for science and the history of science. That we shall now
attempt
to do.
Liebig writes, “A theory, i.e., an idea“; he accordingly
regards
theory and idea as equivalents — the first source of his error. The
Greek
word idea — which in its living significance has never been
successfully
translated into any modern language — means exclusively something seen
with the eyes, a phenomenon, a form; even Plato understands so fully by
idea the quintessence of the Visible, that the single individual
appears
to him too pale
constant laws lead
the
way with principles of her own judgment and compel nature to answer her
questions“ (Preface to the second edition of the Critique of Pure
Reason).
314 SCIENCE
to be regarded
as more than the shadow of a true idea. * Theory, on the other hand,
denoted
even from the first not “looking at“ but “looking on“ (Watching) — a
very
great difference, which continued to grow ever greater till the word
theory
had received the special meaning of an arbitrary, subjective view, an
artificial
arrangement. Theory and idea are therefore not synonyms. When John Ray
had by much observation attained so clear a picture of flowering plants
as a whole that he distinctly perceived that they formed two great
groups,
he had an idea; when, however, he published in 1703 his Methodus
Plantarum,
he propounded a theory, a theory far inferior to his idea; for though
he
had discovered the importance of the cotyledons as criteria for
systematising,
many other points (e.g., the importance of the parts of the
flower)
had escaped his notice, so that the man, who already correctly
comprehended
in its essential points the formation of the vegetable kingdom,
nevertheless
sketched an untenable system; in fact our knowledge at that time was
not
thorough enough for Ray's “idea“ to be bodied forth adequately in a
“theory.“
In the case of the idea man is still obviously a piece of nature; here
speaks — if I may venture to make the comparison — that “voice of the
blood“
which forms the principal theme of the narratives of Cervantes; man
perceives
relations for which he cannot account, he has a presentiment of things
which he could not prove. † That is not real knowledge; it is the
reflection
of a transcendent connection, and is, therefore, a direct, not a
dialectical,
experience. The interpretation of such presentiments will always be
* People imagine that Plato's ideas are abstractions; on the contrary,
they are in his estimation the only concrete thing from which the
phenomena
of the empirical world are abstracted. It is the paradox of a mind
longing
for the most intense visualisation.
† Kant has found a splendid expression for this and calls the idea, in
the sense in which I use the word, eine inexponible Vorstellung der
Einbildungskraft (an inexpoundable conception of the Imagination):
Kritik
der Urteilskraft, § 57, note 1.
315 SCIENCE
uncertain;
neither
they nor their interpretation can claim objective validity, their value
is confined to the individual and depends absolutely on his individual
importance. It is here that genius reveals its creative power. And
while
our whole Teutonic science is a science of faithful, painfully exact,
absolutely
prosaic observation, it is at the same time a science of genius.
Everywhere
“do ideas precede,“ here Liebig is perfectly right; we see it as
clearly
in the case of Galilei as of Ray, * in Bichat as well as Winckelmann,
in
Colebrooke as in Kant; but we must avoid the confusion of idea and
theory;
for these ideas of genius are far from being theories. The theory is
the
attempt so to organise a certain mass of experience — often, perhaps
always,
collected with the aid of an idea — that this artificial organism may
serve
the needs of the specific human intellect, without contradicting or
arbitrarily
treating the known facts. It is at once clear that the relative value
of
a theory will always stand in direct relation to the number of known
facts,
but this is by no means true of the idea, the value of which rather
depends
solely upon the greatness of the one personality. Leonardo da Vinci,
for
example, though his facts were very few, so correctly and accurately
grasped
the fundamental principles of geology, that not till the nineteenth
century
did we possess the necessary experience to demonstrate scientifically
(and
that means theoretically) the correctness of his intuition; again, he
did
not demonstrate the circulation of the blood (in some details he
certainly
did not even conceive it rightly or grasp it mechanically), but he
guessed
it, that is, he had the idea of circulation, not the theory.
At a later point, and in another connection, I shall discuss the
incomparable
importance of genius for our
* Ray, who founded rational systematic botany, proved that in his case
real genius predominated by the fact that he did exactly the same in
the
far removed and, previous to this time, hopelessly confused field of
ichthyology.
Power of Intuition is the divine gift here.
316 SCIENCE
whole culture;
there is nothing to explain there; it is sufficient to point to the
fact.
* But here it is still necessary for the comprehension of our science
to
answer the one important question: How do theories arise? Here too, I
hope,
by criticising a well-known remark of Liebig, in which a widespread
view
is expressed, to point out the right path; and it will be seen that our
great scientific theories are neither thinkable without genius nor, at
the same time, indebted to genius alone for their shaping.
The famous chemist writes “Artistic ideas take root in fancy,
scientific
ideas in understanding.“ † This short sentence is full, if I am not
mistaken,
of psychological inaccuracies, but only one point interests us
particularly
at present; imagination is supposed to serve art alone, while science
could
get on without it; from this follows the further — really monstrous —
assertion,
that art “invents facts,“ science “explains facts.“ Science never
explained
anything! The word explain (erklären) has no meaning for
science,
unless we take it to mean “to make more clearly visible.“ If my pen
slips
from my fingers, it falls to the ground; the law of gravitation is a
theory
which sets out in the very best way all the relations which are to be
taken
into account in this fall; but what does it
* I merely wish to call the attention of those who are not very well
read
in philosophy to the fact that at the close of the epoch with which we
are occupied in this chapter, the importance of genius was recognised
and
analysed with incomparable acumen: the great Kant has fixed upon the
relative
predominance of “nature“ (i.e., what is, so to speak, outside
and
above man) in contrast to “reflection“ (i.e. the circumscribed
and
logically Human) as the specific token of genius (see especially
the Kritik der Urteilskraft). This does not mean that the
genius
is less “reflective,“ but rather that, in addition to a maximum of
logical
thinking power, something else is present; this addition is precisely
the
yeast which causes the dough of knowledge to rise.
† Like the former quotation, this is from the speech on Francis Bacon
in
the year 1863. To obviate any misjudgment of Liebig, I beg the reader
to
read once more the totally different remark on p.
236. I am not exploiting the lapsus calami of the great
investigator
from any desire to put him right, but because this criticism helps to
make
my own thesis perfectly clear.
317 SCIENCE
explain? If I
suggest the power of attraction, I arrive no further than the first
chapter
of Genesis, verse 1, that is to say, I put forward as an
explanation
a totally unthinkable and inexplicable entity. Oxygen and hydrogen
unite
to form water; good; what fact here explains and what fact is
explained?
Do oxygen and hydrogen explain water? Or are they explained by water?
Obviously
this word has not the shadow of a meaning, especially in science. It is
true that in more complex phenomena this is not at once apparent, but
the
more thoroughly we analyse, the more does the delusion vanish, that
explanation
means an actual increase not only of knowledge but also of
understanding.
If the gardener, for example, says to me, “This plant turns towards the
sun,“ I fancy in the first place, as he does, that I possess a
perfectly
valid “explanation.“ But if the physiologist says: strong light hinders
growth, so that the plant grows more quickly on the shaded side and for
that reason bends towards the sun — if he shows me the influence of the
capacity of extension on the part of the plant in question and of the
differently
refracted rays, &c., in short, if he reveals the mechanism of the
process
and unites all known facts to a theory of “heliotropism,“ I feel that I
have learned a great deal more, but that the delusion of an
“explanation“
has
considerably paled. The clearer the How, the more vague the Why. The
fact
that the plant “turns towards the sun“ looked like a final explanation,
for I myself, man, seek the sun; but when I hear that strong light
hinders
the separation of cells and consequently the lengthening of the stalk
on
the one side, and thus causes the plant to bend, this is a new fact,
and
that again impels me to seek explanation from still more remote causes,
and so thoroughly dispels my original simple anthropomorphism that I
begin
to ask by what mechanical concatenation it happens that I am so fond of
sunning myself. Here again Goethe is right:
318 SCIENCE
“Every
solution
of a problem is a new problem.“ * And if ever we should reach so far,
that
physical chemistry will take in hand the problem of heliotropism, and
the
whole become a calculation and finally an algebraical formula, then
this
question will have reached the same stage as gravitation, and every one
will recognise here, too, that science does not explain facts, but
helps
to discover and classify them — with as much truth to nature and as
much
in the interest of man as possible. Now is this, the real work of
science,
possible, as Liebig says, without the co-operation of imagination? Does
the creative faculty — and that is what we call genius — play no
necessary
part in the construction of our science? We need not enter into a
theoretical
discussion, for history proves the opposite. The more exact the
science,
the more need has it of imagination, and no science can altogether do
without
it. Where shall we find more daring creations of fancy than those atoms
and molecules without which physics and chemistry would be impossible —
or than that “physical jack-of-all-trades and chimera,“ as Lichtenberg
calls it, ether, which is indeed matter (otherwise it would be useless
for our hypotheses) but to which the most essential characteristics of
matter, as, for example, extension and impenetrability, must be denied
(otherwise it would be of equally little use), a true “Square root of
minus
one!“ It would be hard to say where there is an Art so deeply “rooted
in
imagination.“ Liebig says that art “invents facts.“ It never does! It
has
no need whatever to do that; moreover, we should not understand it if
it
did. It certainly condenses what lies apart, it unites what is only
known
to us as separate, and separates that part of the actual which stands
in
its way; in that way it gives shape to that which is beyond the sight
of
man, and distributes light and shade as it thinks fit, but it never
crosses
the boundary of what is familiar to conception and what
* Gespräch mit Kanzler von Müller, June 8, 1821.
319 SCIENCE
is conceivably
possible; for art is — in direct contrast to science — an activity of
mind
which confines itself solely to the purely human; from man it comes, to
man it addresses itself, the Human alone is its field. * Science, as we
have seen, is quite different; it is directed to the investigation of
nature,
and nature is not human. Indeed, would that it were so, as the Hellenes
supposed! But experience has contradicted the supposition. In science,
therefore, man attacks something which is, of course, not in-human, for
he himself belongs to it, but it is to a great extent super- and
extra-human.
As soon, therefore, as man has an earnest desire to understand nature,
and not to be satisfied with dogmatising in usum Delphini, he
is
compelled, in science, and especially in natural science in the
narrower
sense of the word, to strain to the utmost the powers of his
imagination,
which must be infinitely inventive and pliable and elastic. I know that
such an assumption is contrary to the general acceptation; to me,
however,
it seems that science and philosophy make higher claims on the
imagination
than poetry. The purely creative element in men like Democritus and
Kant
is greater than in Homer and Shakespeare. That is the very reason why
their
works remain accessible to but few. This scientific imagination is
rooted
of course in facts, as all imagination is of necessity; † and
scientific
imagination is particularly rich for this reason, that it has at its
disposal
an enormous number of facts, and its store of facts is being
continually
increased by new discoveries. I have already briefly referred (p.
287) to the importance of new discoveries for nourishing and
stimulating
the imagination; this importance extends
* Landscape painting or animal painting is obviously never anything but
a representation of landscapes or animals as they appear to man; the
most
daring caprice of a Turner or of one of the most modern impressionists
can never be anything but an extravagant assertion of human autonomy.
“When
artists speak of nature, they always suppose the idea, without being
clearly
conscious of it“ (Goethe).
† See vol. i. pp. 177,
427;
vol. ii. p. 273.
320
SCIENCE
even to the
highest
regions of culture, but it reveals itself to begin with and above all
in
science. The wonderful advance of science in the sixteenth century — of
which Goethe wrote: “The world will not soon see the like again“ * — is
by no means due to the regeneration of foolish Hellenic dogmatics, as
people
would have us believe; this has rather had the effect of leading us
astray
— as in systematic botany, so in every department of knowledge; on the
contrary, this sudden advance was directly due to the stimulus of the
new
discoveries, which I discussed in the previous section, discoveries in
the heavens, discoveries on earth. Read the letters in which Galilei,
trembling
with excitement, proclaims the discovery of the moons of Jupiter and of
the ring round Saturn, thanking God for revealing to him “such
never-dreamt-of
wonders,“ and you will get an idea of the mighty influence which the
new
discoveries exercised upon the imagination, and how they at the same
time
impelled man to seek further and further, and to bring the object of
search
nearer to the understanding. When discussing mathematics, we saw to
what
glorious heights of extreme daring the human spirit allowed itself to
be
transported in the intoxicating atmosphere of a newly discovered
super-human
nature. But for the genuine idea of genius, which sprang from the
imagination
— not from observation, nor, as Liebig says, from facts — the higher
mathematics
together with our knowledge of the heavens, of light, of electricity,
&c.,
would have been impossible. But the same holds good everywhere, and
that
for the simple reason adduced above, that we otherwise could not reach
this world which is outside man. The history of our sciences between
1200
and 1800 is an unbroken series of such magnificent workings of the
* Geschichte der Farbenlehre, conclusion of the third part. An
assertion
which Liebig countersigns: “After this sixteenth century there is none
which was richer in men of equal creative power“ (Augsburger Allg.
Zeitung,
1863, in the Reden und Abhandlungen, p. 272).
321 SCIENCE
imaginations.
That implies the predominant power of creative genius.
AN EXAMPLE.
Looking back, we now perceive that scientific chemistry was impossible
so long as oxygen had not been discovered as an element; for this is
the
most important body of our planet, the body from which the organic as
well
as the inorganic phenomena of telluric nature derive their special
colouring.
In water, air and rocks, in all combustion (from the simple slow
oxidising
to flaming fire), in the breathing of all living creatures —
everywhere,
in short, this element is at work. This is the very reason why it
defied
direct observation; for the outstanding characteristic of oxygen is the
energy with which it unites with other elements, in other words,
conceals
from observation its existence as an independent body; even where it
occurs
not chemically united with other substances, but in a free state — as,
for example, in the air, where it only enters into a mechanical union
with
nitrogen — it is impossible for the ignorant to observe oxygen; for not
only is this element, under our conditions of temperature and pressure,
a gas, it is, moreover, a colourless gas, without smell and without
taste.
The senses alone could not, therefore, discover it. Now in the second
half
of the seventeenth century there lived in England one of those genuine
discoverers like Gilbert (see p. 269),
namely, Robert Boyle, who by a treatise, Chemista scepticus,
made
an end of Aristotelian dialectics and alchemistic quackery in the field
of chemistry, and at the same time set a twofold example: that of
strict
observation, and that of classifying and sifting the already much
increased
material of observation by the introduction of a creative idea. As a
birthday
gift he presented to chemistry, which was just arising in a genuine
form,
the new conception of elements, a more daring conception than the old
one
of Empedocles, one more after the spirit of Democritus. This idea was
322
SCIENCE
at that time
based
on no observation; it sprang from the imagination, but became
henceforth
the source of countless discoveries which have not yet reached the end
of their course. Here we see what paths our science always follows. *
But
now for the example of which I am thinking. Boyle's idea had led to a
rapid
increase of knowledge, discovery had succeeded discovery, but the more
numerous the facts became, the more confused was the total result; any
one who desires to know how impossible science is without theory,
should
study the state of chemistry at the beginning of the eighteenth
century;
he will find a Chinese chaos. If, as Liebig thinks, science can
“explain“
facts, if the unimaginative “understanding“ is capable of such a task,
why did it not prove so then? Were Boyle himself and Hooke and Becher
and
the many other capable collectors of facts of that age unintelligent
persons?
Certainly not; but understanding and observation alone are not
sufficient,
and the wish to “explain“ is a delusion; what we call comprehension
always
presupposes a creative contribution from man. The important thing
therefore
was, to deduce from Boyle's brilliant idea the theoretical
consequences,
and this was done by a Franconian doctor, a man of “transcendentally
speculative
tendency of mind“, † by the ever memorable Georg Ernst Stahl. He was
not
a professional chemist, but he saw what was lacking: an element! Could
its existence be proved? Not at that time. But was a daring Teutonic
mind
to be disheartened by that? Fortunately not! So Stahl arbitrarily
invented
an imaginary element, and called it phlogiston. At once
* It deserves mention that Boyle's remarkable capacity for imaginative
inventions found expression in theological writings from his pen, and
was
also noticed in his daily life.
† I quote these words from Hirschel's Geschichte der Medizin,
2nd
ed. p. 260. I possess a number of chemical books, but none of them
mentions
Stahl's intellectual gifts, their authors are much too prosaic and
mechanical
for that.
323 SCIENCE
light shone in
the midst of the chaos; and the Teuton had destroyed magic superstition
in its last stronghold and throttled the salamander for ever. By the
propounding
of a purely mechanical thought, men were henceforth enabled to form a
right
conception of the process of combination, that is to say, to find that
x,
the second focus, or at least to approximate to it, so that they could
begin to draw the humanly comprehensible ellipse. “The theory of
phlogiston
gave chemistry a powerful stimulus, for never before had such a number
of chemical facts been grouped together as analogous processes and
united
in so clear and simple a manner.“ * If that is not a work of the
imagination
words have lost their meaning. But at the same time we must note that
here
it was rather the theorising understanding than intuition that had been
at work. Boyle had been a phenomenally fine observer; Stahl, on the
other
hand, was a pre-eminently acute and inventive mind, but a bad observer.
The difference which I indicated becomes particularly clear in this
case;
for the idea of phlogiston — which held the whole eighteenth century in
its sway, which acquired for its author the honorary title of a founder
of scientific chemistry, and in the light of which all the foundations
of our later theory which is more in consonance with nature were
actually
laid — this idea was based (in addition to the theoretical exploitation
of Boyle's idea) on flagrantly false observations! Stahl thought that
combustion
was a process of disintegration; instead of which it was a process of
unification.
Various experiments had already proved in his time that combustion adds
to weight, but Stahl (who, as I said, was a very unreliable observer
and
possessed to a high degree the special obstinacy of the theorising
logician)
supposed that combustion consisted
* Roscoe und Schorlemmer: Ausführliches Lehrbuch der Chemie
1872, i. 10.
324 SCIENCE
in the escape
of phlogiston, &c. Consequently, when Priestley and Scheele had at
last separated oxygen from certain combinations, they firmly believed
that
they had within their grasp that famous phlogiston, which had been
pursued
ever since Stahl's time. But Lavoisier soon proved that the discovered
element, far from possessing the qualities of the hypothetical
phlogiston,
revealed qualities of exactly the opposite kind! The oxygen thus
discovered
and rendered accessible to observation was in fact a different thing
altogether
from what the human imagination in its need had conceived. Without
imagination
man can establish no connection between phenomena, no theory, no
science,
but human imagination nevertheless always reveals itself as inadequate
to and unlike nature, requiring to be corrected by empirical
observation.
That is also the reason why all theory is ever provisional, and science
ceases as soon as dogmatism assumes the lead.
The history of our science is the history of such phlogistons.
Philology
has its “Aryans,“ but for which its great achievements in the
nineteenth
century would have been inconceivable. * Goethe's theories of
metamorphoses
in the vegetable kingdom and the affinities of the bones of the skull
and
the vertebrae have exercised an enormous stimulus upon the increase and
systematising of our knowledge, but Schiller was perfectly right when
he
shook his head and said: “That is not experience“ (and he might have
added,
nor a theory); “that is an idea.“ † He was equally right when he added:
“Your intellect works to a remarkable degree intuitively
* Cf. vol. i. p. 264,
&c.
† Goethe: Glückliches Ereignis, sometimes printed as Annalen,
1794. Goethe himself, however, recognised this later and did not remain
blind to the defects of his “idea.“ In the supplement to the Nachträge
zur Farbenlehre, under the heading Probleme, we find the
remark,
“The idea of metamorphosis is a most venerable but at the same time
most
dangerous gift from above. It leads to the Formless, destroys
knowledge,
disintegrates it.“
325 SCIENCE
and all your
thinking
powers seem, as it were, to have committed themselves to the
imagination,
as to their common representative.“ * As Carnot says: “Mathematical
analysis
is full of enigmatical hypotheses and from these enigmas it draws its
strength.“
† John Tyndall, a competent authority, says of physics: “The greatest
of
its instruments is the imagination.“ ‡ In the sciences of life, to-day
as well as yesterday, wherever we are endeavouring to open up new
spheres
for the understanding and to reduce to order facts that are in
confusion,
it is imaginative, creative men who take the lead. Haeckel's
plastidules,
Wiesner's
plasoms, Weissmann's biophores, &c., spring from the same
need as Stahl's masterly invention. The imagination of these men is, of
course, nourished and stimulated by the wealth of exact observations;
pure
imagination, for which the theory of “signatures“ may serve as an
example,
has for science the same significance as the picture painted by a man
who
does not know the technique of painting has for art; their hypothetical
suppositions, however, are not observations, consequently not facts,
but
attempts to arrange facts and pave the way for new observations. The
most
salient phlogiston of the eighteenth century was really nothing less
than
Darwin's theory of natural selection.
Perhaps I may be allowed, in summarising these results, to quote
myself.
I once had occasion to make a special and thorough study of a definite
scientific subject, the rising sap of plants. On this occasion I was
greatly
interested in investigating the historical development of our knowledge
of the question, and discovered that although there has been no lack of
competent investigators, only three men, Hales (1727), Dutrochet
* Letter
to Goethe, August 31, 1794. Schiller adds: “At bottom this is
the highest point to which man can raise his powers, as soon as he
succeeds
in generalising his intuition and making his feeling lawgiver.“
† Loc. cit. p. 27.
‡ On the Scientific Use of the Imagination, 1870.
326
SCIENCE
(1826), and
Hofmeister
(1857) have really brought it one step farther. In these three
exceptional
men, though they differ absolutely in other respects, the concurrence
of
the following characteristics is very remarkable: they are all
excellent
observers, they are all men of wide outlook and of pre-eminently vivid,
daring imagination, while all are, as theorists, somewhat one-sided and
desultory. Highly gifted with imagination, they were in fact, like
Goethe,
inclined to ascribe too far-reaching significance to their creative
ideas
— Hales to capillarity, Dutrochet to osmose, and Hofmeister to tension
of tissue; the same power of imagination, which enabled these great men
to enrich us, has therefore in a certain sense limited them: so that in
this they have been forced to submit to correction from intellects
which
were their inferiors. Concerning them I wrote in my treatise: “To such
men we owe all real progress of science; for whatever we may think of
their
theories, they have not only enriched our knowledge by the discovery of
countless facts, but also our imagination by the promulgation of new
ideas;
theories come and go, but what the imagination once possesses, is
eternal.“
But this investigation led me to a second discovery, one of still
greater
importance in principle: our imagination is very limited. If we trace
the
sciences back to antiquity, it is remarkable how few new conceptions
the
course of time has added to the very numerous old ones; this teaches us
that it is solely and simply observation of nature that enriches our
imagination,
whereas all the thought in the world does not add one grain to its
wealth.
*
* Houston Stewart Chamberlain, Recherches sur la Sève
ascendante,
Neuchâtel, 1897, p. 11. Locke, in his Human
Understanding
(iv. 3, 23), already points out that poverty of “ideas“ (as he too
calls
them) is one of the chief primary causes of the limitation of our
knowledge.
327
SCIENCE
THE
GOAL OF SCIENCE
Let me add one final word.
Mathematicians — never at a loss, as we have seen — think it proper to
say that a circle is an ellipse in which the two foci coincide. Will
this
coincidence of the foci ever be realised in our sciences? Is it to be
supposed
that human intuitive perception and nature will ever exactly coincide,
that is, will our perception of things ever be absolute understanding?
The preceding discussion shows how foolish such an assumption is; I am
convinced that I may also assert that no single serious scientist of
the
present day, certainly no Teuton, believes it possible. * We find this
conviction even where (as happens unfortunately very frequently to-day)
the intellect is not adequately schooled by philosophy, and perhaps it
is all the more impressive because it is expressed with perfect
simplicity.
Thus, for example, one of the admittedly most important investigators
of
the nineteenth century, Lord Kelvin, on celebrating in 1896 his jubilee
as a Professor of fifty years standing, made the memorable confession:
“One single word comprises the result of all that I have done towards
the
furthering of science during fifty-five years: this word is Failure. I
know not one iota more to-day about electric or magnetic power, how
ether,
electricity and weighable matter stand to one another, or what chemical
affinity means, than I did when I delivered my first lecture.“ These
are
the words of an honest, truthful, thorough Teuton, the man who seemed
to
have brought
* Our numerous excellent Jewish scholars may be in a different case;
for
when a people without ever learning anything, has known everything for
thousands of years, it is a bitter hardship to have to tread the
painful
but brilliant path of study and to be forced finally to confess that
our
knowledge is everlastingly and narrowly circumscribed by human nature.
328 SCIENCE
the
hypothetical,
unthinkable atoms so near to us, when in a happy hour he undertook to
measure
their length and breadth. Had he been in addition something of a
philosopher,
he would certainly not have needed to speak of failure in such a
melancholy
strain; for in that case he would not have assigned to science an
absolutely
unattainable goal, the ever impossible absolute knowledge, which may
well
be conceived in our inmost hearts but can never take the tangible form
of an actual, empirical “knowledge“; he might then have unhesitatingly
rejoiced over that brilliant, free, shaping power, which began to stir
at the moment when the Teuton rebelled against the leaden might of the
Chaos of Peoples, which since then has conferred on us so rich a
blessing
of civilisation, and in days to come is destined to attain still
greater
things. *
* In this connection I should like to draw the reader's attention to
the
change in men's views regarding the nature of life. At the beginning of
the nineteenth century the gulf between the Organic and the Inorganic
was
thought to be, if not filled up, at least bridged over (vol. i. p.
43); at the close of the century that gulf, for all men of
knowledge,
is wider than ever. Far from being in a position to produce Homunculi
chemically in our laboratories, we have learned first of all (through
the
researches of Pasteur, Tyndall, &c.), that there nowhere exists generatio
spontanea, but that all life is produced solely by life; then
minuter
anatomy (Virchow) has taught us that every cell of a body can only
arise
from an already existing cell; now we know (Wiesner) that
even the
simplest
organic structures of the cell arise not by the chemical activity of
the
contents of the cell, but only from similar organised structures, e.g.
a chlorophyll granule only from an already existing chlorophyll
granule.
Form, not matter, is the fundamental principle of all life. And thus
Herbert
Spencer, who was formerly so daring, had lately, as an honest
investigator,
to confess that “the theory of a special vital principle is inadequate,
the physico-chemical theory has, however, likewise failed: the
corollary
being that in its ultimate nature Life is incomprehensible.“ (Letter in
Nature,
vol. lviii. p. 593, October 12, 1898). Here too a little metaphysical
thought
would have saved him from a painful retreat. Taken in Spencer's sense,
the whole empirical world too is incomprehensible. The mystery is
pre-eminently
striking in the case of life, because life is just the one thing which
we ourselves know from direct experience. By virtue of life we attack
the
problem of life and must now confess that the cat may indeed bite the
point
of its tail (if the latter is long enough), but not
329 SCIENCE
I hope that with the remarks in this section I have contributed
something
to help us to understand the history of our Teutonic sciences and to
form
an exact estimate of the progress in the nineteenth century. We have
seen
that science — according to our new and absolutely individual view — is
the human shaping of something extra-human; we have shown in the
essential
outlines and by the aid of individual examples how this shaping has
hitherto
been accomplished. Of a “makeshift bridge“ more cannot be expected.
more; it cannot
swallow
and digest itself. To what proud flights will our science rise on the
day
when it has discarded the last remnant of the Semitic delusion of
understanding,
and passes on to pure, intensive intuitive perception, united to free,
consciously human shaping. Then in truth will “man by man have entered
into the daylight of life!“ (Cf. my Immanuel Kant, 5th
lecture,
“Plato.“)
Last update: June 12th, 2004.
