MONISM AS CONNECTING RELIGION AND SCIENCE

_A MAN OF SCIENCE_


BY

ERNST HAECKEL


TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN BY J. GILCHRIST, M.A., B.Sc., PH.D.



PREFACE

The following lecture on Monism is an informal address delivered
extemporaneously on October 9, 1892, at Altenburg, on the seventy-fifth
anniversary of the "Naturforschende Gesellschaft des Osterlandes." The
immediate occasion of it was a previous address delivered by Professor
Schlesinger of Vienna on "Scientific Articles of Faith." This
philosophical discourse contained, with reference to the weightiest and
most important problems of scientific investigation, much that was
indisputable; but it also contained some assertions that challenged
immediate rejoinder and a statement of the opposite view. As I had for
thirty years been very closely occupied with these problems of the
philosophy of nature, and had set forth my convictions with respect to
them in a number of writings, a wish was expressed by several members of
the Congress that on this occasion I should give a summary account of
these. It was in compliance with this wish that the following "Scientific