86 The Ottawa Naturalist. [August 



For many years our leading naturalists and biologists have 

 been engaged in investigating these problems and in classifying 

 their observations under natural and well defined laws. It is 

 only within recent years, however, that the student of natural 

 progression has been able to deduce from his observations and 

 study any suggestion as to how plants under domestication might 

 be "bred up" by the applications of principles common to all 

 living phenomena. 



HISTORY OF THE PROGRESS OF THE IDEA OF SPECIES FORMATION. 



In order that we may clearly understand the possibilities 

 of the artificial interference in plant life as a means of evolving 

 improved races and strains, and that we may see how far such 

 work is based on scientific and, therefore, sound principles, we 

 shall examine briefly some of the various theories and ideas 

 which have been advanced respecting the manner in which our 

 present species, varieties and strains have come into existence. 



We find that the idea of organic progression or evolution 

 had its birth among the early Greeks, its renaissance among the 

 early natural philosophers beginning with Bacon and extending 

 to the time of Herder (1744-1803) and that these men in turn 

 served to inspire further investigation and study by Buffon, 

 Erasmus Darwin and Goethe, all of whom are considered as 

 contemporaries of Darwin, the first real propounder of evolution. 



Evolution, as a natural explanation of the origin of the 

 higher forms of life, developed from the mythological teachings 

 of the earlv Greeks into the general conception of Aristotle 

 (384-322 B!C.) who, over 2,200 years ago, believed that higher 

 forms of life originated or were developed from lower forms in 

 some mysterious way. Development or the gradual perfection 

 in the structure of an organism was Aristotle's main thesis and 

 constituted the principle thotight in his natural philosophy. 

 He was also a strong believer in the law of adaptation and in 

 atavism. The principle of Syngenesis was recognized long before 

 Aristotle's time by Empedocles, who may be said to be the father 

 of evolution. Empedocles conceived the idea of "The survival 

 of the fittest" six centuries before Christ. 



Epicurus (341-270 B.C.) established the distinction between 

 natural and supernatural causation, and gathered arguments 

 from his predecessors to support the principle of natural law. 



The idea of the changing rather than of the fixed order of 

 things had its origin among the Greeks in Heraclitus (505-475 

 B.C.) 



For many centuries all study was subject to the approval of 

 the church so that from the time when Christian doctrines shook 

 off Aristotelianism or the scientific reading of the Bible until 



