66 THE MAIN CURRENTS OF ZOOLOGY 



His famous debate with Saint-Hilaire, in 1830, on 

 the subject of unity of type involved the principles of 

 evolution. Cuvier won the debate largely from skill 

 as a debater and his personal magnetism. Posterity 

 views the matter in a different light and reckons this 

 opposition to Lamarck's views as one of the short- 

 comings of Cuvier. 



His influence was so lasting that it prevented for 

 many years a respectful hearing of the evolutionary 

 idea in France, and she was the last of the highly 

 intellectual nations to harbor as true the ideas of 

 organic evolution. Frenchmen, however, have at- 

 toned for this to a degree by establishing in the 

 University of Paris a Professorship of Evolution 

 under the charge of Maurice Caullery, and have 

 given a cordial, if somewhat belated, recognition to 

 one of their foremost zoologists Lamarck. 



Comparative anatomy, the subject founded by 

 Cuvier, supplies some of the most obvious and con- 

 vincing evidences of organic evolution. Rightly 

 pursued it is a rich subject not only for facts but for 

 ideas. It is the division of zoology most commonly 

 used in the laboratory exercises of the present time. 



Before leaving the consideration of Cuvier 's con- 

 tribution to zoology, it should be pointed out that he 



