xxi EVOLUTION OF EVOLUTION THEORIES 415 



is like that of an organism in which cross-fertilisation and 

 composite inheritance complicate the pedigree. 



5. Three Old Masters. Among the evolutionists before 

 Darwin three stand out prominently Buffon, Erasmus 

 Darwin, and Lamarck. 



BUFFON (1707-1788) was born to wealth and was 

 wedded to Fortune. He sat in kings' houses, his statue 

 adorned their gardens. As Director of the Jar din du 

 Hoi he had opportunity to acquire a wide knowledge of 

 animals. He commanded the assistance of able collabo- 

 rateurs, and his own industry was untiring. He was 

 about forty years old when he began his great Natural 

 History, and he worked till he was fourscore. He lived 



/ * 



a full life, the success of which we can almost read in the 

 strong confidence of his style. ' Le style, c'est 1'homme 

 meme," he said ; or again, " Le style est comme le bon- 

 heur ; il vient de la douceur de 1'ame." Rousseau called 

 him "La plus belle plume du siecle " ; Mirabeau said, 

 " Le plus grand homme de son siecle et de bien d'autres." 

 We have pleasant pictures of his handsome person, his 

 magnificence, and his diplomatic manners. He had a 

 splendid genius, which he mistakenly called " a supreme 

 capacity for taking pains." 



Buff on's culture was very wide. He had an early 

 training in mathematics, and translated Newton's 

 Fluxions ; he seems to have been familiar with the 

 chemistry and physics of his time ; he was curious about 

 everything. Before Laplace, he elaborated an hypothesis 

 as to the origin of the solar system ; before Hutton and 

 Lyell, he realised that causes like those now at work had 

 in the long past sculptured the earth ; he had a special 

 theory of heredity not unlike Darwin's, and a by no means 

 narrow theory of evolution, in which he recognised the 

 struggle for existence and the elimination of the unfit, 

 the influence of isolation and of artificial selection, but 

 especially the direct action of food, climate, and other 

 surrounding influences upon the organism. 



It is probable that Buffon's treatment of zoology gained 

 freedom because he wrote in French, having shaken off 

 the shackles w T hich the prevalent custom of writing in 



