ADDRESSES AND COMMUNICATIONS. 



THE APPLICATION OF BIOLOGY TO GEOLOGICAL 



HISTORY.* 



BY CHARLES A. WHITE. 



I have chosen the subject which has just been announced by 

 the Chairman, because I have been so long identified with the 

 geological and paleontological work of our country that I think 

 you will naturally expect my retiring address to have reference to 

 some subject connected with the biological history of the earlier 

 ages of the earth. It has become customary upon occasions like 

 the present for the speaker to select some subject relating to his 

 own special lines of research ; and it is often the case that such 

 addresses are real contributions to science and records of its 

 advancement, as indeed it is well that they should be ; but after 

 much hesitation I have decided that my remarks upon this occa 

 sion shall be of a somewhat opposite character. That is, I shall 

 endeavor to show that certain prevalent ideas are erroneous, and, 

 incidentally, how they have retarded rather than aided philo 

 sophical inquiry. 



It is much pleasanter for one to record and announce the 

 triumphs of long and patient research, and to show the evidence 

 of a steady increase of knowledge in the branch of study to which 

 he is devoted, than to point out the existence of errors in unex 

 pected quarters. But it is well that we should pause occasionally 

 in our labors and question the truth of every proposition upon 



* Annual presidential address delivered at the Fifth Anniversary Meeting 

 of the Society, January 24, 1885, in the lecture-room of the U. S. National 

 Museum. 



