LINN^US' *' SYSTEM A NATURE." '. • 7 3 



nature ; we therefore give his name to the- iie\y era of the 

 History of Evolution.,^ But before considering "the grand 

 discovery by means of which Darwin enabled us to under- 

 stand the causes of evolution, we must glance rapidly at the 

 efforts made by earlier naturalists in the same direction. 

 The historical survey of these endeavours will be much 

 shorter even than that of the labours in the field of On- 

 togeny. There are really but few names to be mentioned. 

 At the head stands the great French naturalist, Jean 

 Lamarck, who, in 1809, for the first time gave a scientific 

 value to the so-called Theory of Descent. But even before 

 this, the most important German philosopher, Kant, and 

 the greatest German poet, Goethe, had both entertained 

 the idea. During the previous half-century, however, their 

 statements on this matter remained almost unnoticed. It 

 was only in the commencement of our century that "Natural 

 Philosophy " took up the question. Previously no one even 

 dared to inquire seriously into the Origin of Species, which, 

 properly speaking, is the culminating point of the History 

 of Descent, or Phylogeny. 



The entire Phylogeny of Man, and also of other animals, 

 is most intimately connected with the question as to the 

 nature of species, and with the problem, how the distinct 

 kinds of animals, which in systems are called species, really 

 originated. The idea of species occupies the foreground. 

 This idea was first presented by Linnseus, who, in 1735, 

 in his Systema Naturae, attempted the first accurate dis- 

 crimination and nomenclature of animal and vegetable 

 species, and made a systematic list of the species then 

 known. Since that time species has retained its place 

 in descriptive Natural History, in systematic Zoology and 



