• HISTORY OF LAMARCK. 83 



his Theory of Descent. In 1809 appeared the important 

 PhilosopJiie Zoologique, the principal work in which he 

 elaborated this theory. In 1815 he gave to the world his 

 comprehensive treatise on the Natural History of Inver- 

 tebrates (Histoire naturelle des aniTnaux sans vertebres), 

 in the Introduction to which the same theory is again 

 developed. About this time Lamarck entirely lost his eye- 

 sight. Grudging fate never favoured him. While his 

 principal opponent, Cuvier, was lucky enough to gain an 

 influential position and the highest rank of scientific fame 

 in Paris, Lamarck, who far surpassed Cuvier in clear and 

 high-minded conception of nature, was obliged to struggle 

 in lonely seclusion for the very necessaries of life, and could 

 obtain no recognition. In 1829 his laborious life closed in 

 the midst of the most needy circumstances.^^ 



Lamarck's Philosophie Zoologique was the first scientific 

 outline of a real history of the evolution of Species, a 

 natural history of the creation of plants, animals, and 

 men. The effect produced by this remarkable and im- 

 portant book was, like that of Wolff's, none : neither was 

 understood. No naturalist felt called upon to interest him- 

 self seriously in this book, and to forward the development 

 of the rudiments of the most valuable progress in Biology 

 which it laid down, The most eminent botanists and 

 zoologists threw the book entirely aside, and did not con- 

 sider it worth refuting. Cuvier, who taught and laboured 

 in Paris as a contemporary of Lamarck, in his account of 

 the progress made in Natural Science, in which the most 

 insignificant observations were mentioned, did not deem it 

 worth while to devote a syllable to this the greatest advance. 



In short, Lamarck's Zoological Philosophy shared the fate 

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