04 LAMARCK, HIS LIFE AND WORK 
Above all, by his attractive style and bold sugges- 
tions he popularized the subjects and created an in- 
terest in these matters and a spirit of inquiry which 
spread throughout France and the rest of Europe. 
But notwithstanding the crude and uncritical na- 
ture of the writings of the second half of the eight- 
eenth century, resulting from the lack of that more 
careful and detailed observation which characterizes 
our day, there was during this period a widespread 
interest in physical and natural science, and it led up 
to that more exact study of nature which signal- 
izes the nineteenth century. ‘ More new truths 
concerning the external world,” says Buckle, ‘were 
discovered in France during the latter half of the 
eighteenth century than during all preceding periods 
put ogether./ * As Perkins }osayse co alnterest sin 
scientific study, as in political investigation, seemed 
to rise suddenly from almost complete inactivity to 
extraordinary development. In both departments 
English thinkers had led the way, but if the impulse 
to such investigations came from without, the work 
done in France in every branch of scientific research 
during the eighteenth century was excelled by no 
other nation, and England alone could assert any 
claim to results of equal importance. The researches 
of Coulomb in electricity, of Buffon in geology, of 
Lavoisier in chemistry, of Daubenton in comparative 
anatomy, carried still farther by their illustrious suc- 
cessors towards the close of the century, did much 
to establish conceptions of the universe and its laws 
* HTistory of Civilization, i. p. 627. 
+ France under Louis XV., p. 359. 
