WHEN DID LAMARCK’S VIEWS CHANGE? 229 
physical cause of the maintenance of life of organic 
beings, still I have ventured to urge at the outset that 
the existence of these astonish:ng beings by no means 
depends on nature; that all which is meant by the 
word nature cannot give life—namely, that all the 
faculties of matter, addea to all possible circum- 
stances, and even to the activity pervading the uni- 
verse, cannot produce a being endowed with the power 
of organic movement, capable of reproducing its like, 
and subject to death. 
“686. All the individuals of this nature which 
exist are derived from similar individuals, which, all 
taken together, constitute the entire species. How- 
ever, I believe that it is as impossible for man to 
know the physical origin of the first individual of 
each species as to assign also physically the cause of 
the existence of matter or of the whole universe. 
This is at least what the result of my knowledge and 
reflection leads me to think. If there exist any va- 
rieties produced by the action of circumstances, these 
varieties do not change the nature of the species (ces 
varictés ne aénaturent point les especes); but doubt- 
less we are often deceived in indicating as a species 
what is only a variety; and I perceive that this error 
may be of consequence in reasoning on this subject ” 
(tome ii., pp. 213-214). 
It must apparently remain a matter of uncertainty 
whether this opinion, so decisively stated, was that 
of Lamarck at thirty-two years of age, and which he 
allowed to remain, as then stated, for eighteen years, 
or whether he inserted it when reading the proofs in 
1794. It would seem as if it were the expression of 
his views when a botanist and a young man. 
In his Wémorres de Physique et a Histoire naturelle, 
which was published in 1797, there is nothing said 
