PAPERS ON BIOLOGY AND AGRICULTURE 149 



FIRST LAW 



"Iii every animal which has not passed the limit of 

 its development, the more frequent and continuous 

 use of any organ gradually strengthens, develops and 

 enlarges that organ, and gives it a power proportional 

 to the leng-th of time it has been so used; while the 

 continuous disuse of any organ imperceptably weakens 

 and deteriorates it, and progressively diminishes its 

 functional capacity. ' ' 



SECOXD LAW 



"All of the acquisitions and losses wrought in indi- 

 viduals by the predominant use or permanent disuse of 

 any organ are preserved by reproduction in the new 

 individuals which descend from those which have ac- 

 quired the modifications." 



(Packard's translation, page 303; Elliott's transla- 

 tion, page 113. The above statement of these laws is 

 a composite of the two translations, and is simplified 

 by the omission of parenthetical matter.) 



It is not enough to glance at these two laws, and then 

 pass on to something else. They should be examined 

 carefully and critically to see what they mean. They 

 should be examined as a lawyer examines the wording of 

 a contract. The failure to give them such careful con- 

 sideration is undoubtedly the primary cause of the wide 

 spread misinformation as to what Lamarck's theory is. 



We all know that exercising any organ, as a muscle, 

 increases the power of that organ, but Lamarck refers to 

 "frequent and continuous" exercise, and says that the 

 acquired development in the individual is "proportional 

 to the length of time" that the organ is exercised. The 

 "frequent and continuous" exercise means continued 

 activity of some kind, and the "length of time" neces- 

 sarily involves the age of the animal, if we are to make 

 any measurements of what the acquirements are. That 

 any test of Lamarck's theory necessarily involves deter- 

 mining the degree of activity of the animal, and its age 

 at the time of reproducing, is evident from the second 



