3 
278 OBITUARY x 
modification of Lamarck’s doctrine of development — 
and progression. Jf this is your deliberate opinion — 
there is nothing to be said, but it does not seem 
so to me. Plato, Buffon, my grandfather, before 
Lamarck and others, propounded the obvious view 
that if species were not created separately they 
must have descended from other species, and I 
can see nothing else in common between the 
“Origin” and Lamarck. I believe this way of 
putting the case is very injurious to its acceptance, 
as it implies necessary progression, and closely 
connects Wallace’s and my views with what I con- 
sider, after two deliberate readings, as a wretched 
book, and one from which (I well remember to my 
surprise) I gained nothing.” 
“But,” adds Darwin with a little touch of 
banter, “I know you rank it higher, which is curi- 
ous, as it did not in the least shake your belief.” 
(III. p. 14; see also p. 16, “to me it was an ab- 
solutely useless book.”) 
Unable to find any satisfactory theory of the 
process of descent with modification in the works 
of his predecessors, Darwin proceeded to lay the — 
foundations of his own views independently ; and 
he naturally turned, in the first place, to the only 
certainly known examples of descent with modifi- — 
cation, namely, those which are presented by 
domestic animals and cultivated plants. He 
devoted himself to the study of these cases with 
a thoroughness to which none of his predecessors — 
