BUFF ON FULLER QUOTATIONS. 15 1 



served if he could have lived during many continuous 

 ages, Buffon goes on to say : 



"And as the number, sustenance, and balance of 

 power among species is constant, Nature would present 

 ever the same appearance, and would be in all times 

 and under all climates absolutely and relatively the 

 same, if it were not her fashion to vary her individual 

 forms as much as possible. The type of each species is 

 founded in a mould of which the principal features have 

 been cut in characters that are ineffaceable and eter- 

 nally permanent, but all the accessory touches vary ; 

 no one individual is the exact facsimile of any other, 

 and no species exists without a large number of varieties. 

 In the human race on which the divine seal has been 

 set most firmly, there are yet varieties of black and 

 white, large and small races, the PatagoniaD, Hottentot, 

 European, American, Negro, which, though all descended 

 from a common father, nevertheless exhibit no very 

 brotherly resemblance to one another." * 



On an earlier page there is a passage which I may 

 quote as showing Buffon to have not been without some 

 though very imperfect perception of the fact which 

 evidently made so deep an impression upon his succes- 

 sor, Dr. Erasmus Darwin. I refer to that continuity of 

 life in successive generations, and that oneness of per- 

 sonality between parents and offspring, which is the 

 only key that will make the phenomena of heredity 

 intelligible. 



" Man," he says, " and especially educated man, is no 

 longer a single individual, but represents no small 

 * Tom. xiii., preface, x. 1765. 



