162 The Science of Life. 



coveries; it is highly probable that it is the simple 

 descriptive statement which brings into a single focus 

 all the complex lines of hereditary influence. If Dar- 

 winian evolution be natural selection combined with 

 heredity, then the single statement which embraces the 

 whole field of heredity must prove almost as epoch- 

 making to the biologist as the law of gravitation to the 

 astronomer." 



Chapter XII. 

 Palaeontology. 



Scope of Paleontology Ancient Opinions Medieval Opinions The 

 Diluvial Theory The Foundation of Paleontology Cuvier 

 Lamarck William Smith Palaeontology of Plants The Cuvierian 

 School Richard Owen Louis Agassiz Paleontology after Darwin 

 Paleontology and Evolution. 



It is the task of palaeontology to spell out the history 

 of the past, so far as that can be deciphered from the 

 Sco e of fossil-bearing rocks, to trace the rise and 

 Paiseon- decline of races, to disclose the sublime 

 toiogy. spectacle of life's progress. The palaeon- 

 tologist is no Dryasdust " poring over the entrails of an 

 antediluvian frog", as a witty scholar once described 

 him, he is rather one who makes the present intelligible 

 in the light of the past. The palaeontologists are the 

 historians of the prehistoric, searching in the grave- 

 yards of a buried past. For all practical purposes palae- 

 ontology dates from Cuvier, who may be linked to the 

 Victorian era, if we recall that Richard Owen, after 

 studying in Edinburgh, went to Paris and listened to 

 some of the famous anatomist's lectures. The study is 

 thus strictly modern, but it may be of interest to notice 

 briefly what was said about fossils in ancient days. 



In ancient days there were four theories in regard to 

 fossils. 



(i) Some held them to be lusus natures, " sports of 

 nature", of a mineral sort; and we do well to remem- 



