LAMARCK 



scientific value from the absence of nearly all induc- 

 tive evidence, and consisted mainly of inadequate 

 a-priori reasoning, yet it was the only subject worthy 

 of serious consideration in his voluminous pages, and 

 will keep his name alive as one of the early pioneers 

 into speculations that have since then changed the 

 very basis of modern thought. His classical learn- 

 ing was useless to him ; his metaphysics and philos- 

 ophy were erroneous or worthless; but what Dr. 

 Johnson and others thought were idle conjectures, 

 contemptible and ridiculous, have proved to be pre- 

 mature glimpses by him, of the light to come nearly 

 a century later. 



In the development of the doctrine of Evolution, 

 Jean Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet, Chevalier de 

 Lamarck, Jesuit Student, soldier, Botanist, Chemist 

 and Biologist, b. 1 744 ; d. 1 829, brought widely different 

 faculties to the service of science. He was born at 

 Bazentin in Picardie. When scarcely seventeen years 

 old he escaped from the Jesusit College at Amiens, 

 and joined the French army as a Volunteer on the 

 eve of the battle of Wittinghausen against the 

 allied armies of England and Prussia. His firmness 

 and bravery were so strikingly shown that he was 

 rewarded by being made a lieutenant, and as such 

 distinguished himself in several engagements. Not 

 long after, an injury accidentally received from a 



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