248 THE THEORIES OF EVOLUTION 



the effects of natural selection. He owns in his Auto- 

 biography to having been influenced by Lamarckian 

 ideas through Lyell's writings; for Lyell makes fre- 

 quent reference to Lamarck in his "Principles of Ge- 

 ology" and in his correspondence. 



Haeckel, although a determined partisan of the 

 selection theory, paid Lamarck a high tribute in his 

 "History of Creation," the first edition of which ap- 

 peared in 1868. "To him will always belong the im- 

 mortal glory of having for the first time worked out 

 the theory of descent, as an independent scientific 

 theory of the first order, and as the philosophical foun- 

 dation of the whole science of biology. . . . This 

 admirable work, 'Philosophic Zoologique,' is the first 

 connected exposition of the theory of descent car- 

 ried out strictly into all its consequences. By its 

 purely mechanical method of viewing organic nature, 

 and the strictly philosophical proofs brought forward 

 in it, Lamarck's work is raised far above the prevailing 

 dualistic views of his time ; and with the exception of 

 Darwin's work, which appeared just half a century 

 later, there is none which we could in this respect place 

 by the side of the 'Philosophic Zoologique.' 



What contributed more to the propagation of La- 

 marckism were controversies which threw much light 

 on the exaggeration of the selectionists. It must be 

 noted that in the course of controversy Darwin showed 



i Haeckel. History of Creation, Vol. I, p. 114. 



