CUVIER AND THE RISE OF PALAEONTOLOGY 93 



Darwin could exhaust the inquiry. "The veil of 

 secrecy," he goes on, "is as yet far from lifted." 



Cuvier and the Rise of Palaeontology. 



If this historical sketch had been prepared within a 

 few years of the death of Cuvier, it would no doubt 

 have held him up as the greatest of zoologists and 

 comparative anatomists. Nor would it have been hard 

 to find reasons for such a verdict. His Regne Animal 

 extended and corrected the zoological system of 

 Linnaeus ; his comparative anatomy, and especially his 

 comparative osteology, were far ampler and more 

 exact than anything that had been attempted before. 

 It would not have been forgotten, moreover, that he 

 was the practical founder of the new science of palaeon- 

 tology. 



At a later time, say in the sixties and seventies of 

 the nineteenth century, when the Origin of Species 

 controversy was in full blast, any estimate of Cuvier 

 by an evolutionist would have been much less laudatory. 

 Cuvier had actively opposed that form of evolution 

 which had been brought forward in his day, and with 

 such power as to close the discussion for a time. The 

 assailants of the Origin of Species found his refutation 

 of unity of type and progressive development adaptable 

 to the new situation, and the reasoning which had 

 pulverised Geoffrey St. Hilaire was brought out again 

 in order to pulverise Darwin. Then the supporters of 

 Darwin found it necessary to show that Cuvier was by 

 no means infallible. This they were able to do without 

 introducing matter foreign to the main question, for 

 Cuvier's exposition of fixity of species, of the principles 

 of classification and of the process of extinction, were 

 entirely opposed to the beliefs not only of Darwin, but 



