150 FROM THE GREEKS TO DARWIN 



and philosophy were held back by his scientific 

 instinct for evidence, and evidence was then 

 wholly lacking, for even the explanation offered 

 by Lamarck was not available. 



Kant was undoubtedly familiar with the writ- 

 ings of Buff on and Maupertuis ; he alludes to 

 them both, and in his second work, prepared in 

 1757 but not published until much later, it is evi- 

 dent that his standpoint toward Evolution was 

 very similar to that of Buff on in what we call his 

 'middle period.' Later, in 1763, he parallels 

 Buffon in tracing back all the higher forms of 

 life to simpler elementary forms. As to the origin 

 of man, he traces the changes produced in man 

 by migration, differences of climate and the like, 

 and, like Buffon,^ the principle of 'degeneration' 

 (denaturee) from originally and perfectly cre- 

 ated types of species. In 1771 he also brings 

 man into the ranks of Nature, and alludes to his 

 former quadrupedal attitude, here agreeing with 

 Buffon and Helvetius. In his study upon the 

 races of man we also find that he expresses the 

 principle of survival of the fittest, as applied to 

 groups of organisms, very much in the form 

 in which it had been stated by Buffon. In this 

 connection he quotes Maupertuis. He also sees 

 the force of accidental variation and artificial 



1 As pointed out in Chapter IV, Buffon first advanced belief 

 in the mutability of species in the year 1761, when he used the 

 terms denaturee and degeneration. 



