EIGHTEENTH CENTURY EVOLUTIONISTS 185 



namely, air, whereby galvanism, or the vital 

 process arose." 



The Great Naturalists (1707-1788) 



Early in the eighteenth century, or eighty-one 

 years after the death of Bacon, were born, only 

 four days apart, Linnaeus and Buffon, the first 

 of the great naturalists of western Europe. 

 Twenty-four years later was born Erasmus Dar- 

 win, who shares with Lamarck the honor of set- 

 ting forth the first comprehensive view of the evo- 

 lution of the entire living world, including man. 



Linnceus (1707-1778) 



In the environment of the idea of Evolution, 

 Linnseus may be considered not as a positive but 

 as one of the negative factors, as founding the 

 'school of facts' of which Cuvier was later the 

 distinguished leader, and as extending the spe- 

 cial creation idea to the innumerable species of 

 plants and animals which he named. Linnaus 

 had been preceded as a systematic classifier by 

 Wotton in 1552, one of the last of the Aristote- 

 lian zoologists; by Gessner of the same period, 

 one of the first zoologists who shook off the tra- 

 ditions of Aristotle; by Aldrovandi in 1599; by 

 Sperling in 1661; by Ray (1628-1705), who 



