328 FROM THE GREEKS TO DARWIN 



predecessors, Darwin was early fired with the 

 truth of the idea and was equally ready to suffer 

 social and scientific ostracism in its pursuit. 



Second, I may endeavor to trace the influences 

 which moulded Darwin's earlier and later opin- 

 ions ; how, starting with some leaning toward the 

 theories of modification of Buff on and Lamarck, 

 he reached an almost exclusive belief in the pow- 

 ers of his own principle of 'natural selection,' 

 and then gradually reverted to Buffon's views 

 of the direct action of the environment and to 

 Lamarck's theory of the transmitted effect of 

 habit as well, until in his maturest writings he 

 embraced a threefold causation in the origin 

 of species: namely, as first and most important, 

 the Darwin- Wallace factor of natural selection; 

 second, as of considerable importance, the E. 

 Darwin-Lamarck factor of the inheritance of the 

 effects of use and disuse; third, as still of some 

 importance, the Buffon factor of the direct ac- 

 tion of the environment. Yet he independently 

 reached each of these factors, chiefly through his 

 own observations and partly through contempo- 

 rary observers, rather than through the argu- 

 ments advanced by their authors. All this con- 

 nects Darwin with the past, not by way of di- 

 minishing his lustre, but of doing the past justice. 



And now a word as to the method of observa- 

 tion and induction which enabled him, in a single 



