THE THEORY OF ORGANIC EVOLUTION 173 



knowledge of Cuvier won the day. Transmutation was 

 seemingly disposed of in the scientific world and the Lamarck- 

 ian doctrines seemed at an end. But almost immediately 

 afterward came the publication of the first edition of Charles 

 Lyell's ''Principles of Geology" (1830). In this the theory 

 of geologic evolution was formulated as the only reasonable 

 explanation of the changes which have given the surface of 

 the earth its present form. The year following, Charles 

 Darwin set out on the voyage around the world which was 

 destined to become so decisive a factor in his subsequent 

 work upon the origin of species. The " coming of evolution " 

 was at hand even when its precursors seemed discredited as 

 in the case of Lamarck. 



THE DARWINIAN THEORY 



There were other reasons for the initial failure of scien- 

 tific evolutionism. But the fundamental reason was the 

 inertia of the human mind when confronted with an inter- 

 pretation of nature which differs widely from established 

 tradition. Belief in special creation and an unscientific 

 attitude toward the larger problems of nature had dominated 

 thought for almost two thousand years. It was natural, 

 therefore, that the first scientific theories of evolution should 

 end in failure. Nevertheless, this failure was apparent 

 rather than real. 



During the early decades of the nineteenth century the 

 great Cuvier (1769-1832) continued the work of Daubenton 

 and established the science of Comparative Anatomy. 

 Karl Ernst von Baer (1792-1876) followed, establishing 

 Comparative Embryology during the second quarter of the 

 century. Geological science had received its initial impulse 

 during the eighteenth century through the work of James 

 Hutton (1726-1797), whose "Theory of the Earth" (1795) 

 maintained that the past history of our planet was explicable 

 in terms of changes observable in the present. In the main, 



