LINNAEUS. 129 



ture, its faculties, its functions; and the end of 

 classification was to consider all these facts and to 

 arrange animals in a natural system according 

 to their greater or less likeness. 



Linnaeus thus took a broad view of the true 

 basis of classification upon general structure, a 

 view which was expanded and developed by Cuvier. 

 As Perrier observes in his admirable critique of 

 Linnaeus, he adopted the aphorism of Leibnitz 

 natura non facit saltum ; to him every species was 

 exactly intermediate between two others: "We 

 reckon as many species as issued in pairs from the 

 hands of the Creator." These were his earlier views 

 in all his writings between 1735 and 1751, in which 

 the sentence nullce species nova recurs, expressing 

 his idea of the absolute fixity of species from the 

 period of their creation as described in Genesis, the 

 only change being that of the extension in numbers, 

 not of variation in kind. Yet Linnaeus was too 

 close an observer to continue to hold this idea of 

 absolute fixity, and in 1762 we find his views had 

 somewhat altered, and this is of particular interest 

 because of the hypothesis which he advanced to 

 explain the origin of new species : " All the species 

 of one genus constituted at first (that is, at the 

 Creation) one species, ab initio unam constituerint 

 speciem; they were subsequently multiplied by 

 hybrid generation, that is, by intercrossing with 

 other species." He was thus inclined to admit a 

 great increase of species, more or less recent 



