BARON CUVIER. 217 



having been developed by the discovery of the 

 natural properties of bodies, each of these dis- 

 coveries has a corresponding degree of civilis- 

 ation ; and therefore the history of this civilis- 

 ation, and consequently of all humanity, is 

 intimately connected with the history of natural 

 sciences." In order to be fully in possession of 

 his subject, how immense must have been the 

 research of M. Cuvier ! and nothing but a 

 review of his whole life seems to account for his 

 capability. Several have been able to elucidate 

 particular periods, to the study of which they 

 have devoted themselves ; but his researches em- 

 braced all historical and pliilosophical science. 

 He consulted all books, in order to go back to 

 the origin of discoveries ; and the judgment 

 necessary for the employment of materials thus 

 collected was so much the greater, inasmuch as 

 writers frequently state but the germs of their 

 ideas, and leave facts almost as obscure as they 

 are in nature. 



The first, or opening lecture, divided the pro- 

 gress of science into three epochs ; the religious, 

 more especially emanating from the Egyptians and 

 Hebrews ; the philosophical, which commenced 

 in Greece ; and the tliird, the beginning of 

 which may, perhaps, be traced to Aristotle, 



