32 MEMOIR OF LAMARCK. 



sequently it may be said, that they are not conform- 

 able to nature, and are even opposed to it, because 

 they unceasingly reproduce what nature continually 

 tends to destroy. Vegetables form direct combina- 

 tions of the elements ; animals produce more com - 

 plicated compounds by combining those formed by 

 vegetables; but there is in every living body a 

 power which tends to destroy it ; all therefore die, 

 each in his appointed season, and all mineral sub- 

 stances, and all organic bodies whatsoever, are 

 nothing but the remains of bodies which once had 

 life, and from which the more volatile principles 

 have been successfully disengaged. The products 

 of the most complex animals are calcareous sub- 

 stances, those of vegetables are argils or earths. 

 Both of these pass into a siliceous state, by freeing 

 themselves more and more from their less fixed 

 principles, and at last are reduced to rock-crystal, 

 which is earth in its greatest purity. Salts, pyrites, 

 metals, differ from other minerals, only because 

 certain circumstances have had the effect of accu- 

 mulating in them, in different proportions, a greater 

 quantity of carbonic or acidific fire." 



Lamarck's opinion regarding the origin of living 

 beings, and the manner in which they acquired the 

 various organs and forms which they now possess, 

 are well known. They were first given to the 

 public in 1802, in a work entitled " Researches on 

 the Organization of living Bodies, on the Cause of 

 its Developements, and the Progress of its Composi- 

 tion, and on that Principle, which, by continually 



