44 MEMOIR OF LAMARCK. 



acts necessarily, has not, indeed, called matter into 

 existence, but it has formed all bodies of which 

 matter is essentially the base; and as it exercises 

 no power except on the latter, which it modifies 

 and changes in every possible manner, producing 

 all its various aggregates and combinations, we may 

 be assured that it is it which has made all bodies 

 such as we now behold them, and that it is Na- 

 ture which confers on some their properties, and 

 on others the faculties which they exercise*. All 

 this power Lamarck distinctly admits has been de- 

 legated to Nature by the Deity, and among other 

 errors which he conceives to have attached to the 

 ideas which have been entertained regarding Nature, 

 he refutes the notion that Nature is the Deity him- 

 self. " Strange occurrence ! that the watch should 

 have been confounded with its maker, the work 

 with its author. Assuredly this idea is illogical and 

 unfit to be maintained. The power which has 

 created Nature, has, without doubt, no limits, can- 

 not be restricted in its will or made subject to 

 others, and is independent of all law. It alone can 

 change Nature and her laws, and even annihilate 

 them ; and although we have no positive knowledge 

 of this great object, the idea which we thus form 

 of the Almighty Power, is at least the most suitable 

 for man to entertain of the Divinity, when he can 

 raise his thoughts to the contemplation of him. If 

 Nature were an intelligence, it could exercise voli- 

 tion, and change its laws, or rather there could be 



* Anim. sans Vert. i. p. 316. 



