152 Sir A. Gcikit' — Lamarclx and Phtj[fai)' — 



plays ftti important part among the p;oologioal operations which 

 change the surface of the earth. TIail he heen content to state in 

 explicit terms the facts of ohservation on which he relied, and to 

 pnt forward tentatively, or at least less dogmatically, the conclusions 

 which he drew from them, his views would not improbably have 

 received the attention to which they would then have been justly 

 entitled. But he submitted no evidence in support of his contident 

 asseverations, lie made statements as it' tliey expressed admitted 

 truths, when in reality they were for the most part either disputable 

 or actually contrary to already ascertained fact. On such an 

 unreliable basis his characteristic ardour led him to build a 

 stupendous speculation, in the promulgation of which, besides giving 

 flight to his winged imagiiu\tion, he was able at the same time to 

 proclaim his own peculiar chemical views and to express once 

 more his scornful dissent from the prevailing chemistry of his day. 

 It can hardly be matter for surprise that, as he himself complained, 

 his opinions on these matters met with no serious attention. 



It is interesting to trace the logical process by which so gifted 

 a genius arrived at conclusions to which his contemporaries would 

 pay no heed, and which his successors have consigned to oblivion. 

 The external crust of the earth, which, in his opinion, might be- 

 three or four leagues in thickness, consists of various minerals and 

 rooks almost wholly made up of compound substances. The 

 materials of this crust have imdoubtedly been exposed to the 

 manifold agents of geological change, ever since the world began. 

 According to the prevalent opinion in his time (an opinion which 

 has been amply sustained by subsequent research) the elements have 

 a natural tendency to enter into combination, and the general com- 

 pound nature of the constituents of the crust could be cited in favour 

 of the orthodox view. Lamarck, however, had formed a totally 

 diflerent judgment of the matter. His own investigations had led 

 him to conclude that, owing to the operation of the agents of 

 destruction, the tendency in Nature was in exactly the opposite 

 direction, that is, towards the breaking up and simpliiication rather 

 than to the foruiation of compound substances. He regarded the 

 surface of the globe as a vast field whereon Nature is ceaselessly 

 at work in destroying every compound and resolving it into its 

 integral constituents. Not that this change is always efiected at 

 once, by a complete liberation of the components ; it rather comes 

 as the result of successive alteration, the cmnulative eiVect of which 

 is to leave the substances progressively less complex (p. 101). 

 This process of disintegration appeared to him to arise sometimes 

 from an inherent tendencj' in the material itself to split up into its 

 component ingredients, but more frequently from the action of 

 external provocative influences, such as those of heat, water, and 

 saline solutions. 



But if such be the normal order of things, how comes it, he asks, 

 that the outer crust of our planet, which, for such a prolonged 

 succession of ages, has been ceaselessly exposed to this destruction 

 and simplification of composite bodies, should nevertheless now 



