CHAPTER XVTIT. 



DISTRIBUTION. 



BEFORE we go any further in discussing the problem 

 of the origin of species, it is necessary to consider the 

 doctrine, which is chiefly associated with the great name 

 of Cuvier, that all the facts of organization are to be Cuvier's 

 directly referred to the conditions of that existence for ^'^'^tnue, 

 which the organism has been created. 



This brief and somewhat technical statement of the 

 theory needs to be further explained. I have already 

 defined organization as the adaptation of structure to 

 function ;^ and I have stated the law of the physiological 

 division of labour, which consists in setting apart parti- 

 cular tissues and organs for particiilar functions. Cuvier's 

 doctrine is no more than an extension of this : it is, in 

 truth, no mere theory, but a generalized statement of 

 unquestionable and most important facts. He taught that of orgauin 

 every part of an organism ^ is directly and specially adapted ^."^P^^^ 

 to every other part, and all to the conditions of that exist- 

 ence for which it has been made ; and this doctrine, so far 

 from being in his hands a mere barren truism, enabled him, 

 with the aid of his vast anatomical knowledge, to restore 

 many extinct organisnas, which were known only by a few 

 fragments of bone : to restore them, I say, to the mind's 

 eye and on paper, ^.s an architect can restore a ruin. Thus, 



1 P. 115. 



2 So far as I ani aware, Cuvier made no attempt to apply this principle 

 to vegetables ; but no one who understands the rudiments of the subject 

 can doubt that all such general principles are applicable to animals and 

 vegetables alike. 



