330 ON THE CLASSES OF THE 



constituting the whole of the animal kingdom does not 

 agree with the evident order of Nature; " car cet ordre 

 est loin d'etre simple; il est rameux, et parait mime com- 

 post de plusieurs series distinctes." He then presumes 

 that animals offer two separate subramose series ; one com- 

 mencing with the lufusoria, and leading by means of the 

 Mollusca to the Cephalopoda ; and the other commencing 

 with the Intestinal Worms and leading to Insects. Now 

 this notion could only have gained a place in thfe mind of 

 Lamarck, from a conviction by experiment of its being an 

 incontrovertible truth ; for be it observed, that no more 

 complete proof of the insufficiency of his theory of forma- 

 tion can be adduced than the existence of two series. 

 Lamarck had unfortunately, from a ready perception of 

 affinities, been induced to confound natural order, by 

 which is meant the actual regularity of disposition which 

 exists in Nature, with that order of formation by which is 

 meant the process of it in time; and this error is more 

 difficult to avoid, than a person who is not deeply versed 

 in the investigation of affinities will be apt to imagine. 

 The consequence however of thus mingling effects of 

 which we are sure, with the means by which these effects 

 have been produced, of which we known nothing, was, 

 that Lamarck adopted the hypothesis of a principle con- 

 stantly existing in organized matter, by which it as constant- 

 ly tends to be more organified. The great first Cause had 

 only to create a particle of matter Avith this principle, and 

 the work of creation as far as it regarded animals was ef- 

 fected. Now, had the series of affinities been simple, we 

 should have had a strong argument for the truth of this hy- 

 pothesis : but when its author is obUged to confess that Na- 

 ture "en donnant V existence au regne animal, a necessaire- 



