1 



252 



LAMAECK'S THEOEY OF THE 



[Ch. XXXIW 



sentiment 



and ^ acts of organisation/ as canses whereby animals and 

 plants acquire new organs^ he substituted names for things • 

 and resorted to fictions almost as ideal as the ' plastic 

 virtue ' of some greolosrists of the middle ao-es. 



some 



have been adduced to establish one complete step in the pro- 

 cess of transformation^ such as the appearance^ in indi- 

 viduals descending from a common stock, of a sense or organ 

 entirely new, and a complete disappearance of some other 



time alone mi 



posed sufficient to 



bring about any 



amount of metamor- 



We must bear in mind 



to the theory of transmutation, was gratuitously assumed 



by its advocate. 



;em 



as an undoubted fact, that a change of external circum- 



may 



a new one to be developed, such as never before belonged to 

 the species, the following proposition is announced, which, 

 however startling it may seem, is logically deduced from the 



It is not the organs, or, in other words, 



'emises 



the nature and form of the parts of the body of an animal, 

 which have given rise to its habits and its particular facul- 

 ties ', but, on the contrary, its habits, its manner of Hving, 

 and those of its progenitors, have in the course of tinte 

 Tmined the form of its body, the number and condition 



of its organs 



-in short, the faculties which it enjoys. Thus 

 otters, beavers, waterfowl, turtles, and frogs, were not made 



swim 



theni 



Stretched out the toes of their feet to strike the water and 

 move rapidlj along its surface. Bj the repeated stretching 

 of their toes, the skin which united them at the base ac- 

 quired a habit of extension, until, in the course of time, the 



membranes 



formed 



In like manner, the antelope and the gazelle were not 

 endowed with light agile forms, in order that they might 





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ri? 



ill runn"^ 



oi many < 



their \eS= 

 The g^ 



cause it ^^ 

 the soil Av 

 the n-^ 



by ^ 

 of loftj * 

 to rea ch t 

 that it eoi 



round. 



?■ 



Anothe 



further 



C( 



r 



[] 



it was s 

 unaltered 

 ought lie 

 such sexi 

 animals ; 

 tions are 

 Hjbridi 



between t 

 alone, i^iiy, 



of time -«■( 



Afler ei 



'^ the ai. 



^''% orj>a 



ch 



;t 







