134 DUBLIN NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 



can reflect upon how good and excellent their ancestors were, and con- 

 gratulate each other upon their superiority to those that will come after 

 them. Every system of philosophy provides its followers with a " sola- 

 tium (Moris ;'^ the degradationists find it in the contemplation of the 

 past, and the progressionists in the prospect of the future ; to those who 

 are contented with the present, and deny our knowledge of the past or 

 future, both theories appear as the idle dreams of childhood, the awaken- 

 ing from which will disclose a reality totally different from the troubled 

 fancies of the night. 



Lamarck is the father of the progressionists, and of the many who 

 quote his name as an authority in support of their systems, or express 

 their disapproval of his doctrine, few have taken the trouble to under- 

 stand his theory or trace it to its origin. It is apparently founded on 

 the confusion of species, like that of BufFon ; but there is in reality an 

 arriere pensee, like an unseen presence, which corrupts his reasoning, and 

 discloses the motive force of his entire system. This hidden spring of 

 action and theorizing is a profound, and, as many think, a well-founded 

 contempt for humanity, which pervades his writings as thoroughly as 

 it does the " Voyage to the Houyhnhms." Lamarck was too quick- 

 witted and acute an observer, however deficient he may have been as a 

 reasoner, to have believed his own theory, the real mainspring of which 

 is the desire to degrade man into an intelligent baboon, or yahoo ; what 

 difi'erence is there in a name ! In his desire to do so, he overlooks every 

 fact at variance with his foregone conclusion, and writes of mankind 

 with a virulence which, though devoid of the wit of Swift, springs from 

 the same profound and unalterable conviction of the worthlessness of 

 the creature he describes : — 



" Si I^ewton, Bacon, Montesquieu, Voltaire, et tant d'autres hommes 

 ont honore I'espece humaine par I'etendue de leur intelligence et de 

 leur genie ; combien ne la rapprochent pas de 1' animal cette quantite 

 d'hommes bruts, ignorans, en proie aux prejuges les plus absurdes, et 

 constamment asservis par leurs habitudes, qui cependant composent la 

 masse principale chez toutes les nations ?"f 



Lamarck's contempt for his species is again shown in the strange 

 list of resemblances he selects for his comparison between man and the 

 chimpanzee, a comparison fully as degrading as Swift's mock imitation 

 of a naturalist's description of a yahoo. 



Lamarck's theory consists in the assertion of the following laws, 

 six in number, which he dignifies with the title of Laws of I^ature : — 



I. Law of Specialimtion of Function, by which a function at first 

 general, or belonging to the whole body, is determined to a particular 

 organ. 



* " Recherches sur 1' Organization des Corps Vivans," p. 127. Paris, 27 Floreal, 

 An. X. 



