Prof. Owen on Life and Species. 35 
the whole in every part,’ operated ees ously to the 
calm inquiry into the prime question at issue. To Cuvier this 
language seemed little better than savatieal jargon, and he 
alluded to it with transparent contempt.* When he did extend 
inferences from comparative anatomy beyond the adaptation of 
structure to function, Cuvier went not beyond a recognition of 
what I have since termed ‘special hod lee + and this 
lowest degree of correspondence he explained on the ground of 
the subserviency we such homologous parts to similar ends in 
different animals ;{ viewing them, in fact, in that relation when 
curring in different specie 
After the publication of the ‘ Memoir on the Pearly Nautilus,’ 
and of those on Monotrematous and Marsupial generation, which 
subjects Cuvier had strongly recommended to my attention, the 
question of the condition or law of special homologies presse 
itself upon me, more especially in connection with the task of 
arranging and ‘cataloguing the osteological part of the Hun- 
to which Thad previously velict a assent. To eee the 
evidence of the community of organization, I found that the arti- 
fice of an archetype vertebrate “animal was as essential as that 
of the archetype plant had been to Goethe in expressing anal- 
ogous ideas ; and as the like reference to an ‘ideal type’ must 
be to all who undertake to make intelligible the ‘ unity in va- 
riety’ pervading any group of organisms. ac From the demon- 
* ‘Quant a sal —_— il déclare les piéces en question les parties écailleuses 
.“‘ la fourchette du membre supérieur 
fe la ite nCot. heen de la téte de M. Oken devient pour M. Spix le pubis 
de cette méme téte; ou, oat parler un langage oe un des osselets de 
Pegi: sath le marteau. IXXXix, tom. v, 2¢ partie, p 
C 
-* Ce" sel it qu’un __ pe subordonné a4 un autre bien plus élevé et bien plus 
fécond,a celui des conditions d’existence, de la convenance des parties, de leur coér- 
dination eee le réle ee Fanimal 4 jouer os la nature. Voila eo vrai are 
| possi 
i ] xv. : 
Pett type’ “must not be confounded with the so-called ‘ s’ sup- 
pose to be exemplified by certat certain living species. Arguments latter 
vague and _ ideas are of no weight nem the former, and indicate a 
certain obtuseness of apprehension in the objector. See cooxxvr’, * Sh. 
