CHAPTER VIII 



LAMARCK'S WORK IN GEOLOGY 



Whatever may be said of his chemical and phy- 

 sical lucubrations, Lamarck in his geological and 

 palaeontological writings is, despite their errors, al- 

 ways suggestive, and in some most important respects 

 in advance of his time. And this largely for the rea- 

 son that he had once travelled, and to some extent 

 observed geological phenomena, in the central regions 

 of France, in Germany, and Hungary ; visiting mines 

 and collecting ores and minerals, besides being in a 

 degree familiar with the French cretaceous fossils, 

 but more especially those of the tertiary strata of 

 Paris and its vicinity. He had, therefore, from his 

 own experience, slight as it was, some solid grounds 

 of facts and observations on which to meditate and 

 from which to reason. 



He did not attempt to touch upon cosmological 

 theories— chaos and creation — but, rather, confined 

 himself to the earth, and more particularly to the ac- 

 tion of the ocean, and to the changes which he believed 

 to be due to organic agencies. The most impressive 

 truth in geology is the conception of the immensity 

 of past time, and this truth Lamarck fully realized. 

 His views are to be found in a little book of 268 

 pages, entitled Hydrogdologie. It appeared in 1802 



