LAMARCK'S THEORY OF DESCENT 285 



ization, which are designated by the expression of 

 spontaneous generations ; 



"3. That the first germs of the animal and plant 

 having been formed in appropriate places and cir- 

 cumstances, the faculties of a beginning life and of an 

 organic movement established, have necessarily grad- 

 ually developed the organs, and that with time they 

 have diversified them, as also the parts ; 



" 4. That the power of growth in each part of the 

 organized body being inherent in the first created 

 forms of Hfe, it has given rise to different modes of 

 multiplication and of regeneration of individuals; and 

 that consequently the progress acquired in the com- 

 position of the organization and in the shape and 

 diversity of the parts has been preserved ; 



" 5. That with the aid of sufficient time, of circum- 

 stances which have been necessarily favorable, of 

 changes of condition that every part of the earth's 

 surface has successively undergone — in a word, by 

 the power which new situations and new habits have 

 of modifying the organs of living beings, all those 

 which now exist have been gradually formed such as 

 we now see them ; 



" 6. Finally, that, according to a similar order of 

 things, living beings having undergone each of the 

 more or less great changes in the condition of their 

 structure and parts, that which we call a species among 

 them has been gradually and successively so formed, 

 having only a relative constancy in its condition, and 

 not being as old as Nature herself. 



" But, it will be said, when it is supposed that by 

 the aid of much time and of an infinite variation in 

 circumstances. Nature has gradually formed the differ- 

 ent animals known to us, shall we not be stopped in 

 this supposition by the simple consideration of the ad- 

 mirable diversity which we observe in the instincts of 

 different animals, and by that of the marvels of every 

 kind presented by their different kinds of industry ? 



