248 LUCK, OR CUNNING? 



were made possible by Lamarck and Erasmus Darwin, 

 and these two were made possible by Buffon. Here a 

 somewhat sharper line can be drawn than is usually 

 found possible when defining the ground covered by 

 philosophers. No one broke the ground for Buffon to 

 anything like the extent that he broke it for those 

 who followed him, and these broke it for one another. 



Mr. Allen says (p. 1 1 ) that, " in Charles Darwin's 

 own words, Lamarck ' first did the eminent service of 

 arousing attention to the probability of all change in 

 the organic as well as in the inorganic world being 

 the result of law, and not of miraculous interposition.' " 

 Mr. Darwin did indeed use these words, but Mr. Allen 

 omits the pertinent fact that he did not use them till 

 six thousand copies of his work had been issued, and 

 an impression been made as to its scope and claims 

 which the event has shown to be not easily effaced ; 

 nor does he say that Mr. Darwin only pays these few 

 words of tribute in a quasi-preface, which, though pre- 

 fixed to his later editions of the " Origin of Species," is 

 amply neutralised by the spirit which I have shown to 

 be omnipresent in the body of the work itself. More- 

 over, Mr. Darwin's statement is inaccurate to an un- 

 pardonable extent ; his words would be fairly accurate if 

 applied to Buffon, but they do not apply to Lamarck. 



Mr. Darwin continues that Lamarck " seems to 

 attribute all the beautiful adaptations in nature, such 

 as the long neck of the giraffe for browsing on the 

 branches of trees," to the effects of habit. Mr. Darwin 

 should not say that Lamarck " seems " to do this. It 

 was his business to tell us what led Lamarck to his 



