Charles Schuchert — Historical Geology, 1818-1918. 95 



"Were the transmutation theory true, the geological record 

 should exhibit an uninterrupted succession of types blending 

 gradually into one another. The fact is that throughout all 

 geological times each period is characterized by definite specific 

 types, belonging to definite genera, and these to definite families, 

 referable to definite orders, constituting definite classes and 

 definite branches, built upon definite plans. Until the facts of 

 Nature are shown to have been mistaken by those who have col- 

 lected them, and that they have a different meaning from that 

 now generally assigned to them, I shall therefore consider the 

 transmutation theory as a scientific mistake, untrue in its facts, 

 unscientific in its method, and mischievous in its tendency." 



Dana, in reviewing Huxley's well known book, Man's 

 Place in Nature (35, 451, 1863), holds that man is apart 

 from brute nature because man exhibits "extreme ceph- 

 alization" in that he has arms that no longer are used 

 in locomotion but go rather with the head, and because 

 he has a far higher mentality and speech. As for the 

 Darwinian theory, the evidence, he says, "comes from 

 lower departments of life, and is acknowledged by its 

 advocates to be exceedingly scanty and imperfect." 



The growth of evolution is set forth in the Journal in 

 Asa Gray's article on Charles Darwin (24, 453, 1882), 

 which speaks of the latter as "the most celebrated man of 

 science of the nineteenth century," and, in addition, as 

 "one of the most kindly and charming, unaffected, sim- 

 ple-hearted, and lovable of men." In regard to the rise 

 of evolution in America, more can be had from Dana's 

 paper on Asa Gray (35, 181, 1888). Here w T e read, as a 

 sequel to his Thoughts on Species, that the "paper may 

 be taken, perhaps, as a culmination of the past, just as 

 the new future was to make its appearance." Finally, 

 in this connection there should be mentioned 0. C. 

 Marsh's paper on Thomas Henry Huxley (50, 177, 1895), 

 w r herein is recorded the latter 's share in the upbuilding 

 of the evolutionary theory. 



We have seen that originally Dana was a creationist, 

 but in the course of his long and fruitful life he gradually 

 became tin evolutionist, and rather a Neo-Lamarckian 

 than a Darwinian. This change may be traced in the 

 various editions of his Manual of Geology, and in the last 

 edition of 1895 he says his "speculative conclusions" of 

 1852 in regard to the origin of species are not "in accord 

 with the author 's present judgment. " " The evidence in 



