30 cuvier versus st.-iiilaire. 



This view as to function determining structure 

 is, we have seen, associated with the direct denial of 

 design in the Creation ; though, oddly enough, 

 design is implied in the doctrine of Evolution, only 

 it is shifted from the Creator to the living beings 

 themselves — from the Creator to the creature. 

 Thus, according to Dr. Erasmus Darwin, the acqui- 

 sition of new parts in the course of its development 

 was the result of the animal's own exertions to 

 obtain what it longed for ; or, according to Lamarck, 

 new organs having become necessary in consequence 

 of new wants, efforts were made by the animal to 

 acquire the desiderated organ, and so it came into 

 existence ! Lamarck even represents the hypothe- 

 tical immediate ape-progenitors of man as planning 

 and executing the various steps requisite for advanc- 

 ing themselves to the dignity of manhood ! 



Against such views, which were upheld by 

 Geoffroy St.-Hilaire, in the memorable discussion 

 at the French Academy of Sciences, in 1830, the 

 Baron Cuvier raised his voice and maintained, what 

 our common sense acknowledges, that living beings 

 were created by design and for a purpose. 



Man was created with his faculties — intellectual 

 and moral — capable and ready in the individual to 

 be elicited under the proper conditions. The least 

 civilised man in early times could not have been 

 lower than some savages of the present day. Now, 

 the lowest savage individually, it has been found, 



