hunter's posthumous paper on fossils. 337 



It has been well remarked, that no period could have been more for- 

 tunate for the discovery in the immediate neighbourhood of Paris of a 

 rich store of well-preserved fossils, than the commencement of tbe pre- 

 sent century ; for at no former era had Natural History and Compara- 

 tive Anatomy been more extensively and successfully studied at the 

 Jardin des Plantes. 



The labours of Cuvier in Comparative Osteology, and of Lamarck in 

 recent and fossil Conchology, had raised these departments of study to 

 a rank far above that which they had previously attained. Their inves- 

 tigations had eventually a powerful effect in dispelling the illusion 

 which had long prevailed, but from which Hunter was free, concerning 

 the absence of analogy between the ancient and modern states of our 

 planet. 



A close comparison of the recent and fossil species, and the inferences 

 drawn in regard to their habits, accustomed the geologist to contem- 

 plate the earth as having been at successive periods the dwelling-place 

 of animals and plants of different races, some terrestrial and others 

 aquatic — some fitted to live in seas, others in the waters of lakes and 

 rivers. 



By the consideration of these topics, the mind was slowly and insen- 

 sibly withdrawn from imaginary pictures of catastrophes and chaotic 

 confusion, such as had haunted the imagination of the early cosmogonists, 

 Numerous proofs were discovered of the tranquil deposition of sediment- 

 ary matter, and the slow and successive development of organic life. 



The application of the binomial nomenclature of Linnaeus to the 

 animals indicated by fossil remains, and especially of the same generic 

 names to the fossils and their living congeners, was an important step 

 towards familiarizing the mind with the idea of the identity and unity 

 of the mundane system in distant eras. "It was an acknowledgement," 

 as Lyell well says, " that part, at least, of the ancient memorials of 

 Nature were written in a living language." The growing importance 

 of the Natural History and anatomical determination of fossil organic 

 remains may be pointed out as the characteristic feature of the progress 

 of the science during the present century. 



This branch of knowledge has not only become an instrument of 

 great utility in geological classification, but it has added largely to the 

 facts of Comparative Anatomy and to the physiological relations of 

 modified parts and organs to the peculiar habits of extinct species ; and 

 it is continuing daily to unfold new data for grand and enlarged views 

 respecting the former changes of the earth. 



Zoology has gained an immense accession of subjects through the 

 determination of the nature and affinities of extinct animals, and much 



