l8o FROM LAMARCK TO ST. HI LAIR E. 



istry and other branches of science. Another 

 marked defect was, that Lamarck was completely 

 carried away with the belief that his theory of the 

 transmission of acquired characters was adequate 

 to explain all the phenomena. He did not, like his 

 contemporaries, Erasmus Darwin and Goethe, per- 

 ceive and point out, that certain problems in the 

 origin of adaptations were still left wholly untouched 

 and unsolved. Believing that he saw a great Evo- 

 lution factor, and applying it to organic nature, he 

 was blind to its deficiencies and to every other 

 factor, and sought to establish it as a sufficient ex- 

 planation of every change in the animal world. His 

 arguments are, in most cases, not inductive, but de- 

 ductive, and are frequently found not to support his 

 law, but to postulate it. Another defect was his 

 limited conception of Natural Environment, in 

 which he was inferior to his contemporary, Trevira- 

 nus. Treviranus and St. Hilaire enlarged upon 

 Buffon's view of Environment, while Lamarck did 

 not. The greatest gap in his reasoning has become 

 obvious since his time ; namely, that it turned upon 

 the assumption that acquired characters are inher- 

 ited ; this he took for granted and never endeavoured 

 to demonstrate. 



None the less we must close by placing La- 

 marck in the first rank. He was the first natur- 

 alist to become profoundly convinced of the great 

 law, and to place it in the form of a system ; he 

 suffered social and scientific ostracism for this con- 



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