ANIMAL KINGDOM. 335 



dergo an exactly equal and proportionable degradation. 

 Hence, to obtain the simple progression so devoutly wished 

 for, we are under the necessity of making use of the only 

 alternative remaining, that is, of the first method proposed ; 

 which failing, I fancy that it will be readily allowed that the 

 truth of a simple progression in Nature is as little to be de- 

 monstrated as that of the Ptolemaic system . Now, that the 

 method of referring an organized being to man, by a compari- 

 son of the whole of its parts, will fail to produce such simpli- 

 city, I think can be proved — In the first place by experiment, 

 which has led almost every naturalist to express his inability 

 to obtain a simple series; which has led Lamarck to pre- 

 sume the existence of a double subramose series; and which 

 has induced the reader ere this, I trust, to have little doubt 

 of the existence of a progression which returns into itself: 

 In the second place, by argument; for, as Cuvier has 

 most properly said, to form a simple scale of organization, 

 upon the comparison of every organ existing in animals, 

 we ought to calculate the effect resulting from each com- 

 bination, and then to give each animal its definitive place 

 in the scale according to this calculation. Let us then go 

 so far in our desire to procure the simple series, as to sup- 

 pose this plan, which is the only one I will venture to say 

 that can be devised, to be practically possible. Let us 

 grant a simple scale to be thus obtained, and there are few 

 so ignorant of Natural History as not to see that it would be 

 the most artificial system that ever was invented. Well does 

 Lamarck observe that such an operation, if practicable, 

 could only be effected by making use of arbitrary data, 

 and that such a result, if obtained, would be totally use- 

 less and nugatorv. It would no more argue a simple se- 



