372 
POPULAR SCIENCE REVIEW. 
that just as some organs become strong and others weak, so may certain 
portions of the body become obsolete and others attain a superior development. 
Lamarck did not stop here, but, as our author remarks, “ not satisfied 
with such legitimate speculations, the French philosopher conceived that, 
by repeated acts of volition, animals might acquire new organs and attri- 
butes ; and that in plants, which could not exert a will of their own, 
certain subtle fluids or organizing forces might operate so as to work out 
analogous effects.” Herein we see that Lamarck went a step too far, and 
herein lies the great line of distinction between his hypothesis and that 
originated by Mr. Darwin. There has been an outcry raised against 
the theory of the latter, on the ground that it was the same as Lamarck’s ; 
but this imputation was cast by good folk, who never tried, or were too 
dull to understand, either one hypothesis or the other. Mr. Darwin 
never supported the theory of spontaneous generation, which w r as employed 
by Lamarck, nor did he ever suppose that the variation of a species 
depended upon the volition of the individual. He simply maintained that 
new forms rose from pre-existing ones, from the circumstance that, in the 
ordinary struggle which every animal has for life, those of any brood 
which had the greatest physical powers (no matter in what direction those 
powers lay) had the advantage ; and that, whilst the weaker members 
were unable to obtain the conditions necessary to their existence, the 
stronger were enabled to live, and hence to perpetuate, in intensified form, 
the peculiar qualities they possessed. Sir Charles Lyell gives the following 
clear distinction between the two theories : — “ Lamarck, when speculating 
on the origin of the long neck of the giraffe, imagined that quadruped to 
have stretched himself up, in order to reach the boughs of lofty trees, 
until by continued efforts and longing to reach higher, he obiained an 
elongated neck. Mr. Darwin and Mr. Wallace simply suppose that, in a 
season of scarcity, a longer-necked variety, having the advantage in this 
respect over most of the herd, as being able to browse on foliage out of 
their reach, survived them, and transmitted its peculiarity of cervical con- 
formation to its successors.” The author supports the theory of progression 
on a geological basis, and agrees with Huxley, Marshall, llolleston, and 
Flower in believing that the brain of man does not differ from that of 
apes in having the cerebellum covered by the cerebrum. The appendix 
will be found extremely useful, dealing as it does with the subject of 
several very recent discoveries, including, among others, that of the Moulin 
Quignon jaw-bone. 
We think our readers (even those ignorant of geology) can with advan- 
tage peruse Sir Charles Lyell’s splendid treatise, which is certainly one 
of the least technical and most philosophic works we have ever met with. 
Every geologist must possess it, and every one who desires to know what 
palaeontology is doing, should be familiar with its pages. 
