LORD MONBODDO, A PRECURSOR OF THE 
DARWINS.* 
May M. Jarvis, M. A.f 
In his history of the evolution idea , 1 Osborn considers only two pre- 
Darwinian Englishmen, Francis Bacon and Erasmus Darwin, to be 
worthy of mention. Bacon’s chief contribution lay in proposing a 
method for ascertaining the natural system of the Universe, rather 
than in speculation on the Universe itself. He was one of the first to 
observe that mutability of species is merely the accumulation of varia- 
tions; he stressed the importance of studying variations; called atten- 
tion to the fact that artificial selection takes advantage of natural 
fluctuations; mentioned transitional forms; and advised that there be 
founded an institute for experiments on metamorphoses of organs and 
the causes of variations in species. 
Osborn credits Erasmus Darwin with several original theories; he 
believed in the spontaneous generation of the lowest forms, but a nat- 
ural development, through millions of years, from these to the highest 
animals. He called attention to the struggle for existence, just miss- 
ing the connection between this and the survival of the fittest; he con- 
ceived the ideas that modifications spring from within by reactions of 
the organism, and that acquired characters are transmitted, thus antici- 
pating Lamarck’s theories. 
It is surprising that we should credit all of Erasmus Darwin’s vague 
theories, and yet overlook an earlier writer so voluminous as James 
Burnet. This author, better known as Lord Monboddo, was a" prominent 
lawyer of Edinburgh who occupied his spare time with metaphysics and 
philosophy. He was a special creationist, and an advocate of the Greek 
nature-in-systems idea ; but he added a doctrine of the evolution of the 
human race from a brute to a civilized stage, reaching its culmination 
with the ancient Athenians and deteriorating to modern conditions, 
which seems entirely original. Perhaps his devotion to classical learn- 
ing has blinded readers to his real worth ; at any rate, it was left to his 
biographer, William Knight , 2 to class him among the evolutionists. 
^Contribution from the Zoological Laboratory of the University of Texas, 
fTutor in Zoology, University of Texas. 
No. 88. 
x From the Greeks to Darwin, New York, 1899. 
2 Knight, Wm. : Lord Monboddo and Some of Hie Contemporaries, New 
York, 1900. 
