SPECIES. 
and Buffon would remove the character of dura- 
bility from the species to fix it in some original 
stock, the type of the genus, the family, the tribe, 
or perhaps even of the order. That of Lamarck 
would overturn the permanent character of all 
forms. The first asserts the degeneration, the 
second the gradual development and perfecti- 
bility, of species. While the one reposes chiefly 
on the phenomena of variation, the other rests 
upon those general analogies among species, 
which have led Bonnet to form his universal 
chain of existence, and later writers their circu- 
lar theories. 
It is to Linnzeus that we must assign the merit 
of relieving systematic botany from those acci- 
dental varieties which spring up daily in our 
gardens, and had been improperly raised by 
Tournefort and other former botanists to the 
rank of species. But the zeal of this great Na- 
turalist in bringing down varieties from their 
undue elevation, led him to conjecture that many 
of those plants which had been discovered since 
the time of Tournefort might have been pro- 
duced, during the intervening period, by the in- 
termixture of species. From the impregnation 
of one kind of plant with the pollen of another, 
he was induced, not only to suspect that nature 
now produced new species by this means, but 
that, even at the origin of things, there had been 
created only a certain number of simple genera, 
the continual crossing of which has given rise to 
the immense number of species at present known. 
This hypothesis, which originated from the con- 
sideration of plants, was afterwards extended by 
Linneus even to animals, and however plausible 
it may at first sight appear from contemplating 
those races, by which Nature has so infinitely 
varied some species in different parts of the 
globe, it seems, on a further consideration, to be 
wholly untenable. Contrivance and ingenuity, 
on the part of man, are always seen to be neces- 
sary to bring about the production of a hybrid 
or cross between two different species. There is 
further an impossibility of perpetuating these 
crosses as species or distinct races, arising either 
from their absolute or relative want of fecundity, 
or from that degeneration and deterioration to 
which their issue is subject. They always re- 
quire the assistance of one of their primitive 
stocks, to prevent the new race from becoming 
wholly extinct. Further, in those genera and 
classes where the objects are very numerous, we 
often see two or more species formed evidently 
upon the same model, which may be more or less 
varied, yet they always remain distinct from 
each other. Examples of this are not wanting 
from the quadrumana and cheiroptera to the 
lowest species of zoophytes. We also see that 
those peculiarities which serve to characterize 
the several species, genera, or even natural 
families, continue to exist without there ever 
appearing before our eyes new links between 
allied species. For nearly two centuries, animals 
299 
and plants have been observed with great care, 
yet there has not been one authenticated in- 
stance of a distinct and constant species, which 
has yet been proved to be of modern origin. 
Finally, those fossil shells and bones found in 
earthy strata, deposited during the earlier ages 
of animal life, exhibit the same variety, not only 
of those forms which are found at the present 
day, but also of many others now wholly extinct. 
These facts are opposed by a mere probability or 
conjecture, and we are hence compelled to con- 
sider species, although very nearly resembling 
each other, to have been so formed at the origin 
of things. 
Buffon has carried these views regarding the 
degeneration of species among animals to a much 
greater extent than Linneus did in respect to | 
plants. After reducing the numerous races of 
domestic animals to certain original stocks, he 
grouped the allied species of quadrupeds into 
races or natural families. Assuming certain 
species to be the primitive stocks from which 
the numerous allied species at present existing 
have descended, he thence attempted to explain 
their degeneration, partly by their close affinities, 
but chiefly by those causes which are sufficient 
to vary the domestic animals. He thought that 
species, such as now are commonly admitted, did 
not formerly exist, and that we must seek for their 
characters in those natural groups which have 
served to form genera or families. The degen- 
eration of species, according to Buffon, was one 
which preceded all history, and formed the most 
ancient of their changes. It appeared to arise 
in each family, or in each of those genera under 
which nearly-allied species are usually comprised. 
Only a few isolated kinds, he remarked, formed, 
like man, at once the species and the genus. 
The elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, and 
camelopard, according to him, composed simple 
genera and species which were continued in a 
direct line, and without any collateral branches ; 
while all the others appeared to form families, in 
which a chief and common stock might generally 
be observed, from which there seemed to proceed 
different offsets, increasing in number according 
as the individuals in each species were smaller 
and more fertile. Buffon on these principles re- 
duced all the species of quadrupeds then known 
to thirty-eight families. He admits that this 
state of Nature has not come down to us, but is, 
on the contrary, the remnant of a former state of 
things, and that we can only acquire a knowledge 
of it “ by inductions and relations nearly as fugi- 
tive as the time, which seems to have obliterated 
all traces of its existence.” 
Notwithstanding the opinion which M. F, Cu- 
vier has hazarded upon this theory, “that it 
even now presents an appearance of the greatest 
probability,” it is one to which we can by no 
means subscribe. After making due allowance 
for the influence of climate, food, and the numer- 
ous accidents to which all the individuals are 
