Lamarck, the Founder of Evolution | Page 9

of wants on the organism; and this brilliant writer seems to have been
the first to suggest natural selection, though only in the case of man,
when he says that the weaker in Sparta were eliminated in order that the
superior and stronger of the race might survive and be maintained.
"Accustomed from infancy to the severity of the weather and the rigors
of the seasons, trained to undergo fatigue, and obliged to defend naked
and without arms their life and their prey against ferocious beasts, or to

escape them by flight, the men acquired an almost invariably robust
temperament; the infants, bringing into the world the strong
constitution of their fathers, and strengthening themselves by the same
kind of exercise as produced it, have thus acquired all the vigor of
which the human species is capable. Nature uses them precisely as did
the law of Sparta the children of her citizens. She rendered strong and
robust those with a good constitution, and destroyed all the others. Our
societies differ in this respect, where the state, in rendering the children
burdensome to the father, indirectly kills them before birth."[14]
Soon Lamarck abandoned not only a military career, but also music,
medicine, and the bank, and devoted himself exclusively to science. He
was now twenty-four years old, and, becoming a student of botany
under Bernard de Jussieu, for ten years gave unremitting attention to
this science, and especially to a study of the French flora.
Cuvier states that the Flore Française appeared after "six months of
unremitting labor." However this may be, the results of over nine
preceding years of study, gathered together, written, and printed within
the brief period of half a year, was no hasty tour de force, but a
well-matured, solid work which for many years remained a standard
one.
It brought him immediate fame. It appeared at a fortunate epoch. The
example of Rousseau and the general enthusiasm he inspired had made
the study of flowers very popular--"une science à la mode," as Cuvier
says--even among many ladies and in the world of fashion, so that the
new work of Lamarck, though published in three octavo volumes, had a
rapid success.
The preface was written by Daubenton.[15] Buffon also took much
interest in the work, opposing as it did the artificial system of Linné,
for whom he had, for other reasons, no great degree of affection. He
obtained the privilege of having the work published at the royal
printing office at the expense of the government, and the total proceeds
of the sale of the volumes were given to the author. This elaborate work
at once placed young Lamarck in the front rank of botanists, and now
the first and greatest honor of his life came to him. The young

lieutenant, disappointed in a military advancement, won his spurs in the
field of science. A place in botany had become vacant at the Academy
of Sciences, and M. de Lamarck having been presented in the second
rank (en seconde ligne), the ministry, a thing almost unexampled,
caused him to be given by the king, in 1779, the preference over
M. Descemet, whose name was presented before his, in the first rank,
and who since then, and during a long life, never could recover the
place which he unjustly lost.[16] "In a word, the poor officer, so
neglected since the peace, obtained at one stroke the good fortune,
always very rare, and especially so at that time, of being both the
recipient of the favor of the Court and of the public."[17]
[Illustration: LAMARCK AT THE AGE OF 35 YEARS]
The interest and affection felt for him by Buffon were of advantage to
him in another way. Desiring to have his son, whom he had planned to
be his successor as Intendant of the Royal Garden, and who had just
finished his studies, enjoy the advantage of travel in foreign lands,
Buffon proposed to Lamarck to go with him as a guide and friend; and,
not wishing him to appear as a mere teacher, he procured for him, in
1781, a commission as Royal Botanist, charged with visiting the
foreign botanical gardens and museums, and of placing them in
communication with those of Paris. His travels extended through
portions of the years 1781 and 1782.
According to his own statement,[18] in pursuit of this object he
collected not only rare and interesting plants which were wanting in the
Royal Garden, but also minerals and other objects of natural history
new to the Museum. He went to Holland, Germany, Hungary, etc.,
visiting universities, botanical gardens, and museums of natural history.
He examined the mines of the Hartz in Hanover, of Freyburg in Saxony,
of Chemnitz and of Cremnitz in Hungary, making there numerous
observations which he incorporated in his work on