“There is then, for the animals as for the plants, an order which belongs to nature, and which results, as also the objects which this order makes exist, from the power which it has received from the Supreme Author of all things. She is herself only the general and unchangeable order that this Sublime Author has created throughout, and only the totality of the general and special laws to which this order is subject. By these means, whose use it continues without change, it has given and will perpetually give existence to its productions; it varies and renews them unceasingly, and thus everywhere preserves the whole order which is the result of it.”[200]
“To regard nature as eternal, and consequently as having existed from all time, is to me an abstract idea, baseless, limitless, improbable, and not satisfactory to my reason. Being unable to know anything positive in this respect, and having no means of reasoning on this subject, I much prefer to think that all nature is only a result: hence, I suppose, and I am glad to admit it, a first cause, in a word, a supreme power which has given existence to nature, and which has made it in all respects what it is.”[201]
“Nature, that immense totality of different beings and bodies, in every part of which exists an eternal circle of movements and changes regulated by law; totality alone unchangeable, so long as it pleases its Sublime Author to cause its existence, should be regarded as a whole constituted by its parts, for a purpose which its Author alone knows, and not exclusively for any one of them.
“Each part is necessarily obliged to change, and to cease to be one in order to constitute another, with interests opposed to those of all; and if it has the power of reasoning it finds this whole imperfect. In reality, however, this whole is perfect and completely fulfils the end for which it was designed.”[202]
Lamarck’s work on general philosophy[203] was written near the end of his life, in 1820. He begins his “Discours préliminaire” by referring to the sudden loss of his eyesight, his work on the invertebrate animals being thereby interrupted. The book was, he says, “rapidly” dictated to his daughter, and the ease with which he dictated was due, he says, to his long-continued habit of meditating on the facts he had observed.
In the “Principes primordiaux” he considers man as the only being who has the power of observing nature, and the only one who has perceived the necessity of recognizing a superior and only cause, creator of the order of the wonders of the world of life. By this he is led to raise his thoughts to the Supreme Author of all that exists.
“In the creation of his works, and especially those we can observe, this omnipotent Being has undoubtedly been the ruling power in pursuing the method which has pleased him, namely, his will has been:
“Either to create instantaneously and separately every particular living being observed by us, to personally care for and watch over them in all their changes, their movements, or their actions, to unremittingly care for each one separately, and by the exercise of his supreme will to regulate all their life;
“Or to reduce his creations to a small number, and among these, to institute an order of things general and continuous, pervaded by ceaseless activity (mouvement), especially subject to laws by means of which all the organisms of whatever nature, all the changes they undergo, all the peculiarities they present, and all the phenomena that many of them exhibit, may be produced.
“In regard to these two modes of execution, if observation taught us nothing we could not form any opinion which would be well grounded. But it is not so; we distinctly see that there exists an order of things truly created (véritablement créé), as unchangeable as its author allows, acting on matter alone, and which possesses the power of producing all visible beings, of executing all the changes, all the modifications, even the extinctions, so also the renewals or recreations that we observe among them. It is to this order of things that we have given the name of nature. The Supreme Author of all that exists is, then, the immediate creator of matter as also of nature, but he is only indirectly the creator of what nature can produce.
“The end that God has proposed to himself in creating matter, which forms the basis of all bodies, and nature, which divides (divise) this matter, forms the bodies, makes them vary, modifies them, changes them, and renews them in different ways, can be easily known to us; for the Supreme Being cannot meet with any obstacle to his will in the execution of his works; the general results of these works are necessarily the object he had in view. Thus this end could be no other than the existence of nature, of which matter alone forms the sphere, and should not be that causing the creation of any special being.
“Do we find in the two objects created, i.e., matter and nature, the source of the good and evil which have almost always been thought to exist in the events of this world? To this question I shall answer that good and evil are only relative to particular objects, that they never affect by their temporary existence the general result expected (prévu), and that for the end which the Creator designed, there is in reality neither good nor evil, because everything in nature perfectly fulfils its object.
“Has God limited his creations to the existence of only matter and nature? This question is vain, and should remain without an answer on our part; because, being reduced to knowing anything only through observation, and to bodies alone, also to what concerns them, these being for us the only observable objects, it would be rash to speak affirmatively or negatively on this subject.
“What is a spiritual being? It is what, with the aid of the imagination, one would naturally suppose (l’on vaudra supposer). Indeed, it is only by means of opposing that which is material that we can form the idea of spirit; but as this hypothetical being is not in the category of objects which it is possible for us to observe, we do not know how to take cognizance of it. The idea that we have of it is absolutely without base.
“We only know physical objects and only objects relative to these beings (êtres): such is the condition of our nature. If our thoughts, our reasonings, our principles have been considered as metaphysical objects, these objects, then, are not beings (êtres). They are only relations or consequences of relations (rapports), or only results of observed laws.
“We know that relations are distinguished as general and special. Among these last are regarded those of nature, form, dimension, solidity, size, quantity, resemblance, and difference; and if we add to these objects the being observed and the consideration of known laws, as also that of conventional objects, we shall have all the materials on which our thoughts are based.
“Thus being able to observe only the phenomena of nature, as well as the laws which regulate these phenomena, also the products of these last, in a word, only bodies (corps) and what concerns them, all that which immediately proceeds from supreme power is incomprehensible to us, as it itself [i.e., supreme power] is to our minds. To create, or to make anything out of nothing, this is an idea we cannot conceive of, for the reason that in all that we can know, we do not find any model which represents it. God alone, then, can create, while nature can only produce. We must suppose that, in his creations, the Divinity is not restricted to the use of any time, while, on the other hand, nature can effect nothing without the aid of long periods of time.”
Without translating more of this remarkable book, which is very rare, much less known than the Philosophie zoologique, the spirit of the remainder may be imagined from the foregoing extracts.
The author refers to the numerous evils resulting from ignorance, false knowledge, lack of judgment, abuse of power, demonstrating the necessity of our confining ourselves within the circle of the objects presented by nature, and never to go beyond them if we do not wish to fall into error, because the profound study of nature and of the organization of man alone, and the exact observation of facts alone, will reveal to us “the truths most important for us to know,” in order to avoid the vexations, the perfidies, the injustices, and the oppressions of all sorts, and “incalculable disorders” which arise in the social body. In this way only shall we discover and acquire the means of obtaining the enjoyment of the advantages which we have a right to expect from our state of civilization. The author endeavors to state what science can and should render to society. He dwells on the sources from which man has drawn the knowledge which he possesses, and from which he can obtain many others—sources the totality of which constitutes for him the field of realities.
Lamarck also in this work has built up a system for moral philosophy.
Self-love, he says, perfectly regulated, gives rise: