"The character of any habitable quarter of the globe is quâ man constant: the constancy of type in species is therefore also quâ man persistent. But this is an illusion. We establish, therefore, the three following propositions:—
"1. That every considerable and sustained change in the surroundings of any animal involves a real change in its needs.
"2. That such change of needs involves the necessity of changed action in order to satisfy these needs, and, in consequence, of new habits.[288]
"3. It follows that such and such parts, formerly less used, are now more frequently employed, and in consequence become more highly developed; new parts also become insensibly evolved in the creature by its own efforts from within.
"From the foregoing these two general laws may be deduced:—
"Firstly. That in every animal which has not passed its limit of development, the more frequent and sustained employment of any organ develops and aggrandizes it, giving it a power proportionate to the duration of its employment, while the same organ in default of constant use becomes insensibly weakened and deteriorated, decreasing imperceptibly in power until it finally disappears.[289]
"Secondly. That these gains or losses of organic development, due to use or disuse, are transmitted to offspring, provided they have been common to both sexes, or to the animals from which the offspring have descended."[290]
Lamarck now sets himself to establish the fact that animals have developed modifications which have been transmitted to their offspring.
"Naturalists," he says, "have believed that the possession of certain organs has led to their employment. This is not so: it is need and use which have developed the organs, and even called them into existence." [I have already sufficiently insisted that it is impossible to dispense with either of these two views. Demand and Supply have gone hand in hand, each reacting upon the other.] "Otherwise a special act of creation would be necessary for every different combination of conditions; and it would be also necessary that the conditions should remain always constant.
"If this were really so we should have no racehorses like those of England, nor drayhorses so heavy in build and so unlike the racehorse; for there are no such breeds in a wild state. For the same reason, we should have no turnspit dogs with crooked legs, no greyhounds nor water-spaniels; we should have no tailless breed of fowls nor fantail pigeons, &c. Nor should we be able to cultivate wild plants in our gardens, for any length of time we please, without fear of their changing.