Jean-Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet, Chevalier de Lamarck
On classification and evolution
Extracts from: Philosophie zoologique, ou exposition des considérations
relatives à l'histoire naturelle des animaux.
(Zoological Philosophy. An Exposition with
Regard to the Natural History of Animals)
by J.B. Lamarck
1809
Translated by Hugh Elliot
Macmillan, London 1914
Reprinted by University of Chicago Press, 1984
"Thus, among living
bodies, nature, as I have already said, definitely contains nothing but individuals
which succeed one another by reproduction and spring from one another; but
the species among them have only a relative constancy and are only invariable
temporarily.
Nevertheless, to facilitate the study and knowledge of so many different
bodies it is useful to give the name of species to any collection of like
individuals perpetuated by reproduction without change, so long as their environment
does not alter enough to cause variations in their habits, character and shape."
(p. 44)