species were designed to retain the individuality of character with which they were endowed at the time of their creation, and that they have a real existence in nature[1].
The intellectual faculties of animals, Lamarck regards as entirely the result of organization. Even in the case of the most perfect of them, the human species, there is no distinct recognition of a spiritual substance derived from heaven; and all intellectual phenomena whatever, are ascribed to some physical cause. Nature, he conceives, offers nothing cognizable by us but body; the movements, changes, and properties of bodies, form the only field open to our observation, and the only source of real knowledge and useful truths[2]. The place of the soul seems to be usurped by a certain interior sentiment, to which he continually refers, as exercising a most powerful influence over all the faculties, and giving rise to all the passions and affections[3]. Thus the noblest faculties of the mind, "the capability and godlike reason," by which we are distinguished from other animals, a
and this spirit,
This all-pervading, this all-conscious soul,
This particle of energy divine,
Which travels nature, flies from star to star,
And visits gods, and emulates their powers;
