Details
LAMARCK, Jean Baptiste de (1744-1829). Hydrogologie ou recherches sur l'influence qu'ont les eaux sur la surface du globe terrestre. Paris: the author, Agasse, and Maillard, an X [1802].
8o (203 x 128 mm). (Foxing to first and last few leaves, paper flaw causing marginal tear to Q4.) 19th-century quarter mottled sheep, spine gilt, edges stained yellow (small gouge to leather on lower cover, coners bumped).
FIRST EDITION OF A "BIBLIOGRAPHIC RARITY ESSENTIALLY UNKNOWN TO MODERN GEOLOGISTS AND HISTORIANS OF SCIENCE" (Carozzi, p. v). Lamarck's approach to geology was characteristic of his scientific method - "concern with the general principles and contempt for those who interested themselves too much with the specifics" (DSB). In his Hydrogologie, which he had originally intended as a much broader work, Lamarck set forth a geological theory in which water was the main agent of change. "Although Lamarck's geological views were not original (he was strongly influenced by Buffon and Daubenton, among others), they were an important part of his conception of nature. His preoccupation with marine fossil shells had a decisive influence on his choice of geological theories. Since such shells had to have been laid down in water, he needed a theory to explain how this was possible. As in his meteorology, he used the moon as the main cause, in this case of a constant slow progression of the oceans around the globe. The main geological force was water acting according to uniformitarian principles over millions of years. The substances of the mineral kingdom were produced by the progressive disintegration of organic remains; water operated on these products to produce geological formations such as mountains... Some historians have thought that Lamarck's perception of a slowly changing environment and the resulting necessity of organisms to change or become extinct (a possibility he could not accept) led him to his theory of evolution" (DSB). "A critical study of Hydrogologie reveals the modern character of so many of Lamarck's fundamental concepts that his scientific rehabilitation as a geologist seems imperative for a correct understanding of the history of geology" (Carozzi, pp. v-vi). Along with the term hydrogologie, which he defined as the study of the external crust of the globe, Lamarck also coined the term biologie in this work (in its modern use of the study of living organisms). A surviving printer's bill records a press run of 1025 copies, printed, like most of Lamarck's works, at his own expense.
A. V. Carozzi, translator and editor, Hydrogeology (Urbana, Ill., 1964); Ward and Carozzi 1312; Norman 1263.
8o (203 x 128 mm). (Foxing to first and last few leaves, paper flaw causing marginal tear to Q4.) 19th-century quarter mottled sheep, spine gilt, edges stained yellow (small gouge to leather on lower cover, coners bumped).
FIRST EDITION OF A "BIBLIOGRAPHIC RARITY ESSENTIALLY UNKNOWN TO MODERN GEOLOGISTS AND HISTORIANS OF SCIENCE" (Carozzi, p. v). Lamarck's approach to geology was characteristic of his scientific method - "concern with the general principles and contempt for those who interested themselves too much with the specifics" (DSB). In his Hydrogologie, which he had originally intended as a much broader work, Lamarck set forth a geological theory in which water was the main agent of change. "Although Lamarck's geological views were not original (he was strongly influenced by Buffon and Daubenton, among others), they were an important part of his conception of nature. His preoccupation with marine fossil shells had a decisive influence on his choice of geological theories. Since such shells had to have been laid down in water, he needed a theory to explain how this was possible. As in his meteorology, he used the moon as the main cause, in this case of a constant slow progression of the oceans around the globe. The main geological force was water acting according to uniformitarian principles over millions of years. The substances of the mineral kingdom were produced by the progressive disintegration of organic remains; water operated on these products to produce geological formations such as mountains... Some historians have thought that Lamarck's perception of a slowly changing environment and the resulting necessity of organisms to change or become extinct (a possibility he could not accept) led him to his theory of evolution" (DSB). "A critical study of Hydrogologie reveals the modern character of so many of Lamarck's fundamental concepts that his scientific rehabilitation as a geologist seems imperative for a correct understanding of the history of geology" (Carozzi, pp. v-vi). Along with the term hydrogologie, which he defined as the study of the external crust of the globe, Lamarck also coined the term biologie in this work (in its modern use of the study of living organisms). A surviving printer's bill records a press run of 1025 copies, printed, like most of Lamarck's works, at his own expense.
A. V. Carozzi, translator and editor, Hydrogeology (Urbana, Ill., 1964); Ward and Carozzi 1312; Norman 1263.