the fact that it first brought
the subject of natural history into popular literature. Probably no
writer of the time, with the exception of Voltaire and Rousseau, was so
widely read and quoted as Buffon. But the gross inaccuracy which
pervaded his writings, and the visionary theories in which he constantly
indulged, gave the work a less permanent value than it might otherwise
have attained. Buffon detested the scientific method, preferring
literary finish to accuracy of statement. Although the work was widely
translated, and was the only popular natural history of the time, there
is little of it that is worthy of a place in the world's best
literature. It is chiefly as a relic of a past literary epoch, and as
the pioneer work in a new literary field, that Buffon's writings appeal
to us. They awakened for the first time a wide interest in natural
history, though their author was distinctly _not_ a naturalist.

Arabella Buckley has said of Buffon and his writings that though "he
often made great mistakes and arrived at false conclusions, still he had
so much genius and knowledge that a great part of his work will always
remain true." Cuvier has left us a good memoir of Buffon in the
'Biographic Universelle.'

[Illustration: Signature: Spencer Trotter]

NATURE

From the 'Natural History'

So with what magnificence Nature shines upon the earth! A pure light
extending from east to west gilds successively the hemispheres of the
globe. An airy transparent element surrounds it; a warm and fruitful
heat animates and develops all its germs of life; living and salutary
waters tend to their support and increase; high points scattered over
the lands, by arresting the airy vapors, render these sources
inexhaustible and always fresh; gathered into immense hollows, they
divide the continents. The extent of the sea is as great as that of the
land. It is not a cold and sterile element, but another empire as rich
and populated as the first. The finger of God has marked the boundaries.
When the waters encroach upon the beaches of the west, they leave bare
those of the east. This enormous mass of water, itself inert, follows
the guidance of heavenly movements. Balanced by the regular oscillations
of ebb and flow, it rises and falls with the planet of night; rising
still higher when concurrent with the planet of day, the two uniting
their forces during the equinoxes cause the great tides. Our connection
with the heavens is nowhere