hich they had to deal through comprehensive studies
of anatomy. Such studies of individual forms in their relations to the
entire scale of organic beings were pursued in these last decades of
the century, but though two or three most important generalizations were
achieved (notably Kaspar Wolff's conception of the cell as the basis of
organic life, and Goethe's all-important doctrine of metamorphosis of
parts), yet, as a whole, the work of the anatomists of the period was
germinative rather than fruit-bearing. Bichat's volumes, telling of the
recognition of the fundamental tissues of the body, did not begin to
appear till the last year of the century. The announcement by Cuvier of
the doctrine of correlation of parts bears the same date, but in general
the studies of this great naturalist, which in due time were to stamp
him as the successor of Linnaeus, were as yet only fairly begun.

V. ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

CUVIER AND THE CORRELATION OF PARTS

We have seen that the focal points of the physiological world towards
the close of the eighteenth century were Italy and England, but when
Spallanzani and Hunter passed away the scene shifted to France. The
time was peculiarly propitious, as the recent advances in many lines of
science had brought fresh data for the student of animal life which were
in need of classification, and, as several minds capable of such a task
were in the field, it was natural that great generalizations should have
come to be quite the fashion. Thus it was that Cuvier came forward with
a brand-new classification of the animal kingdom, establishing
four great types of being, which he called vertebrates, mollusks,
articulates, and radiates. Lamarck had shortly before established the
broad distinction between animals with and those without a backbone;
Cuvier's Classification divided the latter--the invertebrates--into
three minor groups. And this division, familiar ever since to all
students of zoology, has only in very recent years been supplanted, and
then not by revolution, but by a further division, which the elaborate
recent studies of lower forms of life seemed to make desirable.

In the course of those studies of comparative anatomy which led to his
new classification, Cuvier's attention was called constantly to the
peculiar co-ordination of parts in each individual organism. Thus an
animal with sharp talons for catching living prey--as a member of the
cat trib