Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 16.djvu/237

Rh mountains of Calabria, a considerable distance from the sea, a variegated hard marble, in which many sea-shells but little changed were heaped, forming one mass with the marble.

With the beginning of the sixteenth century, a great impetus was given to the investigation of organic fossils, especially in Italy, where this study really began. The discovery of fossil shells, which abound in this region, now attracted great attention, and a fierce discussion soon arose as to the true nature of these and other remains. The ideas of Aristotle in regard to spontaneous generation, and especially his view of the hidden forces of the earth, which he claimed had power to produce such remains, now for the first time were seriously questioned, although it was not till nearly two centuries later that these doctrines lost their dominant influence.

Leonardo da Vinci, the renowned painter and philosopher, who was born in 1452, strongly opposed the commonly accepted opinions as to the origin of organized fossils. He claimed that the fossil shells under discussion were what they seemed, and had once lived at the bottom of the sea. "You tell me," he says, "that Nature and the influence of the stars have formed these shells in the mountains; then show me a place in the mountains where the stars at the present day make shelly forms of different ages, and of different species in the same place." Again, he says, "In what manner can such a cause account for the petrifactions in the same place of various leaves, sea-weeds, and marine crabs?"

In 1517, excavations in the vicinity of Verona brought to light many curious petrifactions, which led to much speculation as to their nature and origin. Among the various authors who wrote on this subject was Fracastoro, who declared that the fossils once belonged to living animals, which had lived and multiplied where found. He ridiculed the prevailing ideas that the plastic force of the ancients could fashion stones into organic forms. Some writers claimed that these shells had been left by Noah's flood, but against this idea Fracastoro offered a mass of evidence, which would now seem conclusive, but which then only aroused bitter hostility. That inundation, he said, was too transient; it consisted mainly of fresh water; and, if it had transported shells to great distances, must have scattered them over the surface, not buried them in the interior of mountains.

Conrad Gesner (1516-'65), whose history of animals has been considered the basis of modern zoölogy, published at Zurich, in 1565, a small but important work entitled "De omni rerum fossiliura genere." It contained a catalogue of the collection of fossils made by John Kentmann. This is the oldest catalogue of fossils with which I am acquainted.

George Agricola (1494-1555) was, according to Cuvier, the first mineralogist who appeared after the revival of learning in Europe.