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See also:BUFFON, See also:GEORGE See also:- LOUIS
- LOUIS (804–876)
- LOUIS (893–911)
- LOUIS, JOSEPH DOMINIQUE, BARON (1755-1837)
- LOUIS, or LEWIS (from the Frankish Chlodowich, Chlodwig, Latinized as Chlodowius, Lodhuwicus, Lodhuvicus, whence-in the Strassburg oath of 842-0. Fr. Lodhuwigs, then Chlovis, Loys and later Louis, whence Span. Luiz and—through the Angevin kings—Hungarian
LOUIS LECLERC, See also:COMTE DE (1707-1788) , See also:French naturalist, was See also:born on the 7th of See also:September 1707, at Montbard (Cote d'Or), his See also:father, See also:Benjamin See also:Francois Leclerc de Buffon (1683-1775), being councillor of the Burgundian See also:parlement. He studied See also:law at the See also:college of See also:Jesuits at See also:Dijon; but he soon exhibited a marked predilection for the study of the See also:physical sciences, and more particularly for See also:mathematics. Whilst at Dijon he made the acquaintance of a See also:young Englishman, See also:Lord See also:Kingston, and with him travelled through See also:Italy and then went to See also:England. He published a French See also:translation of See also:Stephen See also:Hales's See also:Vegetable See also:Statics in 1735, and of See also:Sir I. See also:Newton's Fluxions in 1740. At twenty-five years of See also:age he succeeded to a consider-.able See also:property, inherited from his See also:mother, and from this See also:- TIME (0. Eng. Lima, cf. Icel. timi, Swed. timme, hour, Dan. time; from the root also seen in " tide," properly the time of between the flow and ebb of the sea, cf. O. Eng. getidan, to happen, " even-tide," &c.; it is not directly related to Lat. tempus)
- TIME, MEASUREMENT OF
- TIME, STANDARD
time onward his See also:life was devoted to See also:regular scientific labour. At first he directed his See also:attention more especially to mathematics, physics,
and See also:agriculture, and his See also:chief See also:original papers are connected with these subjects. In the See also:spring of 1739 he was elected an See also:associate of the See also:Academy of Sciences; and at a later See also:period of the same See also:year he was appointed keeper of the Jardin du Roi and of the Royal Museum. This appears to have finally determined him to devote himself to the biological sciences in particular, and he began to collect materials for his Natural See also:History. In the preparation of this voluminous See also:work he associated with himself L. J. M. See also:Daubenton, to whom the descriptive and anatomical portions of the See also:treaties were entrusted, and the first three volumes made their See also:appearance in the year 1749. In 1752 (not in 1743 or 1760, as sometimes stated) he married See also:Marie Francoise de See also:Saint-Belin. He seems to have been fondly attached to her, and See also:felt deeply her See also:death at Montbard in 1769. The See also:remainder of Buffon's life as a private individual presents nothing of See also:special See also:interest. He belonged to a very See also:long-lived See also:race, his father having attained the age of ninety-three, and his grandfather eighty-seven. He himself died at See also:Paris on the 15th of See also:April 1788, at the age of eighty-one, of vesical calculus, having refused to allow any operation for his See also:relief. He See also:left one son, George Louis Marie Leclerc Buffon, who was an officer in the French See also:army, and who died by the See also:guillotine, at the age of See also:thirty, on the loth of See also:July 1793 (22 Messidor, An II.), having espoused the party of the See also:duke of See also:- ORLEANS
- ORLEANS, CHARLES, DUKE OF (1391-1465)
- ORLEANS, DUKES OF
- ORLEANS, FERDINAND PHILIP LOUIS CHARLES HENRY, DUKE OF (1810-1842)
- ORLEANS, HENRI, PRINCE
- ORLEANS, HENRIETTA, DUCHESS
- ORLEANS, JEAN BAPTISTE GASTON, DUKE
- ORLEANS, LOUIS
- ORLEANS, LOUIS PHILIPPE JOSEPH
- ORLEANS, LOUIS PHILIPPE ROBERT, DUKE
- ORLEANS, LOUIS PHILIPPE, DUKE OF (1725–1785)
- ORLEANS, LOUIS, DUKE OF (1372–1407)
- ORLEANS, PHILIP I
- ORLEANS, PHILIP II
Orleans.
Buffon was a member of the French Academy (his inaugural address being the celebrated Discours sur le See also:style, 1753), perpetual treasurer of the Academy of Sciences, See also:fellow of the Royal Society of See also:London, and member of the See also:Academies of See also:Berlin, St See also:Peters-See also:burg, Dijon, and of most of the learned See also:societies then existing in See also:Europe. Of handsome See also:person and See also:noble presence, endowed with many of the See also:external gifts of nature, and rejoicing in the social advantages of high See also:rank and large possessions, he is mainly known by his published scientific writings. Without being a profound original investigator, he possessed the See also:art of expressing his ideas in a clear and generally attractive See also:form. His chief defects as a scientific writer are that he was given to excessive and hasty generalization, so that his hypotheses, however seemingly brilliant; are often destitute of any sufficient basis in observed facts, whilst his See also:literary style is not unfrequently theatrical and turgid, and a See also:great want of method and See also:- ORDER
- ORDER (through Fr. ordre, for earlier ordene, from Lat. ordo, ordinis, rank, service, arrangement; the ultimate source is generally taken to be the root seen in Lat. oriri, rise, arise, begin; cf. " origin ")
- ORDER, HOLY
order is commonly observable in his writings.
His great work is the Histoire naturelle, generale et particuliere; and it can undoubtedly claim the merit of having been the first work to See also:present the previously isolated and apparently disconnected facts of natural history in a popular and generally intelligible form. The sensation which was made by its appearance in successive parts was very great, and it certainly effected much See also:good in its time by generally diffusing a See also:taste for the study of nature. For a work so vast, however—aiming, as it did, at being little less than a See also:general See also:encyclopaedia of the sciences—Buffon's capacities may, without disparagement, be said to have been insufficient, as is shown by the great weakness of parts of the work (such as those See also:relating to See also:mineralogy). The Histoire naturelle passed through several See also:editions, and was translated into various See also:languages. The edition most highly prized by See also:col-lectors, on See also:account of the beauty of its plates, is the first, which was published in Paris (1749–1804) in See also:forty-four See also:quarto volumes, the publication extending over more than fifty years. In the preparation of the first fifteen volumes of this edition (1749–1767) Buffon was assisted by Daubenton, and subsequently by P. Gueneau de See also:Montbeliard, the See also:abbe G. L. C. A. Bexon, and C. N. S. Sonnini de Manoncourt. The following seven volumes form a supplement to the preceding, and appeared in 1774–1789, the famous Epoques de la nature (1779) being the fifth of them. They were succeeded by nine volumes on the birds (1770-1783), and these again by five volumes on minerals (1783–1788). The remaining eight volumes, which See also:complete this edition, appeared after Buffon's death, and comprise See also:reptiles, fishes and cetaceans. They were executed by B. G.E. de Lacepede, and were published in successive volumes between 1788 and 1804. A second edition begun in 1774 and completed in 1804, in thirty-six volumes quarto, is in most respects similar to the first, except that theanatomical descriptions are suppressed and the supplement recast.
See See also:Humbert-Bazile, Buffon, sa See also:famine, £&'c. (1863); M. J. P. See also:Flourens, Hist. See also:des travaux et des 'Nees de See also:Buff on (1844, 3rd ed., 1870) ; H. Nadault de Buffon, Correspondance de Buffon (186o); A. S. Packard, See also:Lamarck (1901).
End of Article: BUFFON, GEORGE LOUIS LECLERC, COMTE DE (1707-1788)
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