Georges Cuvier and the Power of Rhetoric

Abstract

Georges Cuvier’s powerful rhetoric and exceptional descriptive talents enabled him to dominate French thinking in the debate between those who were convinced, as he was, that species remained unchanged and those who, like his arch-rival Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, believed in gradual transformation of species away from the fossil record. Cuvier’s quickness of mind in public debates as well as his ability to bring past ages vividly alive to lay readers exerted a considerable hold over writers, the wider public, and the scientific community. This article explores some of the rhetorical techniques and devices that enabled him to impose his convictions on the nation well beyond the publication of Darwin’s Origin of Species.