Spines of two first edition books (1749) \Histoire Naturelle, generale et particuliere\". The first of 36 Volumes by the Compte de Buffon published between 1749 and 1789. The series covered the animal and mineral kingdoms, and contentiously included man as a subject of natural historical investigation. They were said to have been read by every educated person in Europe. He did not believe in evolution, but did believe that species could be incrementally changed by the conditions they grew up in. He thought the American fauna was degenerate, an idea which caused Thomas Jefferson to send soldiers to get a moose to send him, (and redouble efforts to find mammoth fossils). The books paid little attention to theological dogma, which earned him the condemnation of the Sorbonne. He retracted the statements saying \"it is better to be humble than hung\" but continued publishing them all the same."