I have entitled this volume "Darwiniana" because the pieces republished in
it either treat of the ancient doctrine of Evolution, rehabilitated and
placed upon a sound scientific foundation, since and in consequence of, the
publication of the "Origin of Species;" or they attempt to meet the more
weighty of the unsparing criticisms with which that great work was visited
for several years after its appearance; or they record the impression left
by the personality of Mr. Darwin on one who had the privilege and the
happiness of enjoying his friendship for some thirty years; or they
endeavour to sum up his work and indicate its enduring influence on the
course of scientific thought.
Those who take the trouble to read the first two essays, published in 1859
and 1860, will, I think, do me the justice to admit that my zeal to secure
fair play for Mr. Darwin, did not drive me into the position of a mere
advocate; and that, while doing justice to the greatness of the argument I
did not fail to indicate its weak points. I have never seen any reason for
departing from the position which I took up in these two essays; and the
assertion which I sometimes meet with nowadays, that I have "recanted" or
changed my opinions about Mr. Darwin's views, is quite unintelligible to
me.
As I have said in the seventh essay, the fact of evolution is to my mind
sufficiently evidenced by palaeontology; and I remain of the opinion
expressed in the second, that until selective breeding is definitely proved
to give rise to varieties infertile with one another, the logical
foundation of the theory of natural selection is incomplete. We still
remain very much in the dark about the causes of variation; the apparent
inheritance of acquired characters in some cases; and the struggle for
existence within the organism, which probably lies at the bottom of both of
these phenomena.
Some apology is due to the reader for the reproduction of the "Lectures to
Working Men" in their original state. They were taken down in shorthand by
Mr. J. Aldous Mays, who requested me to allow him to print them. I was very
much pressed with work at the time; and, as I could not revise the reports,
which I imagined, moreover, would be of little or no interest to any but my
auditors, I stipulated that a notice should be prefixed to that effect.
This was done; but it did not prevent a considerable diffusion of the
little book in this country and in the United States, nor its translation
into more than one foreign language. Moreover Mr. Darwin often urged me to
revise and expand the lectures into a systematic popular exposition of the
topics of which they treat. I have more than once set about the task: but
the proverb about spoiling a horn and not making a spoon, is particularly
applicable to attempts to remodel a piece of work which may have served its
immediate purpose well enough.
So I have reprinted the lectures as they stand, with all their
imperfections on their heads. It would seem that many people must have
found them useful thirty years ago; and, though the sixties appear now to
be reckoned by many of the rising generation as a part of the dark ages, I
am not without some grounds for suspecting that there yet remains a fair
sprinkling even of "philosophic thinkers" to whom it may be a profitable,
perhaps even a novel, task to descend from the heights of speculation and
go over the A B C of the great biological problem as it was set before a
body of shrewd artisans at that remote epoch.