THE PUBLICATION OF THE 'ORIGIN OF SPECIES.'
"Remember that your verdict will probably have more influence than
my book in deciding whether such views as I hold will be admitted
or rejected at present; in the future I cannot doubt about their
admittance, and our posterity will marvel as much about the current
belief as we do about fossil shells having been thought to have
been created as we now see them."--From a letter to Lyell, Sept.
1859.
OCTOBER 3RD, 1859, TO DECEMBER 31ST, 1859.
Under the date of October 1st, 1859, in my father's Diary occurs the
entry:--"Finished proofs (thirteen months and ten days) of Abstract on
_Origin of Species_; 1250 copies printed. The first edition was
published on November 24th, and all copies sold first day."
In October he was, as we have seen in the last chapter, at Ilkley, near
Leeds: there he remained with his family until December, and on the 9th
of that month he was again at Down. The only other entry in the Diary
for this year is as follows:--"During end of November and beginning of
December, employed in correcting for second edition of 3000 copies;
multitude of letters."
The first and a few of the subsequent letters refer to proof-sheets, and
to early copies of the Origin which were sent to friends before the book
was published.
_C. Lyell to C. Darwin._ October 3rd, 1859.
MY DEAR DARWIN,--I have just finished your volume, and right glad I am
that I did my best with Hooker to persuade you to publish it without
waiting for a time which probably could never have arrived, though you
lived till the age of a hundred, when you had prepared all your facts on
which you ground so many grand generalizations.
It is a splendid case of close reasoning, and long substantial argument
throughout so many pages; the condensation immense, too great perhaps
for the uninitiated, but an effective and important preliminary
statement, which will admit, even before your detailed proofs appear, of
some occasional useful exemplification, such as your pigeons and
cirripedes, of which you make such excellent use.
I mean that, when, as I fully expect, a new edition is soon called for,
you may here and there insert an actual case to relieve the vast number
of abstract propositions. So far as I am concerned, I am so well
prepared to take your statements of facts for granted, that I do not
think the "pieces justificatives" when published will make much
difference, and I have long seen most clearly that if any concession is
made, all that you claim in your concluding pages will follow. It is
this which has made me so long hesitate, always feeling that the case of
Man and his races, and of other animals, and that of plants is one and
the same, and that if a "vera causa" be admitted for one, instead of a
purely unknown and imaginary one, such as the word "Creation," all the
consequences must follow.
I fear I have not time to-day, as I am just leaving this place to
indulge in a variety of comments, and to say how much I was delighted
with Oceanic Islands--Rudimentary Organs--Embryology--the genealogical
key to the Natural System, Geographical Distribution, and if I went on I
should be copying the heads of all your chapters. But I will say a word
of the Recapitulation, in case some slight alteration, or, at least,
omission of a word or two be still possible in that.
In the first place, at p. 480, it cannot surely be said that the most
eminent naturalists have rejected the view of the mutability of species?
You do not mean to ignore G. St. Hilaire and Lamarck. As to the latter,
you may say, that in regard to animals you substitute natural selection
for volition to a certain considerable extent, but in his theory of the
changes of plants he could not introduce volition; he may, no doubt,
have laid an undue comparative stress on changes in physical conditions,
and too little on those of contending organisms. He at least was for the
universal mutability of species and for a genealogical link between the
first and the present. The men of his school also appealed to
domesticated varieties. (Do you mean _living_ naturalists?)[163]
The first page of this most important summary gives the adversary an
advantage, by putting forth so abruptly and crudely such a startling
objection as the formation of "the eye,"[164] not by means analogous to
man's reason, or rather by some power immeasurably superior to human
reason, but by superinduced variation like those of which a
cattle-breeder avails himself. Pages would be required thus to state an
objection and remove it. It would be better, as you wish to persuade, to
say nothing. Leave out several sentences, and in a future edition bring
it out more fully.
... But these are small matters, mere spots on the sun. Your comparison
of the letters retained in words, when no longer wanted for the sound,
to rudimentary organs is excellent, as both are truly genealogical....
You enclose your sheets in old MS., so the Post Office very properly
charge them, as letters, 2_d._ extra. I wish all their fines on MS. were
worth as much. I paid 4_s._ 6_d._ for such wash the other day from
Paris, from a man who can prove 300 deluges in the valley of Seine.
With my hearty congratulations to you on your grand work, believe me,
Ever very affectionately yours.
_C. D. to L. Agassiz._[165] Down, November 11th [1859].
MY DEAR SIR,--I have ventured to send you a copy of my book (as yet only
an abstract) on the _Origin of Species_. As the conclusions at which I
have arrived on several points differ so widely from yours, I have
thought (should you at any time read my volume) that you might think
that I had sent it to you out of a spirit of defiance or bravado; but I
assure you that I act under a wholly different frame of mind. I hope
that you will at least give me credit, however erroneous you may think
my conclusions, for having earnestly endeavoured to arrive at the truth.
With sincere respect, I beg leave to remain,
Yours very faithfully.
He sent copies of the _Origin_, accompanied by letters similar to the
last, to M. De Candolle, Dr. Asa Gray, Falconer and Mr. Jenyns
(Blomefield).
To Henslow he wrote (Nov. 11th, 1859):--
"I have told Murray to send a copy of my book on Species to you, my dear
old master in Natural History; I fear, however, that you will not
approve of your pupil in this case. The book in its present state does
not show the amount of labour which I have bestowed on the subject.
"If you have time to read it carefully, and would take the trouble to
point out what parts seem weakest to you and what best, it would be a
most material aid to me in writing my bigger book, which I hope to
commence in a few months. You know also how highly I value your
judgment. But I am not so unreasonable as to wish or expect you to write
detailed and lengthy criticisms, but merely a few general remarks,
pointing out the weakest parts.
"If you are _in ever so slight a degree_ staggered (which I hardly
expect) on the immutability of species, then I am convinced with further
reflection you will become more and more staggered, for this has been
the process through which my mind has gone."
_C. D. to A. R. Wallace._ Ilkley, November 13th, 1859.
MY DEAR SIR,--I have told Murray to send you by post (if possible) a
copy of my book, and I hope that you will receive it at nearly the same
time with this note. (N.B. I have got a bad finger, which makes me write
extra badly.) If you are so inclined, I should very much like to hear
your general impression of the book, as you have thought so profoundly
on the subject, and in so nearly the same channel with myself. I hope
there will be some little new to you, but I fear not much. Remember it
is only an abstract, and very much condensed. God knows what the public
will think. No one has read it, except Lyell, with whom I have had much
correspondence. Hooker thinks him a complete convert, but he does not
seem so in his letters to me; but is evidently deeply interested in the
subject. I do not think your share in the theory will be overlooked by
the real judges, as Hooker, Lyell, Asa Gray, &c. I have heard from Mr.
Sclater that your paper on the Malay Archipelago has been read at the
Linnean Society, and that he was _extremely_ much interested by it.
I have not seen one naturalist for six or nine months, owing to the
state of my health, and therefore I really have no news to tell you. I
am writing this at Ilkley Wells, where I have been with my family for
the last six weeks, and shall stay for some few weeks longer. As yet I
have profited very little. God knows when I shall have strength for my
bigger book.
I sincerely hope that you keep your health; I suppose that you will be
thinking of returning[166] soon with your magnificent collections, and
still grander mental materials. You will be puzzled how to publish. The
Royal Society fund will be worth your consideration. With every good
wish, pray believe me,
Yours very sincerely.
P.S.--I think that I told you before that Hooker is a complete convert.
If I can convert Huxley I shall be content.
_C. Darwin to W. B. Carpenter._ November 19th [1859].
... If, after reading my book, you are able to come to a conclusion in
any degree definite, will you think me very unreasonable in asking you
to let me hear from you? I do not ask for a long discussion, but merely
for a brief idea of your general impression. From your widely extended
knowledge, habit of investigating the truth, and abilities, I should
value your opinion in the very highest rank. Though I, of course,
believe in the truth of my own doctrine, I suspect that no belief is
vivid until shared by others. As yet I know only one believer, but I
look at him as of the greatest authority, viz. Hooker. When I think of
the many cases of men who have studied one subject for years, and have
persuaded themselves of the truth of the foolishest doctrines, I feel
sometimes a little frightened, whether I may not be one of these
monomaniacs.
Again pray excuse this, I fear, unreasonable request. A short note would
suffice, and I could bear a hostile verdict, and shall have to bear many
a one.
Yours very sincerely.
_C. D. to J. D. Hooker._ Ilkley, Yorkshire. [November, 1859.]
MY DEAR HOOKER,--I have just read a review on my book in the
_Athenaeum_[167] and it excites my curiosity much who is the author. If
you should hear who writes in the _Athenaeum_ I wish you would tell me.
It seems to me well done, but the reviewer gives no new objections, and,
being hostile, passes over every single argument in favour of the
doctrine.... I fear, from the tone of the review, that I have written in
a conceited and cocksure style,[168] which shames me a little. There is
another review of which I should like to know the author, viz. of H. C.
Watson in the _Gardeners' Chronicle_.[169] Some of the remarks are like
yours, and he does deserve punishment; but surely the review is too
severe. Don't you think so?...
I have heard from Carpenter, who, I think, is likely to be a convert.
Also from Quatrefages, who is inclined to go a long way with us. He says
that he exhibited in his lecture a diagram closely like mine!
_J. D. Hooker to C. Darwin._ Monday [Nov. 21, 1859].
MY DEAR DARWIN,--I am a sinner not to have written you ere this, if only
to thank you for your glorious book--what a mass of close reasoning on
curious facts and fresh phenomena--it is capitally written, and will be
very successful. I say this on the strength of two or three plunges into
as many chapters, for I have not yet attempted to read it. Lyell, with
whom we are staying, is perfectly enchanted, and is absolutely gloating
over it. I must accept your compliment to me, and acknowledgment of
supposed assistance[170] from me, as the warm tribute of affection from
an honest (though deluded) man, and furthermore accept it as very
pleasing to my vanity; but, my dear fellow, neither my name nor my
judgment nor my assistance deserved any such compliments, and if I am
dishonest enough to be pleased with what I don't deserve, it must just
pass. How different the _book_ reads from the MS. I see I shall have
much to talk over with you. Those lazy printers have not finished my
luckless Essay: which, beside your book, will look like a ragged
handkerchief beside a Royal Standard....
_C. D. to J. D. Hooker._ [November, 1859.]
MY DEAR HOOKER,--I cannot help it, I must thank you for your
affectionate and most kind note. My head will be turned. By Jove, I must
try and get a bit modest. I was a little chagrined by the review.[171] I
hope it was _not_ ----. As advocate, he might think himself justified in
giving the argument only on one side. But the manner in which he drags
in immortality, and sets the priests at me, and leaves me to their
mercies, is base. He would, on no account, burn me, but he will get the
wood ready, and tell the black beasts how to catch me.... It would be
unspeakably grand if Huxley were to lecture on the subject, but I can
see this is a mere chance; Faraday might think it too unorthodox.
... I had a letter from [Huxley] with such tremendous praise of my book,
that modesty (as I am trying to cultivate that difficult herb) prevents
me sending it to you, which I should have liked to have done, as he is
very modest about himself.
You have cockered me up to that extent, that I now feel I can face a
score of savage reviewers. I suppose you are still with the Lyells. Give
my kindest remembrance to them. I triumph to hear that he continues to
approve.
Believe me, your would-be modest friend.
The following passage from a letter to Lyell shows how strongly he felt
on the subject of Lyell's adherence:--"I rejoice profoundly that you
intend admitting the doctrine of modification in your new edition;[172]
nothing, I am convinced, could be more important for its success. I
honour you most sincerely. To have maintained in the position of a
master, one side of a question for thirty years, and then deliberately
give it up, is a fact to which I much doubt whether the records of
science offer a parallel. For myself, also I rejoice profoundly; for,
thinking of so many cases of men pursuing an illusion for years, often
and often a cold shudder has run through me, and I have asked myself
whether I may not have devoted my life to a phantasy. Now I look at it
as morally impossible that investigators of truth, like you and Hooker,
can be wholly wrong, and therefore I rest in peace."
_T. H. Huxley[173] to C. Darwin._ Jermyn Street, W. November 23rd, 1859.
MY DEAR DARWIN,--I finished your book yesterday, a lucky examination
having furnished me with a few hours of continuous leisure.
Since I read Von Baer's[174] essays, nine years ago, no work on Natural
History Science I have met with has made so great an impression upon me,
and I do most heartily thank you for the great store of new views you
have given me. Nothing, I think, can be better than the tone of the
book, it impresses those who know nothing about the subject. As for your
doctrine, I am prepared to go to the stake, if requisite, in support of
Chapter IX.,[175] and most parts of Chapters X., XI., XII.; and Chapter
XIII. contains much that is most admirable, but on one or two points I
enter a _caveat_ until I can see further into all sides of the question.
As to the first four chapters, I agree thoroughly and fully with all
the principles laid down in them. I think you have demonstrated a true
cause for the production of species, and have thrown the _onus
probandi_, that species did not arise in the way you suppose, on your
adversaries.
But I feel that I have not yet by any means fully realized the bearings
of those most remarkable and original Chapters III., IV. and V., and I
will write no more about them just now.
The only objections that have occurred to me are, 1st that you have
loaded yourself with an unnecessary difficulty in adopting _Natura non
facit saltum_ so unreservedly.... And 2nd, it is not clear to me why, if
continual physical conditions are of so little moment as you suppose,
variation should occur at all.
However, I must read the book two or three times more before I presume
to begin picking holes.
I trust you will not allow yourself to be in any way disgusted or
annoyed by the considerable abuse and misrepresentation which, unless I
greatly mistake, is in store for you. Depend upon it you have earned the
lasting gratitude of all thoughtful men. And as to the curs which will
bark and yelp, you must recollect that some of your friends, at any
rate, are endowed with an amount of combativeness which (though you have
often and justly rebuked it) may stand you in good stead.
I am sharpening up my claws and beak in readiness.
Looking back over my letter, it really expresses so feebly all I think
about you and your noble book that I am half ashamed of it; but you will
understand that, like the parrot in the story, "I think the more."
Ever yours faithfully.
_C. D. to T. H. Huxley._ Ilkley, Nov. 25 [1859].
MY DEAR HUXLEY,--Your letter has been forwarded to me from Down. Like a
good Catholic who has received extreme unction, I can now sing "nunc
dimittis." I should have been more than contented with one quarter of
what you have said. Exactly fifteen months ago, when I put pen to paper
for this volume, I had awful misgivings; and thought perhaps I had
deluded myself, like so many have done, and I then fixed in my mind
three judges, on whose decision I determined mentally to abide. The
judges were Lyell, Hooker, and yourself. It was this which made me so
excessively anxious for your verdict. I am now contented, and can sing
my "nunc dimittis." What a joke it would be if I pat you on the back
when you attack some immovable creationists! You have most cleverly hit
on one point, which has greatly troubled me; if, as I must think,
external conditions produce little _direct_ effect, what the devil
determines each particular variation? What makes a tuft of feathers come
on a cock's head, or moss on a moss-rose? I shall much like to talk over
this with you....
My dear Huxley, I thank you cordially for your letter.
Yours very sincerely.
_Erasmus Darwin[176] to C. Darwin._ November 23rd [1859].
DEAR CHARLES,--I am so much weaker in the head, that I hardly know if
I can write, but at all events I will jot down a few things that the
Dr.[177] has said. He has not read much above half, so, as he says, he
can give no definite conclusion, and keeps stating that he is not
tied down to either view, and that he has always left an escape by
the way he has spoken of varieties. I happened to speak of the eye
before he had read that part, and it took away his breath--utterly
impossible--structure--function, &c., &c., &c., but when he had read it
he hummed and hawed, and perhaps it was partly conceivable, and then he
fell back on the bones of the ear, which were beyond all probability or
conceivability. He mentioned a slight blot, which I also observed, that
in speaking of the slave-ants carrying one another, you change the
species without giving notice first, and it makes one turn back....
... For myself I really think it is the most interesting book I ever
read, and can only compare it to the first knowledge of chemistry,
getting into a new world or rather behind the scenes. To me the
geographical distribution, I mean the relation of islands to continents
is the most convincing of the proofs, and the relation of the oldest
forms to the existing species. I dare say I don't feel enough the
absence of varieties, but then I don't in the least know if everything
now living were fossilized whether the palaeontologists could distinguish
them. In fact the _a priori_ reasoning is so entirely satisfactory to me
that if the facts won't fit in, why so much the worse for the facts is
my feeling. My ague has left me in such a state of torpidity that I wish
I had gone through the process of natural selection.
Yours affectionately.
_A. Sedgwick[178] to C. Darwin._ [November 1859.]
MY DEAR DARWIN,--I write to thank you for your work on the _Origin of
Species_. It came, I think, in the latter part of last week; but it may
have come a few days sooner, and been overlooked among my book-parcels,
which often remain unopened when I am lazy or busy with any work before
me. So soon as I opened it I began to read it, and I finished it, after
many interruptions, on Tuesday. Yesterday I was employed--1st, in
preparing for my lecture; 2ndly, in attending a meeting of my brother
Fellows to discuss the final propositions of the Parliamentary
Commissioners; 3rdly, in lecturing; 4thly, in hearing the conclusion of
the discussion and the College reply, whereby, in conformity with my own
wishes, we accepted the scheme of the Commissioners; 5thly, in dining
with an old friend at Clare College; 6thly, in adjourning to the weekly
meeting of the Ray Club, from which I returned at 10 P.M., dog-tired,
and hardly able to climb my staircase. Lastly, in looking through the
_Times_ to see what was going on in the busy world.
I do not state this to fill space (though I believe that Nature does
abhor a vacuum), but to prove that my reply and my thanks are sent to
you by the earliest leisure I have, though that is but a very contracted
opportunity. If I did not think you a good-tempered and truth-loving
man, I should not tell you that (spite of the great knowledge, store of
facts, capital views of the correlation of the various parts of organic
nature, admirable hints about the diffusion, through wide regions, of
many related organic beings, &c. &c.) I have read your book with more
pain than pleasure. Parts of it I admired greatly, parts I laughed at
till my sides were almost sore; other parts I read with absolute sorrow,
because I think them utterly false and grievously mischievous. You have
_deserted_--after a start in that tram-road of all solid physical
truth--the true method of induction, and started us in machinery as
wild, I think, as Bishop Wilkins's locomotive that was to sail with us
to the moon. Many of your wide conclusions are based upon assumptions
which can neither be proved nor disproved, why then express them in the
language and arrangement of philosophical induction? As to your grand
principle--_natural selection_--what is it but a secondary consequence
of supposed, or known, primary facts? Development is a better word,
because more close to the cause of the fact? For you do not deny
causation. I call (in the abstract) causation the will of God; and I can
prove that He acts for the good of His creatures. He also acts by laws
which we can study and comprehend. Acting by law, and under what is
called final causes, comprehends, I think, your whole principle. You
write of "natural selection" as if it were done consciously by the
selecting agent. 'Tis but a consequence of the pre-supposed development,
and the subsequent battle for life. This view of nature you have stated
admirably, though admitted by all naturalists and denied by no one of
common-sense. We all admit development as a fact of history: but how
came it about? Here, in language, and still more in logic, we are
point-blank at issue. There is a moral or metaphysical part of nature as
well as a physical. A man who denies this is deep in the mire of folly.
'Tis the crown and glory of organic science that it _does_ through
_final cause_, link material and moral; and yet _does not_ allow us to
mingle them in our first conception of laws, and our classification of
such laws, whether we consider one side of nature or the other. You have
ignored this link; and, if I do not mistake your meaning, you have done
your best in one or two pregnant cases to break it. Were it possible
(which, thank God, it is not) to break it, humanity, in my mind, would
suffer a damage that might brutalize it, and sink the human race into a
lower grade of degradation than any into which it has fallen since its
written records tell us of its history. Take the case of the bee-cells.
If your development produced the successive modification of the bee and
its cells (which no mortal can prove), final cause would stand good as
the directing cause under which the successive generations acted and
gradually improved. Passages in your book, like that to which I have
alluded (and there are others almost as bad), greatly shocked my moral
taste. I think, in speculating on organic descent, you _over_-state the
evidence of geology; and that you _under_-state it while you are talking
of the broken links of your natural pedigree: but my paper is nearly
done, and I must go to my lecture-room. Lastly, then, I greatly dislike
the concluding chapter--not as a summary, for in that light it appears
good--but I dislike it from the tone of triumphant confidence in which
you appeal to the rising generation (in a tone I condemned in the author
of the _Vestiges_) and prophesy of things not yet in the womb of time,
nor (if we are to trust the accumulated experience of human sense and
the inferences of its logic) ever likely to be found anywhere but in the
fertile womb of man's imagination. And now to say a word about a son of
a monkey and an old friend of yours: I am better, far better, than I
was last year. I have been lecturing three days a week (formerly I gave
six a week) without much fatigue, but I find by the loss of activity and
memory, and of all productive powers, that my bodily frame is sinking
slowly towards the earth. But I have visions of the future. They are as
much a part of myself as my stomach and my heart, and these visions are
to have their anti-type in solid fruition of what is best and greatest.
But on one condition only--that I humbly accept God's revelation of
Himself both in His works and in His word, and do my best to act in
conformity with that knowledge which He only can give me, and He only
can sustain me in doing. If you and I do all this, we shall meet in
heaven.
I have written in a hurry, and in a spirit of brotherly love, therefore
forgive any sentence you happen to dislike; and believe me, spite of any
disagreement in some points of the deepest moral interest, your
true-hearted old friend,
A. SEDGWICK.
The following extract from a note to Lyell (Nov. 24) gives an idea of
the conditions under which the second edition was prepared: "This
morning I heard from Murray that he sold the whole edition[179] the
first day to the trade. He wants a new edition instantly, and this
utterly confounds me. Now, under water-cure, with all nervous power
directed to the skin, I cannot possibly do head-work, and I must make
only actually necessary corrections. But I will, as far as I can without
my manuscript, take advantage of your suggestions: I must not attempt
much. Will you send me one line to say whether I must strike out about
the secondary whale,[180] it goes to my heart. About the rattle-snake,
look to my Journal, under Trigonocephalus, and you will see the probable
origin of the rattle, and generally in transitions it is the _premier
pas qui coute_."
Here follows a hint of the coming storm (from a letter to Lyell, Dec.
2):--
"Do what I could, I fear I shall be greatly abused. In answer to
Sedgwick's remark that my book would be 'mischievous,' I asked him
whether truth can be known except by being victorious over all attacks.
But it is no use. H. C. Watson tells me that one zoologist says he will
read my book, 'but I will never believe it.' What a spirit to read any
book in! Crawford[181] writes to me that his notice will be hostile,
but that 'he will not calumniate the author.' He says he has read my
book, 'at least such parts as he could understand.'[182] He sent me some
notes and suggestions (quite unimportant), and they show me that I have
unavoidably done harm to the subject, by publishing an abstract.... I
have had several notes from ----, very civil and less decided. Says he
shall not pronounce against me without much reflection, _perhaps will
say nothing_ on the subject. X. says he will go to that part of hell,
which Dante tells us is appointed for those who are neither on God's
side nor on that of the devil."
But his friends were preparing to fight for him. Huxley gave, in
_Macmillan's Magazine_ for December, an analysis of the _Origin_,
together with the substance of his Royal Institution lecture, delivered
before the publication of the book.
Carpenter was preparing an essay for the _National Review_, and
negotiating for a notice in the _Edinburgh_ free from any taint of
_odium theologicum_.
_C. D. to C. Lyell._ Down [December 12th, 1859].
... I had very long interviews with ----, which perhaps you would like
to hear about.... I infer from several expressions that, at bottom, he
goes an immense way with us....
He said to the effect that my explanation was the best ever published of
the manner of formation of species. I said I was very glad to hear it.
He took me up short: "You must not at all suppose that I agree with you
in all respects." I said I thought it no more likely that I should be
right in nearly all points, than that I should toss up a penny and get
heads twenty times running. I asked him what he thought the weakest
part. He said he had no particular objection to any part. He added:--
"If I must criticise, I should say, we do not want to know what Darwin
believes and is convinced of, but what he can prove." I agreed most
fully and truly that I have probably greatly sinned in this line, and
defended my general line of argument of inventing a theory and seeing
how many classes of facts the theory would explain. I added that I would
endeavour to modify the "believes" and "convinceds." He took me up
short: "You will then spoil your book, the charm of it is that it is
Darwin himself." He added another objection, that the book was too
_teres atque rotundus_--that it explained everything, and that it was
improbable in the highest degree that I should succeed in this. I quite
agree with this rather queer objection, and it comes to this that my
book must be very bad or very good....
I have heard, by a roundabout channel, that Herschel says my book "is
the law of higgledy-piggledy." What this exactly means I do not know,
but it is evidently very contemptuous. If true this is a great blow and
discouragement.
_J. D. Hooker to C. Darwin_. Kew [1859].
DEAR DARWIN,--You have, I know, been drenched with letters since the
publication of your book, and I have hence forborne to add my mite.[183]
I hope now that you are well through Edition II., and I have heard that
you were flourishing in London. I have not yet got half-through the
book, not from want of will, but of time--for it is the very hardest
book to read, to full profits, that I ever tried--it is so cram-full of
matter and reasoning.[184] I am all the more glad that you have
published in this form, for the three volumes, unprefaced by this, would
have choked any Naturalist of the nineteenth century, and certainly have
softened my brain in the operation of assimilating their contents. I am
perfectly tired of marvelling at the wonderful amount of facts you have
brought to bear, and your skill in marshalling them and throwing them on
the enemy; it is also extremely clear as far as I have gone, but very
hard to fully appreciate. Somehow it reads very different from the MS.,
and I often fancy that I must have been very stupid not to have more
fully followed it in MS. Lyell told me of his criticisms. I did not
appreciate them all, and there are many little matters I hope one day to
talk over with you. I saw a highly flattering notice in the _English
Churchman_, short and not at all entering into discussion, but praising
you and your book, and talking patronizingly of the doctrine!... Bentham
and Henslow will still shake their heads, I fancy....
Ever yours affectionately.
_C. D. to T. H. Huxley._ Down, Dec. 28th [1859].
MY DEAR HUXLEY,--Yesterday evening, when I read the _Times_ of a
previous day, I was amazed to find a splendid essay and review of me.
Who can the author be? I am intensely curious. It included an eulogium
of me which quite touched me, though I am not vain enough to think it
all deserved. The author is a literary man, and German scholar. He has
read my book very attentively; but, what is very remarkable, it seems
that he is a profound naturalist. He knows my Barnacle-book, and
appreciates it too highly. Lastly, he writes and thinks with quite
uncommon force and clearness; and what is even still rarer, his writing
is seasoned with most pleasant wit. We all laughed heartily over some of
the sentences.... Who can it be? Certainly I should have said that there
was only one man in England who could have written this essay, and that
_you_ were the man. But I suppose I am wrong, and that there is some
hidden genius of great calibre. For how could you influence Jupiter
Olympus and make him give three and a half columns to pure science? The
old fogies will think the world will come to an end. Well, whoever the
man is, he has done great service to the cause, far more than by a dozen
reviews in common periodicals. The grand way he soars above common
religious prejudices, and the admission of such views into the _Times_,
I look at as of the highest importance, quite independently of the mere
question of species. If you should happen to be _acquainted_ with the
author, for Heaven-sake tell me who he is?
My dear Huxley, yours most sincerely.
There can be no doubt that this powerful essay, appearing in the leading
daily Journal, must have had a strong influence on the reading public.
Mr. Huxley allows me to quote from a letter an account of the happy
chance that threw into his hands the opportunity of writing it:--
"The _Origin_ was sent to Mr. Lucas, one of the staff of the _Times_
writers at that day, in what I suppose was the ordinary course of
business. Mr. Lucas, though an excellent journalist, and, at a later
period, editor of _Once a Week_, was as innocent of any knowledge of
science as a babe, and bewailed himself to an acquaintance on having to
deal with such a book. Whereupon he was recommended to ask me to get him
out of his difficulty, and he applied to me accordingly, explaining,
however, that it would be necessary for him formally to adopt anything I
might be disposed to write, by prefacing it with two or three paragraphs
of his own.
"I was too anxious to seize upon the opportunity thus offered of giving
the book a fair chance with the multitudinous readers of the _Times_ to
make any difficulty about conditions; and being then very full of the
subject, I wrote the article faster, I think, than I ever wrote anything
in my life, and sent it to Mr. Lucas, who duly prefixed his opening
sentences.
"When the article appeared, there was much speculation as to its
authorship. The secret leaked out in time, as all secrets will, but not
by my aid; and then I used to derive a good deal of innocent amusement
from the vehement assertions of some of my more acute friends, that they
knew it was mine from the first paragraph!
"As the _Times_ some years since referred to my connection with the
review, I suppose there will be no breach of confidence in the
publication of this little history, if you think it worth the space it
will occupy."
FOOTNOTES:
[163] In his next letter to Lyell my father writes: "The omission of
'living' before 'eminent' naturalists was a dreadful blunder." In the
first edition, as published, the blunder is corrected by the addition of
the word "living."
[164] Darwin wrote to Asa Gray in 1860:--"The eye to this day gives me a
cold shudder, but when I think of the fine known gradations, my reason
tells me I ought to conquer the cold shudder."
[165] Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz, born at Mortier, on the lake of Morat
in Switzerland, on May 28th, 1807. He emigrated to America in 1846,
where he spent the rest of his life, and died Dec. 14th, 1873. His
_Life_, written by his widow, was published in 1885. The following
extract from a letter to Agassiz (1850) is worth giving, as showing how
my father regarded him, and it may be added that his cordial feeling
towards the great American naturalist remained strong to the end of his
life:--
"I have seldom been more deeply gratified than by receiving your most
kind present of _Lake Superior_. I had heard of it, and had much wished
to read it, but I confess that it was the very great honour of having in
my possession a work with your autograph as a presentation copy, that
has given me such lively and sincere pleasure. I cordially thank you for
it. I have begun to read it with uncommon interest, which I see will
increase as I go on."
[166] Mr. Wallace was in the Malay Archipelago.
[167] Nov. 19, 1859.
[168] The Reviewer speaks of the author's "evident self-satisfaction,"
and of his disposing of all difficulties "more or less confidently."
[169] A review of the fourth volume of Watson's _Cybele Britannica_,
_Gard. Chron._, 1859, p. 911.
[170] See the _Origin_, first edition, p. 3, where Sir J. D. Hooker's
help is conspicuously acknowledged.
[171] This refers to the review in the _Athenaeum_, Nov. 19th, 1859,
where the reviewer, after touching on the theological aspects of the
book, leaves the author to "the mercies of the Divinity Hall, the
College, the Lecture Room, and the Museum."
[172] It appears from Sir Charles Lyell's published letters that he
intended to admit the doctrine of evolution in a new edition of the
_Manual_, but this was not published till 1865. He was, however, at work
on the _Antiquity of Man_ in 1860, and had already determined to discuss
the Origin at the end of the book.
[173] In a letter written in October, my father had said, "I am
intensely curious to hear Huxley's opinion of my book. I fear my long
discussion on classification will disgust him, for it is much opposed to
what he once said to me." He may have remembered the following incident
told by Mr. Huxley in his chapter of the _Life and Letters_, ii. p.
196:--"I remember, in the course of my first interview with Mr. Darwin,
expressing my belief in the sharpness of the lines of demarcation
between natural groups and in the absence of transitional forms, with
all the confidence of youth and imperfect knowledge. I was not aware, at
that time, that he had then been many years brooding over the species
question; and the humorous smile which accompanied his gentle answer,
that such was not altogether his view, long haunted and puzzled me."
[174] Karl Ernst von Baer, b. 1792, d. at Dorpat 1876--one of the most
distinguished biologists of the century. He practically founded the
modern science of embryology.
[175] In the first edition of the _Origin_, Chap. IX. is on the
'Imperfection of the Geological Record;' Chap. X., on the 'Geological
Succession of Organic Beings;' Chaps. XI. and XII., on 'Geographical
Distribution;' Chap. XIII., on 'Mutual Affinities of Organic Beings;
Morphology; Embryology; Rudimentary Organs.'
[176] His brother.
[177] Dr., afterwards Sir Henry, Holland.
[178] Rev. Adam Sedgwick, Woodwardian Professor of Geology in the
University of Cambridge. Born 1785, died 1873.
[179] First edition, 1250 copies.
[180] The passage was omitted in the second edition.
[181] John Crawford, orientalist, ethnologist, &c., b. 1783, d. 1868.
The review appeared in the _Examiner_, and, though hostile, is free from
bigotry, as the following citation will show: "We cannot help saying
that piety must be fastidious indeed that objects to a theory the
tendency of which is to show that all organic beings, man included, are
in a perpetual progress of amelioration and that is expounded in the
reverential language which we have quoted."
[182] A letter of Dec. 14, gives a good example of the manner in which
some naturalists received and understood it. "Old J. E. Gray of the
British Museum attacked me in fine style: 'You have just reproduced
Lamarck's doctrine, and nothing else, and here Lyell and others have
been attacking him for twenty years, and because _you_ (with a sneer and
laugh) say the very same thing, they are all coming round; it is the
most ridiculous inconsistency, &c. &c.'"
[183] See, however, p. 211.
[184] Mr. Huxley has made a similar remark:--"Long occupation with the
work has led the present writer to believe that the _Origin of Species_
is one of the hardest of books to master."--_Obituary Notice, Proc. R.
Soc._ No. 269, p. xvii.