More Letters of Charles Darwin — Volume 2. Darwin Charles

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СКАЧАТЬ as indicating, rather than denying, a PREADAMITE world" ("Memoir of Leonard Horner, II.", page 303).) I declare I had fancied that the date was somehow in the Bible. You are coming out in a new light as a Biblical critic. I must thank you for some remarks on the "Origin of Species" (404/4. Mr. Horner (page xxxix) begins by disclaiming the qualifications of a competent critic, and confines himself to general remarks on the philosophic candour and freedom from dogmatism of the "Origin": he does, however, give an opinion on the geological chapters IX. and X. As a general criticism he quotes Mr. Huxley's article in the "Westminster Review," which may now be read in "Collected Essays," II., page 22.) (though I suppose it is almost as incorrect to do so as to thank a judge for a favourable verdict): what you have said has pleased me extremely. I am the more pleased, as I would rather have been well attacked than have been handled in the namby-pamby, old-woman style of the cautious Oxford Professor. (404/5. This no doubt refers to Professor Phillips' "Life on the Earth," 1860, a book founded on the author's "Rede Lecture," given before the University of Cambridge. Reference to this work will be found in "Life and Letters," II., pages 309, 358, 373.)

      LETTER 405. TO J.D. HOOKER.

      (405/1. Mr. Wallace was, we believe, the first to treat the evolution of Man in any detail from the point of view of Natural Selection, namely, in a paper in the "Anthropological Review and Journal of the Anthropological Society," May 1864, page clviii. The deep interest with which Mr. Darwin read his copy is graphically recorded in the continuous series of pencil-marks along the margins of the pages. His views are fully given in Letter 406. The phrase, "in this case it is too far," refers to Mr. Wallace's habit of speaking of the theory of Natural Selection as due entirely to Darwin.)

      May 22nd 1864.

      I have now read Wallace's paper on Man, and think it MOST striking and original and forcible. I wish he had written Lyell's chapters on Man. (405/2. See "Life and Letters," III., page 11 et seq. for Darwin's disappointment over Lyell's treatment of the evolutionary question in his "Antiquity of Man"; see also page 29 for Lyell's almost pathetic words about his own position between the discarded faith of many years and the new one not yet assimilated. See also Letters 132, 164, 170.) I quite agree about his high-mindedness, and have long thought so; but in this case it is too far, and I shall tell him so. I am not sure that I fully agree with his views about Man, but there is no doubt, in my opinion, on the remarkable genius shown by the paper. I agree, however, to the main new leading idea.

      LETTER 406. TO A.R. WALLACE.

      (406/1. This letter was published in "Life and Letters," III., page 89.)

      Down, {May} 28th {1864}.

      I am so much better that I have just finished a paper for the Linnean Society (406/2. On the three forms, etc., of Lythrum.); but I am not yet at all strong, I felt much disinclination to write, and therefore you must forgive me for not having sooner thanked you for your paper on Man (406/3. "Anthropological Review," May 1864.) received on the 11th. (406/4. Mr. Wallace wrote, May 10th, 1864: "I send you now my little contribution to the theory of the origin of man. I hope you will be able to agree with me. If you are able {to write} I shall be glad to have your criticisms. I was led to the subject by the necessity of explaining the vast mental and cranial differences between man and the apes combined with such small structural differences in other parts of the body, — and also by an endeavour to account for the diversity of human races combined with man's almost perfect stability of form during all historical epochs." But first let me say that I have hardly ever in my life been more struck by any paper than that on "Variation," etc., etc., in the "Reader." (406/5. "Reader," April 16th, 1864, an abstract of Mr. Wallace: "On the Phenomena of Variation and Geographical Distribution as illustrated by the Papilionidae of the Malayan Region." "Linn. Soc. Trans." XXV.) I feel sure that such papers will do more for the spreading of our views on the modification of species than any separate treatises on the simple subject itself. It is really admirable; but you ought not in the Man paper to speak of the theory as mine; it is just as much yours as mine. One correspondent has already noticed to me your "high-minded" conduct on this head.

      But now for your Man paper, about which I should like to write more than I can. The great leading idea is quite new to me — viz. that during late ages the mind will have been modified more than the body; yet I had got as far as to see with you, that the struggle between the races of man depended entirely on intellectual and moral qualities. The latter part of the paper I can designate only as grand and most eloquently done. I have shown your paper to two or three persons who have been here, and they have been equally struck with it. I am not sure that I go with you on all minor points: when reading Sir G. Grey's account of the constant battles of Australian savages, I remember thinking that Natural Selection would come in, and likewise with the Esquimaux, with whom the art of fishing and managing canoes is said to be hereditary. I rather differ on the rank, under a classificatory point of view, which you assign to man; I do not think any character simply in excess ought ever to be used for the higher divisions. Ants would not be separated from other hymenopterous insects, however high the instinct of the one, and however low the instincts of the other. With respect to the differences of race, a conjecture has occurred to me that much may be due to the correlation of complexion (and consequently hair) with constitution. Assume that a dusky individual best escaped miasma, and you will readily see what I mean. I persuaded the Director-General of the Medical Department of the Army to send printed forms to the surgeons of all regiments in tropical countries to ascertain this point, but I daresay I shall never get any returns. Secondly, I suspect that a sort of sexual selection has been the most powerful means of changing the races of man. I can show that the different races have a widely different standard of beauty. Among savages the most powerful men will have the pick of the women, and they will generally leave the most descendants. I have collected a few notes on man, but I do not suppose I shall ever use them. Do you intend to follow out your views? and if so, would you like at some future time to have my few references and notes? I am sure I hardly know whether they are of any value, and they are at present in a state of chaos.

      There is much more that I should like to write, but I have not strength.

      P.S. Our aristocracy is handsomer (more hideous according to a Chinese or Negro) than the middle classes, from {having the} pick of the women; but oh, what a scheme is primogeniture for destroying Natural Selection! I fear my letter will be barely intelligible to you.

      LETTER 406* A.R. WALLACE TO CHARLES DARWIN. 5, Westbourne Grove Terrace, W., May 29th {1864}.

      You are always so ready to appreciate what others do, and especially to overestimate my desultory efforts, that I cannot be surprised at your very kind and flattering remarks on my papers. I am glad, however, that you have made a few critical observations (and am only sorry that you were not well enough to make more), as that enables me to say a few words in explanation.

      My great fault is haste. An idea strikes me, I think over it for a few days, and then write away with such illustrations as occur to me while going on. I therefore look at the subject almost solely from one point of view. Thus, in my paper on Man (406*/1. Published in the "Anthropological Review," 1864.), I aim solely at showing that brutes are modified in a great variety of ways by Natural Selection, but that in none of these particular ways can Man be modified, because of the superiority of his intellect. I therefore no doubt overlook a few smaller points in which Natural Selection may still act on men and brutes alike. Colour is one of them, and I have alluded to this in correlation to constitution, in an abstract I have made at Sclater's request for the "Natural History Review." (406*/2. "Nat. Hist. Review," 1864, page 328.) At the same time, there is so much evidence of migrations and displacements of races of man, and so many cases of peoples of distinct physical characters inhabiting the same or similar regions, and also of races of uniform physical characters inhabiting widely dissimilar regions, — that the external characteristics of the chief races of man must, I think, be older than his present geographical distribution, and the modifications produced by correlation to favourable variations of constitution СКАЧАТЬ