Races and their Origin," and brought forward Darwin's investigations as exemplifying that application of science to which England owes her greatness, was told that it more truly paralleled "the abuse of science to which a neighbouring nation-some seventy years since-owed its temporary degradation." And the professor was accused of audaciously seeking to blind his audience. Samuel Wilberforce, then Bishop of Oxford, was equally denunciatory in The Quarterly. He hopes that "this flimsy speculation" will be completely put down. "It is a dishonouring view of nature. . . . Under such influences," says the courtly bishop, "a man soon goes back to the marvelling stare of childhood at the centaurs and hippogriffs of fancy; or, if he is of a philosophic turn, he comes, like Oken, to write a scheme of creation under a 'sort of inspiration,' but it is the frenzied inspiration of the inhaler of mephitic gas. The whole world of nature is laid for such a man under a fantastic law of glamour, and he becomes capable of believing anything; and he is able, with a continually growing neglect of all the facts around him, with equal confidence and equal delusion, to look back to any past and to look on to any future.” I

The Saturday Review was much more moderate, by no means sharing the anxiety of those who regarded evolutionary theories as hostile to Christianity. The author is said

The reader will thus be able to judge for himself how far Darwin's "Origin of Species" gained, "from the very first outset, universal respect and a fair hearing," as Mr. Grant Allen, with singular forgetfulness, states ("Darwin," p. 112). The violence of the attacks made upon Darwin by the majority of religious and orthodox journals is well known.

to have encountered the difficulties of his theory "with admirable skill and ability," and though The Saturday remained unconvinced of his general argument, yet it acknowledged itself "persuaded that natural selection. must henceforward be admitted as the chief mode by which the structure of organised beings is modified in a state of nature;" and thought it very possible that, through its agency, considerable groups of nearly allied species might have been derived from a single progenitor: but there The Saturday stopped, believing in limits to this power.

The second edition of "The Origin of Species," which appeared in January, 1860, only six weeks after the first, contained but few alterations; the third, in March, 1861, had received extensive additions and corrections. The most important of these discussed the so-called tendency of organisation to advance, and explained the present coexistence of high and lowly organised forms. A valuable historical sketch of the modern progress of opinion on the subject, from Lamarck's time, was prefixed to the book. It was further enlarged in subsequent editions, as evidences accumulated that various thinkers had independently adopted the evolution theory, or the more special one of natural selection. Notable instances of anticipation were those of Dr. Wells, who, in a paper read before the Royal Society in 1813, but not published till 1818, had expressed the opinion that all animals tend to vary; that agriculturists improve breeds by selection; and that what they do by art "seems to be done with equal efficacy, though more slowly, by nature, in the formation of varieties of mankind." He then

goes on to exemplify the survival of the fittest, though in other words. Mr. Patrick Matthew, in 1831, published a work on "Naval Timber and Arboriculture," in which he expressed, in scattered passages, a view nearly resembling Darwin's.

The fourth edition of "The Origin," in 1866, was longer, by fifty pages, than its predecessor. Among the additions may be mentioned a fuller treatment of the argument from embryology, which was made stronger by later investigations. The fifth edition (1869) was comparatively little increased in bulk, though altered in many details. In particular it contained a somewhat important change relating to the extent of the influence of natural selection. This is also referred to in "TheDescent of Man" (first edition, vol. i. pp. 152-3), where the author says he had not formerly considered sufficiently the. existence of many structures which appeared to be neither beneficial nor injurious, and had attributed too much to. natural selection. "I was not able," he says, "to annul the influence of my former belief, then widely prevalent, that each species had been purposely created; and this led to my tacitly assuming that every detail of structure, excepting rudiments, was of some special, though unrecognised, service. . . If I have erred in giving to natural selection great power, which I am far from admitting, or in having exaggerated its power, which is in itself probable, I have, at least, as I hope, done good service in aiding to overthrow the dogma of separate creations."

The sixth edition (1872), in smaller type, was considerably revised and altered, and remains permanent. A glossary of scientific terms was added by Mr. W. S.

Dallas. A new chapter was inserted after the sixth, and entitled "Miscellaneous Objections to the Theory of Natural Selection." It was partly derived from modified portions of chapter iv. of former editions, but the latter and larger part was new, and relates chiefly to the supposed incompetency of natural selection to account for the very early stages of useful structures. Numerous cases, such as the development of the giraffe's neck, the baleen of the whale, the mammary glands, &c., are admirably discussed. Causes preventing the acquisition, through natural selection, of useful structures in many cases are dealt with, and reasons given for disbelieving in great and sudden modifications. In the concluding chapter Darwin further admits that he had formerly underrated the frequency and importance of use and disuse of parts, of the direct action of external conditions, and of variations which seem to us, in our ignorance, to arise spontaneously. He alludes to misrepresentations of his views, and calls attention to the fact that, in the first edition, at the close of the introduction, he stated his conviction that natural selection had been the main, but not the exclusive means of modification. "This has been of no avail. Great is the power of steady misrepresentation; but the history of science shows that, fortunately, this power does not long endure." This is Darwin's almost sole allusion in his works to the persistence with which views not his had been attributed to him, or he had been calumniated for views he did hold. But in his own lifetime-nay, within fifteen years-he witnessed a sufficiently satisfying revolution. "I formerly spoke to very many naturalists on the subject of evolution, and never

Now

once met with any sympathetic agreement. It is probable that some did then believe in evolution, but they were either silent or expressed themselves so ambiguously, that it was not easy to understand their meaning. things are wholly changed, and almost every naturalist admits the great principle of evolution " ("Origin," sixth edition, p. 424). At present the sale of the book in this country approaches forty thousand copies. Its sale in America has been very large; and numerous translations into German, French, Italian, Russian, Dutch, and Swedish, and even into Japanese and Hindustani, have been largely sold. It must always be one of the most valued of all English classics.