THE 'ORIGIN OF SPECIES.' 



I 9 I 



on the one hand, and to the ideal quasi-progressionism of 

 Agassiz, on the other, Lyell, in his own mind, was strongly- 

 disposed to account for the origination of all past and present 

 species of living things by natural causes. But he would have 

 liked, at the same, time, to keep the name of creation for a 

 natural process which he imagined to be incomprehensible. 



In a letter addressed to Mantell (dated March 2, 1827), 

 Lyell speaks of having just read Lamarck ; he expresses his 

 delight at Lamarck's theories, and his personal freedom from 

 any objections based on theological grounds. And though he 

 is evidently alarmed at the pithecoid origin of man involved 

 in Lamarck's doctrine, he observes : 



" But, after all, what changes species may really undergo ! 

 How impossible will it be to distinguish and lay down a line, 

 beyond which some of the so-called extinct species have 

 never passed into recent ones." 



Again, the following remarkable passage occurs in the post- 

 script of a letter addressed to Sir John Herschel in 1836 : 



" In regard to the origination of new species, I am very 

 glad to find that you think it probable that it may be carried 

 on through the intervention of intermediate causes. I left this 

 rather to be inferred, not thinking it worth while to offend a 

 certain class of persons by embodying in words what would 

 only be a speculation." * He goes on to refer to the criticisms 

 which have been directed against him on the ground that, by 

 leaving species to be originated by miracle, he is inconsistent 

 with his own doctrine of uniformitarianism ; and he leaves it 



* In the same sense, see the letter 

 to Whewell, March 7, 1837, vol. ii., 

 p. 5 : 



" In regard to this last subject 

 [the changes from one set of animal 

 and vegetable species to another] . . . 

 you remember what Herschel said 

 in his letter to me. If I had stated 

 as plainly as he has done the possi- 

 bility of the introduction or origina- 



tion of fresh species being a natural, 

 in contradistinction to a miraculous 

 process, I should have raised a host 

 of prejudices against me, which are 

 unfortunately opposed at every step 

 to any philosopher who attempts to 

 address the public on these mys- 

 terious subjects." See also letter to 

 Sedgwick, Jan. 20, 1838, vol. ii. 



P- 35- 



