1860 1882] DESCENT OF MAN 45 



To Max Miiller. Letter 413 



Down, July 3rd, 1873. 



In June, 1873, Professor Max Miiller sent to Mr. Darwin a copy of 

 the sixth edition of his Lectures on the Science of Language^ with a letter 

 concluding with these words : " I venture to send you my three lectures, 

 trusting that, though I differ from some of your conclusions, you will 

 believe me to be one of your diligent readers and sincere admirers." 



I am much obliged for your kind note and present of 

 your lectures. I am extremely glad to have received them 

 from you, and I had intended ordering them. 



I feel quite sure from what I have read in your works that 

 you would never say anything of an honest adversary to 

 which he would have any just right to object ; and as for 

 myself, you have often spoken highly of me perhaps more 

 highly than I deserve. 



As far as language is concerned I am not worthy to be 

 your adversary, as I know extremely little about it, and that 

 little learnt from very few books. I should have been glad 

 to have avoided the whole subject, but was compelled to take 

 it up as well as I could. He w r ho is fully convinced, as I am, 

 that man is descended from some lower animal, is almost 

 forced to believe a priori that articulate language has been 

 developed from inarticulate cries 2 ; and he is therefore hardly 

 a fair judge of the arguments opposed to this belief. 



In October, 1875, ^ r - Darwin again wrote cordially to Professor Max 

 Miiller on receipt of a pamphlet entitled In Self-Defence? which is a 

 reply to Professor Whitney's " Darwinism and Language" in the North 

 American Review, July, 1874. This essay had been brought before the 

 "general reader" in England by an article of Mr. G. Darwin's in the 

 Contemporary Review, November, 1874, p. 894, entitled, "Professor 

 Whitney on the Origin of Language." The article was followed by 

 "My Reply to Mr. Darwin," contributed by Professor Miiller to the 

 Contemporary Review, January, 1875, p. 305. 



1 A reference to the first edition occurs in Life and Letters, II., 

 p. 390. 



2 Descent of Man (1901), p. 133. 



3 Printed in Chips from a German Workshop, Vol. IV., 1875, P- 473 



