1859-1863] NATURAL SELECTION 135 



the imperfection of the Geological Record, though no language Letter 88 

 can be stronger or arguments fairer and sounder against it. Of 

 course I am influenced by Botany, and the conviction that we 

 have not in a fossilised condition a fraction of the plants that 

 have existed, and that not a fraction of those we have are 

 recognisable specifically. I never saw so clearly put the fact 

 that it is not intermediates between existing species we want, 

 but between these and the unknown tertium quid. 



You certainly make a hobby of Natural Selection, and pro- 

 bably ride it too hard ; that is a necessity of your case. If 

 the improvement of the creation-by-variation doctrine is con- 

 ceivable, it will be by unburthening your theory of Natural 

 Selection, which at first sight seems overstrained i.e., to 

 account for too much. I think, too, that some of your 

 difficulties which you override by Natural Selection may give 

 way before other explanations. But, oh Lord ! how little we 

 do know and have known to be so advanced in knowledge by 

 one theory. If we thought ourselves knowing dogs before 

 you revealed Natural Selection, what d d ignorant ones we 

 must surely be now we do know that law. 



I hear you may be at the Club on Thursday. I hope so. 

 Huxley will not be there, so do not come on that ground. 



To T. H. Huxley. Letter 89 



Jan. ist [1860]. 



I write one line merely to thank you for your pleasant 

 note, and to say that I will keep your secret. I will shake 

 my head as mysteriously as Lord Burleigh. Several persons 

 have asked me who wrote that " most remarkable article " in 

 the Times. 1 As a cat may look at a king, so I have said that 

 I strongly suspected you. X was so sharp that the first 

 sentence revealed the authorship. The Z.'s (God save the 

 mark) thought it was Owen's ! You may rely on it that it 

 has made a deep impression, and I am heartily glad that the 

 subject and I owe you this further obligation. But for God's 

 sake, take care of your health ; remember that the brain 

 takes years to rest, whilst the muscles take only hours. There 

 is poor Dana, to whom I used to preach by letter, writes to 



1 The Times, December 26th, 1859, p. 8. The opening paragraphs 

 were by one of the staff of the Times. See Life and Letters, II., p. 255, 

 for Mr. Huxley's interesting account of his share in the matter. 



