396 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



THE ORIGIN OF THE THEOEY OF NATURAL SELECTION^ 



By Dr. A. R. WALLACE 



I BEG to thank the council of the Linnean Society for the very great 

 honor they have done me, in coupling my name with that of 

 Charles Darwin on tlie celebration of this anniversary, and for the still 

 greater and more exceptional honor, of perpetuating my features with 

 those of my illustrious forerunner, upon the medal you have now 

 awarded me. 



With your permission I propose to make a few remarks both as to 

 the actual relations between Darwin and myself prior to July, 1858, 

 and also to some peculiarities of our respective life-histories which 

 brought about those relations, and which will, I hope, be both novel and 

 of some general interest. 



Since the death of Darwin in 1882, 1 have found myself in the 

 somewhat unusual position of receiving credit and praise from popular 

 writers under a complete misapprehension of what my share in Darwin's 

 work really amounted to. It has been stated (not unfrequently) in the 

 daily and weekly press, that Darwin and myself discovered " natural 

 selection " simultaneously, while a more daring few have declared that 

 I was the first to discover it, and that I gave way to Darwin ! 



In order to avoid further errors of this kind (which this celebration 

 may possibly encourage), I think it will be well to give the actual 

 facts as simply and clearly as possible. 



The one fact that connects me with Darwin, and which, I am happy 

 to say, has never been doubted, is that the idea of what is now termed 

 " natural selection " or " survival of the fittest," together with its far- 

 reaching consequences, occurred to us independently, and was first 

 jointly announced before this society fifty years ago. 



But, what is often forgotten by the press and the public, is, that 

 the idea occurred to Darwin in October, 1838, nearly twenty years 

 earlier than to myself (in Febrnary, 1858)'; and that during the whole 

 of that twenty years he had been laboriously collecting evidence from 

 the vast mass of literature of biology, of horticulture and of agriculture : 

 as well as himself carrying out ingenious experiments and original 

 observations, the extent of which is indicated by the range of subjects 

 discussed in his " Origin of Species," and especially in that wonderful 

 store-house of knowledge — his " Animals and Plants under Domestica- 



^ Reply on receiving the Darwin-Wallace medal of the Linnean Society of 

 London on July 1, 1908. 



