EVOLUTION BY NATURAL SELECTION : DARWIN S CONCEPTION 



tions in Men and Animals," 1872; "Insectivorous Plants," 1875; "The Effects 

 of Cross- and Self-Fertilization in the Vegetable Kingdom," 1876; "Differ- 

 ent Forms of Flowers on Plants of the Same Species," 1877; "The Power 

 of Movement in Plants," 1880; and finally, "The Formation of Vegetable 

 Mould through the Action of Worms," 1881. In addition to this immense 

 program of publication, he also brought out revised editions of many of 

 his books, including five revisions of the "Origin." 



This, then, is the scientific background of the man who wrote the "Ori- 

 gin of Species." It can be equalled by very few either for breadth or for 

 depth. 



Darwin's Mental Qualities. Before concluding these biographical 

 notes, it may be of interest to review Darwin's estimate of his own mental 

 qualities. His writing is remarkably clear and persuasive, and his style has 

 a charm seldom found in scientific works. Yet he says that "There seems 

 to be a sort of fatality in my mind leading me to put at first my statement 

 or proposition in a wrong or awkward form." Again, it is difficult to escape 

 the feeling that he is himself his harshest critic, for his letters are also very 

 effectively written, and it seems unlikely that these were carefully planned 

 and revised, as were his books. The general manner in which the "Origin" 

 was developed, through a series of outlines based upon a large series of 

 notes, has already been described in detail. This was the general plan of 

 work for all of his larger books, though none other was done quite so 

 thoroughly and over so long a period of years as the "Origin." 



As a young man, Darwin enjoyed poetry, particularly Shakespeare, and 

 such other poets as Milton, Byron, Wordsworth, and Shelley. While at 

 Cambridge, he developed a taste for fine paintings and music. But in later 

 years this taste for the fine arts was lost. "I have tried lately to read 

 Shakespeare, and found it so intolerably dull that it nauseated me." The 

 only artistic taste which remained was for novels. He says, "I often bless 

 all novelists. ... A novel, according to my taste, does not come into the 

 first class unless it contains some person whom one can thoroughly love, 

 and if a pretty woman all the better." He regarded his loss of taste for the 

 arts in general as a personal defect, and said that he would cultivate such 

 tastes every week if he had his life to live over. "My mind seems to have 

 become a kind of machine for grinding general laws out of large collec- 

 tions of facts, but why this should have caused the atrophy of that part of 

 the brain alone, on which the higher tastes depend, I cannot conceive." 



Darwin regarded himself as rather slow of apprehension, and as being 

 incapable of following for long a purely abstract train of thought. But 

 against the charge of some of his critics that he had no powers of reason- 

 ing, he defended himself. For he pointed out that the "Origin" is one long 

 argument, and that it convinced many able men, and he felt justified in 

 saying that this could not have been done by a man without some powers 

 of reasoning. But he felt that he did not exceed in this respect the average 

 successful doctor or lawyer. However he believed that his powers of ob- 

 servation and his love of natural science were superior. His mind was kept 

 open, and indeed he exercised unusual care in recording any data con- 

 trary to his hypotheses. ". . . with the single exception of the Coral Reefs, 



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