CHARLES DARWIN. 457 



of Natural Selection, Mr. Darwin with the instinct of genius divined, 

 and with the ability of a master worked out its pregnant and far- 

 reaching applications. He not only saw its strong points, but he fore- 

 saw its limitations, indicated most of the objections in advance of his 

 opponents, weighed them with judicial mind, and where he could not 

 obviate them, seemed never disposed to underrate their force. Al- 

 though naturally disposed to make the most of his theory, he dis- 

 tinguished between what he could refer to known causes and what 

 thus far is not referrible to them. Consequently, he kept clear of that 

 common confusion of thought which supposes that natural selection 

 originates the variations which it selects. He believed, and he has 

 shown it to be probable, that external conditions induce the actions 

 and changes in the Hving plant or animal which may lead on to the 

 difference between one species and another ; but he did not maintain 

 that they produced the changes, or were sufficient scientifically to 

 explain them. Unlike most of his contemporaries in this respect, he 

 appears to have been thoroughly penetrated by the idea that the whole 

 physiological action of the plant or animal is a response of the living 

 organism to the action of the surroundings. 



The judicial fairness and openness of Darwm's mind, his penetration 

 and sagacity, his wonderful power of eliciting the meaning of things 

 which had escaped questioning by their very commonness, and of dis- 

 cerning the great significance of causes and interactions which had 

 been disregarded on account of their supposed insignificance, his 

 method of reasoning close to the facts and in contact with the solid 

 ground of nature, his aptness in devising fruitful and conclusive exper- 

 iments, and in prosecuting nice researches with simple but effectual 

 appliances, and the whole rare combination of qualities which made 

 \\\m. facile princeps in biological investigation, — all these gifts are so 

 conspicuously manifest in his published writings, and are so fully 

 appreciated, that there is no need to celebrate them in an obituary 

 memorial. The writings also display in no small degree the spirit of 

 the man, and to this not a little of their persuasiveness is due. His 

 desire to ascertain the truth, and to present it purely to his readers, is 

 everywhere apparent. Conspicuous, also, is the absence of all trace 

 of controversy and of everything like pretension ; and this is remark- 

 able, considering how censure and how praise were heaped upon him 

 without stint. He does not teach didactically, but takes the reader 

 along with him as his companion in observation and in experiment. 

 And in the same spirit, instead of showing pique to an opponent, he 

 seems always to regard him as a helper in his search for the truth. 



