CHARLES DARWIN. 143 



proposed only in consequence of the representations of Lyell 

 and Hooker. His one work, his whole life-long labour, 

 is at stake, and there is not a feeling in the man but 

 honour, an English gentleman's honour : " I would far 

 rather burn my whole book, than that he or any other 

 man should think that I had behaved in a paltry spirit." 



And here, it is but just to add, the question is not 

 only of one English gentleman, but two. Mr. Wallace, 

 in the disinterestedness of his own self-annihilation, is as 

 noble as Darwin ; and this the Darwin s themselves are 

 prompt to declare. In fact, I know not but that in the 

 whole incident, it is Mr. Wallace alone who has suffered 

 not that, on this side or on that, the will of man is to 

 be blamed, but only the fatality of circumstance. Often 

 in this world it would seem that it is not merit decides, 

 but only the goddess Fortuna. With Mr. Darwin, if 

 merit was supreme, so undoubtedly also was the favour 

 of the Divinity. 



I know not that it is illustrative of more than the 

 general reader, to point out this reader's usual attitude, 

 not to what is new simpliciter, but to what as new con- 

 tradicts some belief or custom that as yet has been a 

 matter of course. The initial reception, on the whole, of 

 Mr. Darwin's theory was of that nature ; and if he took it 

 at all amiss, he might have reflected on how he himself 

 felt when spiritualism, when mesmerism, when flint celts 

 were first brought to his notice. " George hired a 

 medium," he says (iii. 187), "who made the chairs, a 

 flute, a bell, and candlestick, and fiery points jump about 

 how the man could possibly do what was done sur- 

 passes my understanding the Lord have mercy on us all, 

 if we have to believe such rubbish." Now it was just 

 this that, to the horror of Mr. Darwin, Carlyle and others 

 retorted on himself. Nor was it different as regards 

 mesmerism, on which his son reports (i. 374) Mr. 



