LIFE OF DARWIN. 65 



young; and that the life of plants and animals was one 

 science, their study one discipline. What Huxley had 

 begun to proclaim from the housetop, Darwin was 

 meditating in secret ; and much more. Let us see how 

 he states the case in the famous modest opening of the 

 ' Origin of Species " (1859) : "When on board H. M. S. 

 Beagle, as naturalist, I was much struck with certain facts 

 in the distribution of the inhabitants of South America, 

 and in the geological relations of the present to the past 

 inhabitants of that continent These facts seemed to 

 me to throw some light on the origin of species that 

 mystery of mysteries, as it has been called by one of our 

 greatest philosophers. On my return home, it occurred 

 to me, in 1837, triat something might perhaps be made 

 out on this question by patiently accumulating and re- 

 flecting on all sorts of facts which could possibly have 

 any bearing on it. After five years' work I allowed 

 myself to speculate on the subject, and drew up some 

 short notes; these I enlarged in 1844 into a sketch of 

 the conclusions, which then seemed to me probable : 

 from that period to the present day I have steadily 

 pursued the same object. I hope that I may be excused 

 for entering on these personal details, as I give them to 

 show that I have not been hasty in coming to a decision." 

 We learn also, independently, from the " Expression of 

 the Emotions" (p. 19), that Darwin as early as 1838 was 

 inclined to believe in the principle of evolution, or the 

 derivation of species from other and lower forms. 



It is somewhat difficult to decide precisely what 

 Darwin owed to his predecessors who believed in the 

 mutability of species and doubted their separate creation ; 

 5 



