ix THE DEBT OF SCIENCE TO DARWIN 473 



ing facts and making fresh observations, the final result being 

 to elevate one of the humblest and most despised of the 

 animal creation to the position of an important agent in the 

 preparation of the earth for the use and enjoyment of the 

 higher animals and of man. 



The sketch now given of Darwin's work, though it may have 

 seemed tedious to the reader by its length, is yet in many 

 respects imperfect, since it has given no account of those 

 earlier important labours which would alone have made the 

 reputation of a lesser man. None but the greatest geologists 

 have produced more instructive works than the two volumes 

 of Geological Observations, and the profound and original essay 

 " On the Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs " ; the 

 most distinguished zoologists and anatomists might be proud 

 of the elaborate " Monograph of the Cirripedia," of which a 

 competent judge says : " The prodigious number and minute 

 accuracy of his dissections, the exhaustive detail with which 

 he worked out every branch of his subject sparing no pains 

 in procuring every species that it was possible to procure, in 

 collecting all the known facts relating to the geographical and 

 geological distribution of the group, in tracing all the compli- 

 cated history of the metamorphoses presented by the indivi- 

 duals of the sundry species, in disentangling the problem of 

 the homologies of these perplexing animals, etc. all combine to 

 show that, had Mr. Darwin chosen to devote himself to a life 

 of morphological work, his name would probably have been 

 second to none in that department of biology," 1 while the 

 numerous researches on the fertilisation and structure of 

 flowers and the movements of plants, would alone place him 

 in the rank of a profound and original investigator in botanical 

 science. 



Estimate of Darwin's Life- Work 



Yet these works, great as is each of them separately, and, 

 taken altogether, amazing as the production of one man, sink 

 into insignificance as compared with the vast body of research 

 and of thought of which the Origin of Species is the brief 

 epitome, and with which alone the name of Darwin is 

 associated by the mass of educated men. I have here 

 1 Nature, vol. xxvi. p. 99. 



