76 THE PERSONALITY OF CHARLES DARWIN 



and that our having such an instinct is reason enough for 

 scientific researches without any practical results ever ensu- 

 ing from them.' l 



The same high motive was expressed in similar 

 language in a letter to his second cousin, W. D. 

 Fox :- 



' You do me injustice when you think that I work for 

 fame ; I value it to a certain extent ; but, if I know myself, 

 I work from a sort of instinct to try to make out truth.' 2 



The * higher ground ' taken by Darwin is now 

 recognized as the only motive cause which can 

 lead to scientific work at its best. The scientific 

 spirit is essentially and intensely antimateria- 

 list. The expression of an opposite opinion, in 

 spite of the superficial plausibility that made it at 

 one time popular, can only lead in these days 

 to humorous exaggerations such as that contained 

 in the toast said to have been drunk at a Cam- 

 bridge mathematical society : ' To the latest 

 discovery in pure mathematics, and may it never 

 be of the slightest use to anybody.' 



One other dominant element in Darwin's genius 

 which has been sometimes forgotten, must be 

 referred to. I mean the power thus described 

 in the autobiography (1881) : 



' . . . I think that I am superior to the common run of 

 men in noticing things which easily escape attention, and in 

 observing them carefully.' 3 



1 April 1, 1848. More tetters, i. 61. 



2 Mar. 24, 1859. Life and Letters, ii. 150. 



3 Life and Letters, i. 103. The editors of More Letters (I 72) 

 speak of ' that supreme power of seeing and thinking what the 

 rest of the world had overlooked, which was one of Darwin's most 

 striking characteristics '. 



