Pre-Darwinian Evolutionists 9 
the labours of his predecessors, whereas, as a matter of fact, he knew 
very little about them till after he had been for years at work. To 
write, as Samuel Butler did, “Buffon planted, Erasmus Darwin and 
Lamarck watered, but it was Mr Darwin who said ‘That fruit is 
ripe, and shook it into his lap”...seems to us a quite misleading 
version of the facts of the case. The second fallacy which the 
historical citation is a little apt to suggest is that the filiation of 
ideas is a simple problem. On the contrary, the history of an idea, 
like the pedigree of an organism, is often very intricate, and the 
evolution of the evolution-idea is bound up with the whole progress 
of the world. Thus in order to interpret Darwin’s clear formulation 
of the idea of organic evolution and his convincing presentation of it, 
we have to do more than go back to his immediate predecessors, such 
as Buffon, Erasmus Darwin, and Lamarck; we have to inquire into 
the acceptance of evolutionary conceptions in regard to other orders 
of facts, such as the earth and the solar system!; we have to realise 
how the growing success of scientific interpretation along other lines 
gave confidence to those who refused to admit that there was any 
domain from which science could be excluded as a trespasser ; we 
have to take account of the development of philosophical thought, 
and even of theological and religious movements; we should also, 
if we are wise enough, consider social changes. In short, we must 
abandon the idea that we can understand the history of any science 
as such, without reference to contemporary evolution in other depart- 
ments of activity. 
While there were many evolutionists before Darwin, few of 
them were expert naturalists and few were known outside a small 
circle ; what was of much more importance was that the genetic 
view of nature was insinuating itself in regard to other than bio- 
logical orders of facts, here a little and there a little, and that the 
scientific spirit had ripened since the days when Cuvier laughed 
Lamarck out of court. How was it that Darwin succeeded where 
others had failed? Because, in the first place, he had clear visions— 
“pensées de la jeunesse, executées par I’Age mir ”—which a University 
curriculum had not made impossible, which the Beagle voyage made 
vivid, which an unrivalled British doggedness made real—visions 
of the web of life, of the fountain of change within the organism, of 
the struggle for existence and its winnowing, and of the spreading 
genealogical tree. Because, in the second place, he put so much grit 
into the verification of his visions, putting them to the proof in an 
argument which is of its kind—direct demonstration being out of the 
question—quite unequalled. Because, in the third place, he broke 
1 See Chapter rx. ‘The Genetic View of Nature” in J. T. Merz’s History of European 
Thought in the Nineteenth Century, Vol. 2, Edinburgh and London, 1903. 
