Per Contra 243 
originality or literary power—I mean with savoir faire. 
The cards he held—and, on the whole, his hand was a good 
one—he played with judgment; and though not one of 
those who would have achieved greatness under any 
circumstances, he nevertheless did achieve greatness of 
no mean order. Greatness, indeed, of the highest kind— 
that of one who is without fear and without reproach— 
will not ultimately be allowed him, but greatness of a rare 
kind can only be denied him by those whose judgment is 
perverted by temper or personal ill-will. He found the 
world believing in fixity of species, and left it believing— 
in spite of his own doctrine—in descent with modification. 
I have said on an earlier page that Mr. Darwin was 
heir to a discredited truth, and left behind him an accredited 
fallacy. This is true as regards men of science and cultured 
classes who understood his distinctive feature, or thought 
they did, and so long as Mr. Darwin lived accepted it with 
very rare exceptions; but it is not true as regards the 
unreading, unreflecting public, who seized the salient point 
of descent with modification only, and troubled themselves 
little about the distinctive feature. It would almost seem as 
if Mr. Darwin had reversed the usual practice of philoso- 
phers and given his esoteric doctrine to the world, while 
reserving the exoteric for his most intimate and faithful 
adherents. This, however, is a detail; the main fact is, 
that Mr. Darwin brought us all round to evolution. True, 
it was Mr. Darwin backed by the Times and the other 
most influential organs of science and culture, but it was 
one of Mr. Darwin’s great merits to have developed and 
organised this backing, as part of the work which he knew 
was essential if so great a revolution was to be effected. 
This is an exceedingly difficult and delicate thing to do. 
If people think they need only write striking and well- 
considered books, and that then the Times will immediately 
set to work to call attention to them, I should advise them 
not to be too hasty in basing action upon this hypothesis. 
