434 



MY LIFE 



[Chap. 



of the general truth of Darwin's views, with which he had 

 been generally acquainted for twenty years, he was yet loth 

 to express himself definitely ; and Darwin himself was as 

 much disappointed with his pronouncement in the recently 

 published "Antiquity of Man," as he was with my rejection 

 of the sufficiency of natural selection to explain the origin 

 of man's mental and moral nature. Sir Charles Lyell's 

 character is well exhibited in what he wrote Darwin soon 

 after its publication (March ii, 1863). "I find myself, 

 after reasoning through a whole chapter, in favour of man's 

 coming from the animals, relapsing to my old views whenever 

 I read again a few pages of the * Principles,' or yearn for 

 fossil types of intermediate grade. Truly, I ought to be 

 charitable to Sedgwick and others. Hundreds who have 

 bought my book in the hope that I should demolish heresy 

 will be awfully confounded and disappointed. . . . What 

 I am anxious to effect is to avoid positive inconsistencies in 

 different parts of my book, owing probably to the old trains 

 of thought, the old ruts, interfering with the new course. 

 But you ought to be satisfied, as I shall bring hundreds 

 towards you, who, if I treated the matter more dogmatically, 

 would have rebelled. I have spoken out to the utmost 

 extent of my tether, so far as my reason goes, and further 

 than my imagination and sentiment can follow, which, I 

 suppose, has caused occasional incongruities " ( " Life of Sir 

 Charles Lyell," vol. ii. p. 363). These passages well exhibit 

 the difficulties with which the writer had to contend, and 

 serve to explain that careful setting forth of opposing facts 

 and arguments without stating any definite conclusion, which 

 is felt to be unsatisfactory in some portions of his great 

 works. 



During the ten years 1863-72, I saw a good deal of Sir 

 Charles. If he had any special subject on which he wished 

 for information, he would sometimes walk across the park to 

 St. Mark's Crescent for an hour's conversation ; at other 

 times he would ask me to lunch with him, either to meet 

 some interesting visitor or for friendly talk. After my 



