The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin: Including an Autobiographical Chapter, Volume 1D. Appleton, 1887 - Naturalists |
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Page 6
... theories to the utmost . Erasmus had a strong love of all kinds of mechanism , for which Charles Darwin had no taste . Neither had Charles Darwin the literary temperament which made Erasmus a poet as well as a philosopher . He writes of ...
... theories to the utmost . Erasmus had a strong love of all kinds of mechanism , for which Charles Darwin had no taste . Neither had Charles Darwin the literary temperament which made Erasmus a poet as well as a philosopher . He writes of ...
Page 19
... theory for almost everything which occurred . I do not think I gained much from him intellectually ; but his example ought to have been of much moral service to all his children . One of his golden rules ( a hard one to follow ) was ...
... theory for almost everything which occurred . I do not think I gained much from him intellectually ; but his example ought to have been of much moral service to all his children . One of his golden rules ( a hard one to follow ) was ...
Page 57
... theory . Because no other explanation was possible under our then state of knowledge , I argued in favor of sea - action ; and my error has been a good lesson to me never to trust in science to the principle of exclusion . As I was not ...
... theory . Because no other explanation was possible under our then state of knowledge , I argued in favor of sea - action ; and my error has been a good lesson to me never to trust in science to the principle of exclusion . As I was not ...
Page 58
... theory therein given is , I think , now well established . No other work of mine was begun in so deductive a spirit as this , for the whole theory was thought out on the west coast of South America , before I had seen a true coral reef ...
... theory therein given is , I think , now well established . No other work of mine was begun in so deductive a spirit as this , for the whole theory was thought out on the west coast of South America , before I had seen a true coral reef ...
Page 59
... theory , though he had gained much fame by opposing Lamarck's views , and this after he had grown old . He reminded me that I had * . ' Philosophical Magazine , ' 1842 . The slight repetition here observable is accounted for by the ...
... theory , though he had gained much fame by opposing Lamarck's views , and this after he had grown old . He reminded me that I had * . ' Philosophical Magazine , ' 1842 . The slight repetition here observable is accounted for by the ...
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abstract admiration affectionately afterwards animals answer Asa Gray asked Barmouth Beagle believe Cambridge Captain Beaufort Captain Fitz-Roy chapter CHARLES DARWIN Christ's College Cirripedes Cirripedia Coral curious Darwin to J. D. dear Fox dear Henslow dear Hooker DEAR HOOKER,-I delightful doubt edition England Erasmus facts father feel Flora forms genera geological give glad Glen Roy hear heard hope Ilkley insects interest islands Journal kind letter Linnean London look Lyell Maer mind Moor Park Natural History natural selection naturalist never Origin of Species paper plants pleasant pleasure published Recollections remarks remember scientific seeds seems Shrewsbury sincerely Sir J. D. Hooker sketch Society South suppose sure tell thank theory things thought Tierra del Fuego tion told trouble varieties voyage W. D. Fox week whole wish write written wrote Zoology
Popular passages
Page 82 - I suppose, have thus suffered; and if I had to live my life again, I would have made a rule to read some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week; for perhaps the parts of my brain now atrophied would thus have been kept active through use. The loss of these tastes is a loss of happiness, and may possibly be injurious to the intellect, and more probably to the moral character, by enfeebling the emotional part of our nature.
Page 370 - There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved.
Page 86 - Therefore my success as a man of science, whatever this may have amounted to, has been determined, as far as I can judge, by complex and diversified mental qualities and conditions. Of these, the most important have been — the love of science — unbounded patience in long reflecting over any subject — industry in observing and collecting facts — and a fair share of invention as well as of common sense. With such moderate abilities as I possess, it is truly surprising that I should have influenced...
Page 51 - Beagle has been by far the most important event in my life, and has determined my whole career; yet it depended on so small a circumstance as my uncle offering to diive me thirty miles to Shrewsbury, which few uncles would have done, and on such a trifle as the shape of my nose.
Page 25 - I have attempted to write the following account of myself, as if I were a dead man in another world looking back at my own life. Nor have I found this difficult, for life is nearly over with me. I have taken no pains about my style of writing.
Page 81 - My mind seems to have become a kind of machine for grinding general laws out of large collections of facts...
Page 372 - After five years' work I allowed myself to speculate on the subject, and drew up some short notes; these I enlarged in 1844 into a sketch of the conclusions which then seemed to me probable; from that period to the present day I have steadily pursued the same object.
Page 555 - The teleological and the mechanical views of nature are not, necessarily, mutually exclusive. On the contrary, the more purely a mechanist the speculator is, the more firmly does he assume a primordial molecular arrangement of which all the phenomena of the universe...
Page 366 - Seeing this gradation and diversity of structure in one small, intimately related group of birds, one might really fancy that from an original paucity of birds in this archipelago, one species had been taken and modified for different ends.
Page 29 - Nothing could have been worse for the development of my mind than Dr. Butler's school, as it was strictly classical, nothing else being taught, except a little ancient geography and history. The school as a means- of education to me was simply a blank.