On the Reception of the 'Origin of Species'Huxley, Thomas Henry
Religion
On the Reception of the 'Origin of Species'
Huxley, Thomas Henry
Darwin, Charles, 1809-1882. On the origin of species; Evolution (Biology)
may add the weakness) of "Darwinismus" would have its most extensive
and most brilliant illustrations in the land of learning. If a
foreigner may presume to speculate on the cause of this curious
interval of silence, I fancy it was that one moiety of the German
biologists were orthodox at any price, and the other moiety as
distinctly heterodox. The latter were evolutionists, a priori,
already, and they must have felt the disgust natural to deductive
philosophers at being offered an inductive and experimental foundation
for a conviction which they had reached by a shorter cut. It is
undoubtedly trying to learn that, though your conclusions may be all
right, your reasons for them are all wrong, or, at any rate,
insufficient.
On the whole, then, the supporters of Mr. Darwin's views in 1860 were
numerically extremely insignificant. There is not the slightest doubt
that, if a general council of the Church scientific had been held at
that time, we should have been condemned by an overwhelming majority.
And there is as little doubt that, if such a council gathered now, the
decree would be of an exactly contrary nature. It would indicate a
lack of sense, as well as of modesty, to ascribe to the men of that
generation less capacity or less honesty than their successors possess.
What, then, are the causes which led instructed and fair-judging men of
that day to arrive at a judgment so different from that which seems
just and fair to those who follow them? That is really one of the most
interesting of all questions connected with the history of science, and
I shall try to answer it. I am afraid that in order to do so I must
run the risk of appearing egotistical. However, if I tell my own story
it is only because I know it better than that of other people.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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