"We should leave a very wrong impression on the reader's mind if we permitted him to suppose that the value of Darwin's work depends wholly on the ultimate justification of the theoretical views which it contains. On the contrary, if they were disproved to-morrow, the book would still be the best of its kind--the most compendious statement of well-sifted facts bearing on the doctrine of species that has ever appeared. The chapters on variation, on the struggle for existence, on instinct, on hybridism, on the imperfection of the geological record, on geographical distribution, have not only no equals, but, so far as our knowledge goes, no competitors, within the range of biological literature. And viewed as a whole, we do not believe that, since the publication of Von Baer's _Researches on Development_, thirty years ago, any work has appeared calculated to exert so large an influence, not only on the future of biology, but in extending the domination of science over regions of thought into which she has, as yet, hardly penetrated."--(_Ibid._) "Those who take the trouble to read the essays published in 1859 and 1860, will, I think, do me the justice to admit that my zeal to secure fair play for Mr. Darwin did not drive me into the position of a mere advocate; and that, while doing justice to the greatness of the argument, I did not fail to indicate its weak points. I have never seen any reason for departing from the position which I took up in these two essays; and the assertion which I sometimes meet with nowadays that I have 'recanted' or changed my opinions about Mr. Darwin's views is quite unintelligible to me. "As I have said in the seventh essay, the fact of evolution is to my mind sufficiently evidenced by palæontology; and I remain of the opinion expressed in the second, that until selective breeding is definitely proved to give rise to varieties infertile with one another, the logical foundation of the theory of natural selection is quite incomplete. We still remain very much in the dark about the causes of variation; the apparent inheritance of acquired characters in some cases; and the struggle for existence within the organism, which probably lies at the bottom of both these phenomena."--(1893, _Preface_.) Finally, when he was awarded the Darwin Medal of the Royal Society, on November 30, 1894, in the course of an address at the anniversary dinner of the Society, he said, as reported in the _Times_ next day: