IV
Thus, in 1859, ‘The Origin of Species’ startled the world with the theory of evolution through natural selection, a theory which immediately raised a storm that in some of its aspects is still raging. It is occasionally urged that Darwin’s reputation and success had an element of good fortune in them, that, as with so many discoveries, he simply happened to express and as it were crystallize general ideas that were vaguely present to many and needed only a vigorous expositor to give them universal acceptance. Doubtless there is a measure of truth in this view. Yet it must not be forgotten how much Darwin’s character, his tact and reasonableness, his persistent energetic logic, above all the enormous industry and fidelity of his research entered into his final triumph. His own comment on this matter of the timeliness of his theories is exceedingly interesting: ‘It has sometimes been said that the success of the “Origin” proved “that the subject was in the air,” or “that men’s minds were prepared for it.” I do not think that this is strictly true, for I occasionally sounded not a few naturalists, and never happened to come across a single one who seemed to doubt about the permanence of species.... I tried once or twice to explain to able men what I meant by Natural Selection, but signally failed. What I believe was strictly true is that innumerable well-observed facts were stored in the minds of naturalists ready to take their proper places as soon as any theory which would receive them was sufficiently explained.’[419]
In any case, the evolutionary theory, when first propagated, was bitterly attacked, both by scientists and by others. Darwin’s personal friends, and some of the younger men, who were less hardened in conservatism, supported him, though with more or less hesitation and reserve. But scientists of the older school, trained in established traditions, were generally most unfavorable. Some of them brought up the innumerable difficulties of which Darwin himself was only too well aware. Others resorted to the usual weapons of abuse and sarcasm. Owen in England and Agassiz in America represented perhaps the strongest conservative views. To them the Darwinian system was merely a passing heresy, which could not stand for a moment against the array of facts and arguments which they could bring from their vast experience and observation of the natural world.
The hostility of religious circles, aroused by the ‘Origin’ and increased by the later books, especially ‘The Descent of Man,’ was fiercer and less discriminating than that of the scientists. Perhaps the acme of it was reached in the savage interchange in which the Bishop of Oxford asked Huxley whether he ‘was related by his grandfather’s or grandmother’s side to an ape’ and Huxley retorted that a man had no reason to be ashamed of having an ape for a grandfather, but if he were to feel shame, it would be for an ancestor ‘who not content with an equivocal success in his own sphere of activity, plunges into scientific questions with which he has no real acquaintance, only to obscure them by an aimless rhetoric, and distract the attention of his hearers from the real point at issue by eloquent digressions, and skilled appeals to religious prejudice.’[420]
This sort of thing was by no means agreeable to Darwin, and he repeatedly refers to the pain and distress it caused him. For example: ‘I have just read the “Edinburgh,” which without doubt is by ——. It is extremely malignant, clever, and I fear will be very damaging. He is atrociously severe on Huxley’s lecture, and very bitter against Hooker. So we three enjoyed it together. Not that I really enjoyed it, for it made me uncomfortable for one night; but I have got quite over it to-day. It requires much study to appreciate all the bitter spite of many of the remarks against me; indeed I did not discover all myself.... It is painful to be hated in the intense degree with which —— hates me.’[421]
What interests us is the attitude of Darwin in all the aspects of the struggle, and we find everywhere manifested and illustrated the mental and spiritual qualities which we have analyzed generally in the preceding chapters. Long and cruel as the controversy was, that large, tranquil disposition could not be warped or embittered, or substantially shaken in its kindly serenity.
And first there is the candor, the readiness to admit mistakes and errors, and to recognize the force and significance of an opponent’s view and arguments. Darwin himself complains humorously of a weakness in this regard: ‘My God, is not the case difficult enough, without its being, as I must think, falsely made more difficult? I believe it is my own fault—, my d——d candor.’[422] But, damned or not, it is a quality worth admiration. As Professor Osborn excellently puts it: ‘If he were living, ... he would be in the front line of inquiry, armed with matchless assemblage of fact, with experiment verification, and not least with incomparable candor and good-will. This bequest of a noble method is hardly less precious than the immortal content of “The Origin of Species” itself.’[423]
This is the language of an admirer. But it is curious to see how with critics and opponents
‘To some kind of men
Their graces serve them but as enemies.’
Thus, even Alexander Agassiz, who was much more favorably disposed to evolution and to Darwin than was his father, remarks on this point of candor: ‘I was somewhat surprised in Darwin’s Life to see the element of wishing his cause to succeed as a cause brought out so prominently. The one thing always claimed by Darwin’s friends had been his absolute impartiality to his own case. Certainly his correspondence with Hooker, Huxley, and Gray shows no such thing.’[424] And others, distinctly more hostile, are much more severe, declaring that Darwin’s passionate eagerness to prove his point was quite incompatible with any real fairness or breadth. But surely there is misunderstanding here. Any one can be impartial who is perfectly indifferent, and when you care not which side triumphs, there is no merit in seeing the justice of both. The charm and the interest of Darwin are precisely that he was devoted to his own theory, that it was the effort of his life to prove it, and yet that at the same time he could and did look for all the facts against it and even go to excess in allowing weight to the objections that could be opposed to him.
And as the candor was all the more notable because of the enthusiasm, so it was notable because it did not spring from a cold temperament, or an incapacity for natural human anger and indignation. Darwin enlarges, perhaps unduly, on his heat of temper in youth; and in age, though his control and his patience got the better of this, still the sparks would fly when unjust and unreasonable attack annoyed and irritated him. Thus, he cries out in regard to Owen: ‘You would laugh if you could see how indignant all Owen’s mean conduct about E. Columbi made me. I did not get to sleep till past 3 o’clock.’[425] And again, ‘If Owen wrote the article “Oken” and the French work on the Archetype ..., he never did a baser act.... You are so good a Christian that you will hardly understand how I chuckle over this bit of baseness.’[426] When an adversary, not content with rational argument, resorted to personal attack: ‘I care not for his dull, unvarying abuse of me, and singular misrepresentation. But at p. 244 he in fact doubts my deliberate word, and that is the act of a man who has not the soul of a gentleman in him.’[427]
But, however at moments indignation might get the better of him, Darwin, as we have already seen, rarely allowed himself to be drawn into anything approaching controversy. Intelligent argument with those who had reasonable objections might be profitable, but where was the use of contending with those whose object was not to convince but to prevail? ‘I do so hate controversy,’ he cries, ‘and feel I shall do it so badly.’[428] And elsewhere he writes, more generally: ‘All that I think is that you will excite anger, and that anger so completely blinds every one, that your arguments would have no chance of influencing those who are already opposed to our views.’[349]
With this general attitude, it is interesting to find Darwin, in one of his few temptations to sharp retort, checked and repressed by the great fighter Huxley. Darwin submits the draft of a crisp letter, asking Huxley to criticize, and the latter suggests omissions: ‘Though Thomson deserved it and more, I thought it would be better to refrain. If I say a savage thing, it is only “Pretty Fanny’s way”; but if you do, it is not likely to be forgotten.’[350] Huxley and other friends also restrained Darwin in perhaps the most annoying of his controversial affairs, that with Samuel Butler over the translation of Krause’s Life of Erasmus Darwin. It is not necessary for us to attempt to unthread the complicated tangle of this dispute, since we may start with the confident assumption that both men were perfectly sincere in their good intentions. The curious may read the whole story in the Life of Butler by Henry Festing Jones, and it is pleasant to find that the biographers of Butler and of Darwin were able to come together and by comparing unprinted documents straighten out the difficulty to their mutual satisfaction.
With his fellow-workers, those who were following the same lines of research from the same general point of view, Darwin’s relations were most cordial and sympathetic. There was no jealousy, no rivalry, no undue sensitiveness. We have indeed seen that in his treatment of his predecessors, notably Lamarck, there was a suggestion of what in any one else might be taken for a jealous attitude. But all the dealings with Wallace nobly refute the possibility of any such suggestion. And at all times and under all circumstances Darwin was ready to recognize and to proclaim the merits and achievements of those who were laboring beside him. When there was any question of priority in an idea or a discovery, he refused to assert himself unduly: ‘I have always had a strong feeling that no one had better defend his own priority. I cannot say that I am as indifferent to the subject as I ought to be, but one can avoid doing anything in consequence.’[351] When a scientist, whether known or unknown, applied to him for assistance or suggestion, he was always ready to supply it, so far as was in his power. Above all, he was appreciative, almost to excess, of any assistance that was rendered to him, and his gratitude to his friends for supporting and sustaining him and forwarding his views is touching in its naïve earnestness. To Huxley, to Hooker, to Lyell, to Gray, to Häckel, to a dozen others, he speaks with enthusiastic acknowledgment of their efforts and their contributions, and, as Huxley points out, he was ready to bestow almost the same gratitude for services that in themselves appeared to be absurdly insignificant.
For he had a singular humility, most notable and appealing in a man of such distinguished power and achievement. ‘A mind conspicuous for its powerful humility and strong gentleness,’ is Huxley’s vivid characterization.[278] Again and again he expresses distrust of his powers, sense of inadequacy and incompetence, keen consciousness of limitation. Such phrases as the following from the book on Orchids, are constantly recurring: ‘To any one with more knowledge than I possess, it would be an interesting subject to trace the gradations between the several species and groups of species in this great and closely-connected order.’[279] Sometimes the expression of humility is direct. ‘Any one with ordinary faculties, if he had patience enough and plenty of time could have written my book.’[280] Sometimes there is a humorous assertion of the contrary which is quite as significant: ‘I should rather think there was a good chance of my becoming the most egotistical man in Europe. What a proud preëminence!’[281] Occasionally the profession of humility is so extreme, as in the sentence in regard to Owen, ‘The Londoners say he is mad with envy because my book has been talked about; what a strange man to be envious of a naturalist like myself, immeasurably his inferior!’[282] that critics disposed to find fault have discerned something of affectation in it. It is of the nature of the deepest humility always to expose itself to such accusations as this; but surely no one can study Darwin carefully, can be familiar with his work in all its aspects, and not set him down as one of the most sincerely humble spirits that ever lived.