Volume I Part 7 (2/2)
II., page 29.) my last letter, but it must have been a very silly one, as it seems I gave my notion of the number of species being in great degree governed by the degree to which the area had been often isolated and divided. I must have been cracked to have written it, for I have no evidence, without a person be willing to admit all my views, and then it does follow.
(14/5. The remainder of the foregoing letter is published in the ”Life and Letters,” II., page 29. It is interesting as giving his views on the mutability of species. Thus he wrote: ”With respect to books on this subject, I do not know any systematical ones, except Lamarck's, which is veritable rubbish; but there are plenty, as Lyell, Pritchard, etc., on the view of the immutability.” By ”Pritchard” is no doubt intended James Cowles ”Prichard,” author of the ”Physical History of Mankind.” Prof.
Poulton has given in his paper, ”A remarkable Antic.i.p.ation of Modern Views on Evolution” (14/6. ”Science Progress,” Volume I., April 1897, page 278.), an interesting study of Prichard's work. He shows that Prichard was in advance of his day in his views on the non-transmission of acquired characters. Prof. Poulton also tries to show that Prichard was an evolutionist. He allows that Prichard wrote with hesitation, and that in the later editions of his book his views became weaker.
But, even with these qualifications, we think that Poulton has unintentionally exaggerated the degree to which Prichard believed in evolution.
One of Prichard's strongest sentences is quoted by Poulton (loc. cit., page 16); it occurs in the ”Physical History of Mankind,” Ed. 2, Volume II., page 570:--
”Is it not probable that the varieties which spring up within the limits of particular species are further adaptations of structure to the circ.u.mstances under which the tribe is destined to exist? Varieties branch out from the common form of a species, just as the forms of species deviate from the common type of a genus. Why should the one cla.s.s of phenomena be without end or utility, a mere effect of contingency or chance, more than the other?”
If this pa.s.sage, and others similar to it, stood alone, we might agree with Prof. Poulton; but this is impossible when we find in Volume I.
of the same edition, page 90, the following uncompromising statement of immutability:--
”The meaning attached to the term species, in natural history, is very simple and obvious. It includes only one circ.u.mstance--namely, an original distinctness and constant transmission of any character. A race of animals, or plants, marked by any peculiarities of structure which have always been constant and undeviating, const.i.tutes a species.”
On page 91, in speaking of the idea that the species which make up a genus may have descended from a common form, he says:--
”There must, indeed, be some principle on which the phenomena of resemblance, as well as those of diversity, may be explained; and the reference of several forms to a common type seems calculated to suggest the idea of some original affinity; but, as this is merely a conjecture, it must be kept out of sight when our inquiries respect matters of fact only.”
This view is again given in Volume II., page 569, where he asks whether we should believe that ”at the first production of a genus, when it first grew into existence, some slight modification in the productive causes stamped it originally with all these specific diversities? Or is it most probable that the modification was subsequent to its origin, and that the genus at its first creation was one and uniform, and afterwards became diversified by the influence of external agents?” He concludes that ”the former of these suppositions is the conclusion to which we are led by all that can be ascertained respecting the limits of species, and the extent of variation under the influence of causes at present existing and operating.”
In spite of the fact that Prichard did not carry his ideas to their logical conclusion, it may perhaps excite surprise that Mr. Darwin should have spoken of him as absolutely on the side of immutability.
We believe it to be partly accounted for (as Poulton suggests) by the fact that Mr. Darwin possessed only the third edition (1836 and 1837) and the fourth edition (1841-51). (14/7. The edition of 1841-51 consists of reprints of the third edition and three additional volumes of various dates. Volumes I. and II. are described in the t.i.tle-page as the fourth edition; Volumes III. and IV. as the third edition, and Volume V. has no edition marked in the t.i.tle.) In neither of these is the evolutionary point of view so strong as in the second edition.
We have gone through all the pa.s.sages marked by Mr. Darwin for future reference in the third and fourth editions, and have been only able to find the following, which occurs in the third edition (Volume I., 1836, page 242) (14/8. There is also (ed. 1837, Volume II., page 344) a vague reference to Natural Selection, of which the last sentence is enclosed in pencil in inverted commas, as though Mr. Darwin had intended to quote it: ”In other parts of Africa the xanthous variety [of man] often appears, but does not multiply. Individuals thus characterised are like seeds which perish in an uncongenial soil.”)
”The variety in form, prevalent among all organised productions of nature, is found to subsist between individual beings of whatever species, even when they are offspring of the same parents. Another circ.u.mstance equally remarkable is the tendency which exists in almost every tribe, whether of animals or of plants, to transmit to their offspring and to perpetuate in their race all individual peculiarities which may thus have taken their rise. These two general facts in the economy of organised beings lay a foundation for the existence of diversified races, originating from the same primitive stock and within the limits of identical species.”
On the following page (page 243) a pa.s.sage (not marked by Mr. Darwin) emphasises the limitation which Prichard ascribed to the results of variation and inheritance:--
”Even those physiologists who contend for what is termed the indefinite nature of species admit that they have limits at present and under ordinary circ.u.mstances. Whatever diversities take place happen without breaking in upon the characteristic type of the species. This is transmitted from generation to generation: goats produce goats, and sheep, sheep.”
The pa.s.sage on page 242 occurs in the reprint of the 1836-7 edition which forms part of the 1841-51 edition, but is not there marked by Mr.
Darwin. He notes at the end of Volume I. of the 1836-7 edition: ”March, 1857. I have not looked through all these [i.e. marked pa.s.sages], but I have gone through the later edition”; and a similar entry is in Volume II. of the third edition. It is therefore easy to understand how he came to overlook the pa.s.sage on page 242 when he began the fuller statement of his species theory which is referred to in the ”Life and Letters” as the ”unfinished book.” In the historical sketch prefixed to the ”Origin of Species” writers are named as precursors whose claims are less strong than Prichard's, and it is certain that Mr. Darwin would have given an account of him if he had thought of him as an evolutionist.
The two following pa.s.sages will show that Mr. Darwin was, from his knowledge of Prichard's books, justified in cla.s.sing him among those who did not believe in the mutability of species:
”The various tribes of organised beings were originally placed by the Creator in certain regions, for which they are by their nature peculiarly adapted. Each species had only one beginning in a single stock: probably a single pair, as Linnaeus supposed, was first called into being in some particular spot, and the progeny left to disperse themselves to as great a distance from the original centre of their existence as the locomotive powers bestowed on them, or their capability of bearing changes of climate and other physical agencies, may have enabled them to wander.” (14/9. Prichard, third edition, 1836-7, Volume I., page 96.)
The second pa.s.sage is annotated by Mr. Darwin with a shower of exclamation marks:
”The meaning attached to the term SPECIES in natural history is very definite and intelligible. It includes only the following conditions--namely, separate origin and distinctness of race, evinced by the constant transmission of some characteristic peculiarity of organisation. A race of animals or of plants marked by any peculiar character which has always been constant and undeviating const.i.tutes a species; and two races are considered as specifically different, if they are distinguished from each other by some characteristic which one cannot be supposed to have acquired, or the other to have lost through any known operation of physical causes; for we are hence led to conclude that the tribes thus distinguished have not descended from the same original stock.” (14/10. Prichard, ed. 1836-7, Volume I., page 106. This pa.s.sage is almost identical with that quoted from the second edition, Volume I., page 90. The latter part, from ”and two races...,” occurs in the second edition, though not quoted above.)
As was his custom, Mr. Darwin pinned at the end of the first volume of the 1841-51 edition a piece of paper containing a list of the pages where marked pa.s.sages occur. This paper bears, written in pencil, ”How like my book all this will be!” The words appear to refer to Prichard's discussion on the dispersal of animals and plants; they certainly do not refer to the evolutionary views to be found in the book.)
LETTER 15. TO J.D. HOOKER. Down [1844].
Thank you exceedingly for your long letter, and I am in truth ashamed of the time and trouble you have taken for me; but I must some day write again to you on the subject of your letter. I will only now observe that you have extended my remark on the range of species of sh.e.l.ls into the range of genera or groups. a.n.a.logy from sh.e.l.ls would only go so far, that if two or three species...were found to range from America to India, they would be found to extend through an unusual thickness of strata--say from the Upper Cretaceous to its lowest bed, or the Neocomian. Or you may reverse it and say those species which range throughout the whole Cretaceous, will have wide ranges: viz., from America through Europe to India (this is one actual case with sh.e.l.ls in the Cretaceous period).
LETTER 16. TO J.D. HOOKER. Down [1845].
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