No More Learning

Now with the divine, now with the human.


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4376
DANTE
PARADISE
CANTO XXXIII
THE BEATIFIC VISION
[Dante, having been brought by Beatrice to Paradise in the Empyrean, is
left by her in charge of St. Bernard, while she takes her place among the
blessed. Prayer of St. Bernard to the Virgin. - Her intercession. -The vision
of God. -The end of desire. ]
"VIRG
JIRGIN MOTHER, daughter of thine own Son, humble and
exalted more than any creature, fixed term of the eternal
counsel, thou art she who didst so ennoble human nature
that its own Maker disdained not to become His own making.
Within thy womb was rekindled the love through whose warmth
this flower has thus blossomed in the eternal peace. Here thou
art to us the noonday torch of charity, and below, among mor-
tals, thou art the living fount of hope. Lady, thou art so great,
and so availest, that whoso wishes grace, and has not recourse
to thee, wishes his desire to fly without wings. Thy benignity
not only succors him who asks, but oftentimes freely foreruns
the asking. In thee mercy, in thee pity, in thee magnificence,
in thee whatever of goodness is in any creature, are united.
Now doth this man, who, from the lowest abyss of the universe,
far even as here, has seen one by one the lives of spirits, sup-
plicate thee, through grace, for virtue such that he may be able
with his eyes to uplift himself higher toward the Ultimate Salva-
tion. And I, who never for my own vision burned more than I
do for his, proffer to thee all my prayers, and pray that they be
not scant, that with thy prayers thou wouldst dissipate for him.
every cloud of his mortality, so that the Supreme Pleasure may
be displayed to him. Further I pray thee, Queen, who canst
what so thou wilt, that, after so great a vision, thou wouldst
preserve his affections sound. May thy guardianship vanquish
human impulses. Behold Beatrice with all the blessed for my
prayers clasp their hands to thee. "
The eyes beloved and revered by God, fixed on the speaker,
showed to us how pleasing unto her are devout prayers. Then
to the Eternal Light were they directed, on which it is not to be
believed that eye so clear is turned by any creature.
And I, who to the end of all desires was approaching, even
as I ought, ended within myself the ardor of my longings.


## p. 4377 (#147) ###########################################

DANTE
4377
Bernard was beckoning to me, and was smiling, that I should
look upward; but I was already, of my own accord, such as he
wished; for my sight, becoming pure, was entering more and
more through the radiance of the lofty Light which of itself is
true. *
Thenceforward my vision was greater than our speech, which
yields to such a sight, and the memory yields to such excess.
As is he who dreaming sees, and after the dream the passion
remains imprinted, and the rest returns not to the mind, such
am I; for my vision almost wholly fails, while the sweetness
that was born of it yet distills within my heart. Thus the snow
is by the sun unsealed; thus on the wind, in the light leaves,
was lost the saying of the Sibyl.
O Supreme Light, that so high upliftest Thyself from mortal
conceptions, re-lend a little to my mind of what Thou didst
appear, and make my tongue so powerful that it may be able to
leave one single spark of Thy glory for the future people; for
by returning somewhat to my memory and by sounding a little
in these verses, more of Thy victory shall be conceived.
I think that by the keenness of the living ray which I en-
dured, I should have been dazzled if my eyes had been averted
from it. And it comes to my mind that for this reason I was
the more hardy to sustain so much, that I joined my look unto
the Infinite Goodness.
O abundant Grace, whereby I presumed to fix my eyes
through the Eternal Light so far that there I consummated my
vision!
In its depth I saw that whatsoever is dispersed through the
universe is there included, bound with love in one volume; sub-
stance and accidents and their modes, fused together, as it were,
in such wise, that that of which I speak is one simple Light.
The universal form of this knott I believe that I saw, because
in saying this I feel that I more abundantly rejoice. One
instant only is greater oblivion for me than five-and-twenty cen-
turies to the emprise which made Neptune wonder at the shadow
of Argo.
* Light in its essence; all other light is derived from it.
This union of substance and accident.
So overwhelming was the vision that the memory could not retain it
completely even for an instant.


## p. 4378 (#148) ###########################################

4378
DANTE
Thus my mind, wholly rapt, was gazing fixed, motionless,
and intent, and ever with gazing grew enkindled. In that Light
one becomes such that it is impossible he should ever consent to
turn himself from it for other sight; because the Good which is
the object of the will is all collected in it, and outside of it that
is defective which is perfect there.
Now will my speech be shorter even in respect to that which
I remember, than an infant's who still bathes his tongue at the
breast. Not because more than one simple semblance was in the
Living Light wherein I was gazing, which is always such as it
was before; but through my sight, which was growing strong in
me as I looked, one sole appearance, as I myself changed, was
altering itself to me.
Within the profound and clear subsistence of the lofty Light
appeared to me three circles of three colors and of one dimen-
sion; and one appeared reflected by the other, as Iris by Iris,
and the third appeared fire which from the one and from the
other is equally breathed forth.
O how short is the telling, and how feeble toward my con-
ception! and this toward what I saw is such that it suffices not
to call it little.
O Light Eternal, that sole dwellest in Thyself, sole under-
standest Thyself, and, by Thyself understood and understanding,
lovest and smilest on Thyself! That circle, which, thus con-
ceived, appeared in Thee as a reflected light, being somewhile
regarded by my eyes, seemed to me depicted within itself, of its
own very color, by our effigy, wherefore my sight was wholly
set upon it. As is the geometer who wholly applies himself to
measure the circle, and finds not by thinking that principle of
which he is in need, such was I at that new sight. I wished to
see how the image accorded with the circle, and how it has its
place therein; but my own wings were not for this, had it not
been that my mind was smitten by a flash in which its wish
came. *
To my high fantasy here power failed; but now my desire
and my will, like a wheel which evenly is moved, the Love was
turning which moves the Sun and the other stars. †
*The wish to see the mystery of the union of the two natures, the divine
and human in Christ.
That Love which makes sun and stars revolve was giving a concordant
revolution to my desire and my will.


## p. 4379 (#149) ###########################################

4379
JAMES DARMESTETER
(1849-1894)
GOOD example of the latter-day enlightened savant is the
French Jew, James Darmesteter, whose premature death
robbed the modern world of scholarship of one of its most
distinguished figures. Scholars who do noble service in adding to
the sum total of human knowledge often are specialists, the nature
of whose work excludes them from general interest and appreciation.
It was not so with this man,- not alone an Oriental philologist of
more than national repute, but a broadly cultured, original mind, an
enlightened spirit, and a master of literary expression. Darmesteter
calls for recognition as a maker of literature as well as a scientist.
The son of a humble Jewish bookbinder, subjected to the disad-
vantages and hardships of poverty, James Darmesteter was born at
Chateau-Salins in Lorraine in 1849, but got his education in Paris,
early imbibing the Jewish traditions, familiar from youth with the
Bible and the Talmud. At the public school, whence he was gradu-
ated at eighteen, he showed his remarkable intellectual powers and
attracted the attention of scholars like Bréal and Burnouf, who, not-
ing his aptitude for languages, advised devotion to Oriental linguis-
tics. After several years of uncertainty, years spent with books
and in travel, and in the desultory production of poetry and fiction,
philological study was undertaken as his life work, with remarkable
results. For twenty years he labored in this field, and his appoint-
ment in 1882 to succeed Renan as Secretary of the Asiatic Society of
France speaks volumes for the position he won. In 1885 he became
professor of Iranian languages and literature in the College of France.
Other scholastic honors fell to him in due course and good measure.
As a scholar Darmesteter's most important labors were the expo-
sition of Zoroastrianism, the national faith of ancient Persia, which
he made a specialty; and his French translation of and commentary
on the Avesta, the Bible of that religion. As an interpreter of Zoro-
aster he sought to unite synthetically two opposing modern schools:
that which relied solely upon native traditions, and that which, re-
garding these as untrustworthy, drew its conclusions from an exam-
ination of the text, supplemented by the aid of Sanskrit on the side
of language and of the Vedas on the side of religion. Darmesteter's
work was thus boldly comprehensive. He found in the Avesta the
influence of such discordant elements as the Bible, Buddha, and


## p. 4380 (#150) ###########################################

4380
JAMES DARMESTETER
Greek philosophy, and believed that in its present form it was com-
posed at a later time than has been supposed. These technical ques-
tions are still mooted points with the critics. The translation of the
Avesta will perhaps stand as his greatest achievement. A herculean
labor of four years, it was rewarded by the Academy of Inscriptions
and Belles-Lettres with the 20,000-franc prize given but once in a
decade for the work which, in the Academy's opinion, had best
served or brought most honor to the country.
But the technical accomplishments of learning represent but a
fragment of Darmesteter's amazing mental activity. He wrote a
striking book on the Mahdi, the tenacious belief in the Mohammedan
Messiah taking hold on his imagination. He was versed in English
literature, edited Shakespeare, and introduced his countrymen to
Browning. While in Afghanistan on a philological mission he gath-
ered, merely as a side pursuit, a unique collection of Afghan folk-
songs, and the result was a fascinating and valuable paper in a new
field. He helped to found a leading French review. Articles of
travel, critiques on subjects political, religious, literary, and social, fell
fast from his pen. In his general essays on these broader, more vital
aspects of thought and life, he is an artist in literary expression, a
writer with a distinct and great gift for form. Here his vigorous
mind, ample training, his humanistic tastes and humanitarian aspira-
tions, are all finely in evidence.
The English reader who seeks an introduction to Darmesteter is
directed to his 'Selected Essays,' translated by Helen B. Jastrow,
edited with a memoir by Professor Morris Jastrow, Jr. (Houghton,
Mifflin and Company, Boston). There is a translation by Ada S.
Ballin of his 'The Mahdi' (Harper and Brothers, New York); and in
the Contemporary Review for January, 1895, is a noble appreciation
of Darmesteter by his friend Gaston Paris. In the Sacred Books of
the East' will be found an English rendering of the Avesta by
Darmesteter and Mills.
As a thinker in the philosophical sense Darmesteter was remark-
able. Early breaking away from orthodox Judaism, his philological
and historical researches led him to accept the conclusions of de-
structive criticism with regard to the Bible; and a disciple of Renan,
he became enrolled among those scholars who see in science the one
explanation of the universe. But possessing, along with his keen.
analytic powers, a nature dominantly ethical, he made humanity his
idol. His patriotism for France was intense; and, a Jew always
sympathetic to the wonderful history of his people,-in his later
years by a brilliant, poetical, almost audacious interpretation of the
Old Testament,- he found a solution of the riddle of life in the
Hebrew prophets. What he deemed their essential faith — Judaism


## p. 4381 (#151) ###########################################

JAMES DARMESTETER
4381
stripped of ritual and legend - he declared to be in harmony with
the scientific creed of the present: belief in the unity of moral law,—
the Old Testament Jehovah; and belief in the eventual triumph of
justice upon this earth, the modern substitute for the New Testa-
ment heaven. This doctrine, which in most hands would be cold and
comfortless enough, he makes vital, engaging, through the passionate
presentation of an eloquent lover of his fellow-man. In a word,
Darmesteter was a Positivist, dowered, like that other noble Pos-
itivist George Eliot, with a nature sensitive to spiritual issues.
An idyllic passage in Darmesteter's toilful scholar life was his
tender friendship with the gifted English woman, A. Mary F. Robin-
son. Attracted by her lovely verse, the intellectual companionship
ripened into love, and for his half-dozen final years he enjoyed her
wifely aid and sympathy in what seems to have been an ideal union.
The end, when it came, was quick and painless. Always of a frail
constitution, stunted in body from childhood, he died in harness,
October 19th, 1894, his head falling forward on his desk as he wrote.
The tributes that followed make plain the enthusiastic admiration
James Darmesteter awakened in those who knew him best. The
leading Orientalist of his generation, he added to the permanent
acquisitions of scholarship, and made his impress as one of the
remarkable personalities of France in the late nineteenth century.
In the language of a friend, "a Jew by race, a Greek by culture, a
Frenchman in heart," he furnishes another illustration of that strain
of genius which seems like a compensatory gift to the Jewish folk for
its manifold buffetings at the hand of Fate.
ERNEST RENAN
From 'Selected Essays': copyrighted 1895 by Houghton, Mifflin and Company
Renan are due to
THE
HE mistaken judgments passed upon M.
the fact that in his work he did not place the emphasis
upon the Good, but upon the True. Men concluded that
for him, therefore, science was the whole of life. The environ-
ment in which he was formed was forgotten,—an environment
in which the moral sense was exquisite and perfect, while the
scientific sense was nil. He did not need to discover the
moral sense, it was the very atmosphere in which he lived.
When the scientific sense awoke in him, and he beheld the
world and history transfigured by it, he was dazzled, and the
influence lasted throughout his life. He dreamed of making
France understand this new revelation; he was the apostle of
-


## p. 4382 (#152) ###########################################

4382
JAMES DARMESTETER
this gospel of truth and science, but in heart and mind he
never attacked what is permanent and divine in the other
gospel. Thus he was a complete man, and deserved the
disdain of dilettantes morally dead, and of mystics scientifically
atonic.
What heritage has M. Renan left to posterity? As a
scholar he created religious criticism in France, and prepared
for universal science that incomparable instrument, the Corpus.
As an author he bequeathed to universal art, pages which will
endure, and to him may be applied what he said of George
Sand:-"He had the divine faculty of giving wings to his sub-
ject, of producing under the form of fine art the idea which in
other hands remained crude and formless. " As a philosopher
he left behind a mass of ideas which he did not care to collect
in doctrinal shape, but which nevertheless constitute a coherent
whole. One thing only in this world is certain,-duty. One
truth is plain in the course of the world as science reveals it:
the world is advancing to a higher, more perfect form of
being. The supreme happiness of man is to draw nearer to
this God to come, contemplating him in science, and preparing,
by action, the advent of a humanity nobler, better endowed,
and more akin to the ideal Being.
JUDAISM
From 'Selected Essays': copyrighted 1895 by Houghton, Mifflin and Company
Ju
UDAISM has not made the miraculous the basis of its dogma,
nor installed the supernatural as a permanent factor in the
progress of events. Its miracles, from the time of the Mid-
dle Ages, are but a poetic detail, a legendary recital, a picturesque
decoration; and its cosmogony, borrowed in haste from Babylon
by the last compiler of the Bible, with the stories of the apple
and the serpent, over which so many Christian generations have
labored, never greatly disturbed the imagination of the rabbis,
nor weighed very heavily upon the thought of the Jewish phi-
losophers. Its rites were never "an instrument of faith," an
expedient to "lull" rebellious thought into faith; they are merely
cherished customs, a symbol of the family, of transitory value,
and destined to disappear when there shall be but one family in
a world converted to the one truth. Set aside all these miracles,


## p. 4383 (#153) ###########################################

JAMES DARMESTETER
4383
all these rites, and behind them will be found the two great
dogmas which, ever since the prophets, constitute the whole of
Judaism-the Divine unity and Messianism; unity of law through-
out the world, and the terrestrial triumph of justice in humanity.
These are the two dogmas which at the present time illuminate
humanity in its progress, both in the scientific and social order
of things, and which are termed in modern parlance unity of
forces and belief in progress.
For this reason, Judaism is the only religion that has never
entered into conflict, and never can, with either science or social
progress, and that has witnessed, and still witnesses, all their
conquests without a sense of fear. These are not hostile forces
that it accepts or submits to merely from a spirit of toleration
or policy, in order to save the remains of its power by a com-
promise. They are old friendly voices, which it recognizes and
salutes with joy; for it has heard them resound for centuries.
already, in the axioms of free thought and in the cry of the
suffering heart. For this reason the Jews, in all the countries
which have entered upon the new path, have begun to take a
share in all the great works of civilization, in the triple field of
science, of art, and of action; and that share, far from being an
insignificant one, is out of all proportion to the brief time that
has elapsed since their enfranchisement.
Does this mean that Judaism should nurse dreams of ambi-
tion, and think of realizing one day that "invisible church of the
future" invoked by some in prayer? This would be an illusion,
whether on the part of a narrow sectarian, or on that of an
enlightened individual. The truth however remains, that the
Jewish spirit can still be a factor in this world, making for the
highest science, for unending progress; and that the mission of
the Bible is not yet complete. The Bible is not responsible for
the partial miscarriage of Christianity, due to the compromises
made by its organizers, who, in their too great zeal to conquer
and convert Paganism, were themselves converted by it. But
everything in Christianity which comes in a direct line from
Judaism lives, and will live; and it is Judaism which through
Christianity has cast into the old polytheistic world, to ferment
there until the end of time, the sentiment of unity, and an
impatience to bring about charity and justice. The reign of the
Bible, and also of the Evangelists in so far as they were inspired
by the Bible, can become established only in proportion as the


## p. 4384 (#154) ###########################################

4384
JAMES DARMESTETER
positive religions connected with it lose their power. Great reli-
gions outlive their altars and their priests. Hellenism, abolished,
counts less skeptics to-day than in the days of Socrates and
Anaxagoras. The gods of Homer died when Phidias carved
them in marble, and now they are immortally enthroned in the
thought and heart of Europe. The Cross may crumble into
dust, but there were words spoken under its shadow in Galilee,
the echo of which will forever vibrate in the human conscience.
And when the nation who made the Bible shall have disap-
peared, the race and the cult, though leaving no visible
trace of its passage upon earth, its imprint will remain in the
depth of the heart of generations, who will, unconsciously per-
haps, live upon what has thus been implanted in their breasts.
Humanity, as it is fashioned in the dreams of those who desire
to be called freethinkers, may with the lips deny the Bible and
its work; but humanity can never deny it in its heart, without
the sacrifice of the best that it contains, faith in unity and hope
for justice, and without a relapse into the mythology and the
"might makes right" of thirty centuries ago.
-
―――


## p. 4385 (#155) ###########################################

4385
CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
(1809-1882)
BY E. RAY LANKESTER
HARLES ROBERT DARWIN, the great naturalist and author of
the "Darwinian theory," was the son of Dr. Robert Waring
Darwin (1766-1848) and grandson of Erasmus Darwin (1731–
1802). He was born at Shrewsbury on February 12th, 1809. W. E.
Gladstone, Alfred Tennyson, and Abraham Lincoln were born in the
same year.
Charles Darwin was the youngest of a family of four, hav-
ing an elder brother and two sisters. He was sent to a day school at
Shrewsbury in the year of his mother's death, 1817. At this age he
tells us that the passion for "collecting" which leads a man to be a
systematic naturalist, a virtuoso, or a miser, was very strong in him,
and was clearly innate, as none of his brothers or sisters had this
taste. A year later he was removed to the Shrewsbury grammar
school, where he profited little by the education in the dead lan-
guages administered, and incurred (as even to-day would be the case
in English schools) the rebukes of the head-master Butler for "wast-
ing his time" upon such unprofitable subjects as natural history and
chemistry, which he pursued "out of school. "
When Charles was sixteen his father sent him to Edinburgh to
study medicine, but after two sessions there he was removed and
sent to Cambridge (1828) with the intention that he should become
a clergyman. In 1831 he took his B. A. degree as what is called a
"pass-man. " In those days the injurious system of competitive.
examinations had not laid hold of the Universities of Oxford and
Cambridge as it has since, and Darwin quietly took a pass degree
whilst studying a variety of subjects of interest to him, without
a thought of excelling in an examination. He was fond of all field
sports, of dogs and horses, and also spent much time in excursions,
collecting and observing with Henslow the professor of botany, and
Sedgwick the celebrated geologist. An undergraduate friend of those
days has declared that "he was the most genial, warm-hearted, gen-
erous and affectionate of friends; his sympathies were with all that
was good and true; he had a cordial hatred for everything false, or
vile, or cruel, or mean, or dishonorable. He was not only great but
pre-eminently good, and just and lovable. "
Through Henslow and the sound advice of his uncle Josiah Wedg-
wood (the son of the potter of Etruria) he accepted an offer to
VIII-275


## p. 4386 (#156) ###########################################

4386
CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
accompany Captain Fitzroy as naturalist on H. M. S. Beagle, which
was to make an extensive surveying expedition. The voyage lasted
from December 27th, 1831, to October 2d, 1836. It was, Darwin
himself says, "by far the most important event in my life, and has
determined my whole career. " He had great opportunities of making
explorations on land whilst the ship was engaged in her surveying
work in various parts of the southern hemisphere, and made exten-
sive collections of plants and animals, fossil as well as living forms,
terrestrial as well as marine. On his return he was busy with the
description of these results, and took up his residence in London.
His 'Journal of Researches' was published in 1839, and is now
familiar to many readers in its third edition, published in 1860
under the title 'A Naturalist's Voyage; Journal of Researches into
the Natural History and Geology of the Countries visited during the
Voyage of H. M. S. Beagle round the World, under the command of
Captain Fitzroy, R. N. '
This was Darwin's first book, and is universally held to be one
of the most delightful records of a naturalist's travels ever produced.
It is to be placed alongside of Humboldt's 'Personal Narrative,' and
is the model followed by the authors of other delightful books of
travel of a later date, such as Wallace's 'Malay Archipelago,' Mose-
ley's 'Naturalist on the Challenger,' and Belt's 'Naturalist in Nica-
ragua. ' We have given in our selections from Darwin's writings the
final pages of 'A Naturalist's Voyage' as an example of the style
which characterizes the book. In it Darwin shows himself an ardent
and profound lover of the luxuriant beauty of nature in the tropics, a
kindly observer of men, whether missionaries or savages; an inces-
sant student of natural things-rocks, plants, and animals; and one
with a mind so keenly set upon explaining these things and assign-
ing them to their causes, that none of his observations are trivial,
but all of value and many of first-rate importance. The book is
addressed, as are all of Darwin's books, to the general reader. It
seemed to be natural to him to try and explain his observations and
reasonings which led to them and followed from them to a wide
circle of his fellow-men. The reader at once feels that Darwin is an
honest and modest man, who desires his sympathy and seeks for his
companionship in the enjoyment of his voyage and the interesting
facts and theories gathered by him in distant lands. The quiet un-
assuming style of the narrative, and the careful explanation of details
in such a way as to appeal to those who have little or no knowledge
of natural history, gives a charm to the Naturalist's Voyage' which
is possessed in no less a degree by his later books. A writer in the
Quarterly Review in 1839 wrote, in reviewing the Naturalist's Voy-
age,' of the "charm arising from the freshness of heart which is thrown


## p. 4387 (#157) ###########################################

CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
4387
over these pages of a strong intellectual man and an acute and deep
observer. " The places visited in the course of the Beagle's voyage,
concerning each of which Darwin has something to say, were the
Cape Verd Islands, St. Paul's Rocks, Fernando Noronha, parts of
South America, Tierra del Fuego, the Galapagos Islands, the Falk-
land Islands, Tahiti, New Zealand, Australia, Tasmania, Keeling
Island, the Maldives, Mauritius, St. Helena, Ascension. The most
important discoveries recorded in the book-also treated at greater
length in special scientific memoirs-are the explanation of the ring-
like form of coral islands, the geological structure of St. Helena and
other islands, and the relation of the living inhabitants - great tor-
toises, lizards, birds, and various plants-of the various islands of
the Galapagos Archipelago to those of South America.
In 1839 (shortly before the publication of his journal) Darwin mar-
ried his first cousin, Emma Wedgwood, daughter of Josiah Wedgwood
of Maer, and in 1842 they took the country-house and little property
of Down near Orpington in Kent, which remained his home and the
seat of his labors for forty years; that is, until his death on April
19th, 1882. In a letter to his friend Captain Fitzroy of the Beagle,
written in 1846, Darwin says, "My life goes on like clockwork, and I
am fixed on the spot where I shall end it. " Happily, he was pos-
sessed of ample private fortune, and never undertook any teaching
work nor gave any of his strength to the making of money. He
was able to devote himself entirely to the studies in which he took
delight; and though suffering from weak health due to a hereditary
form of dyspepsia, he presented the rare spectacle of a
man of
leisure more fully occupied, more absorbed in constant and exhaust-
ing labors, than many a lawyer, doctor, professor, or man of letters.
His voyage seems to have satisfied once for all his need for travel-
ing, and his absences from Down were but few and brief during the
rest of his life. Here most of his children were born, five sons and
three daughters. One little girl died in childhood; the rest grew up
around him and remained throughout his life in the closest terms
of intimacy and affection with him and their mother. Here he car-
ried on his experiments in greenhouse, garden, and paddock; here he
collected his library and wrote his great books. He became a man
of well-considered habits and method, carefully arranging his day's
occupation so as to give so many hours to noting the results of
experiments, so many to writing and reading, and an hour or two
to exercise in his grounds or a ride, and playing with his children.
Frequently he was stopped for days and even weeks from all intel-
lectual labor by attacks of vomiting and giddiness. Great as were
his sufferings on account of ill health, it is not improbable that the
retirement of life which was thus forced on him, to a very large


## p. 4388 (#158) ###########################################

4388
CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
extent determined his wonderful assiduity in study and led to the
production by him of so many great works.
In later years these attacks were liable to ensue upon prolonged
conversation with visitors, if a subject of scientific interest were
discussed. His wife, who throughout their long and happy union
devoted herself to the care of her husband so as to enable him to do
a maximum amount of work with least suffering in health, would
come and fetch him away after half an hour's talk, that he might lie
down alone in a quiet room. Then after an hour or so he would
return with a smile, like a boy released from punishment, and launch
again with a merry laugh into talk. Never was there an invalid who
bore his maladies so cheerfully, or who made so light of a terrible
burden. Although he was frequently seasick during the voyage of
the Beagle, he did not attribute his condition in later life in any
way to that experience, but to inherited weakness. During the hours
passed in his study he found it necessary to rest at intervals, and
adopted regularly the plan of writing for an hour and of then lying
down for half an hour, whilst his wife or daughter read to him a
novel! After half an hour he would again resume his work, and again
after an hour return to the novel. In this way he got through the
greater part of the circulating libraries' contents. He declared that
he had no taste for literature, but liked a story, especially about a
pretty girl; and he would only read those in which all ended well.
Authors of stories ending in death and failure ought, he declared, to
be hung!
He rarely went to London, on account of his health, and conse-
quently kept up a very large correspondence with scientific friends,
especially with Lyell, Hooker, and Huxley. He made it a rule to
preserve every letter he received, and his friends were careful to
preserve his; so that in the 'Life and Letters' published after his
death by his son Frank-who in later years lived with his father and
assisted him in his work—we have a most interesting record of the
progress of his speculations, as well as a delightful revelation of his
beautiful character. His house was large enough to accommodate
several guests at a time; and it was his delight to receive here for a
week's end not only his old friends and companions, but younger
naturalists, and others, the companions of his sons and daughters.
Over six feet in height, with a slight stoop of his high shoulders,
with a brow of unparalleled development overshadowing his merry
blue eyes, and a long gray beard and mustache,―he presented the
ideal picture of a natural philosopher. His bearing was, however,
free from all pose of superior wisdom or authority. The most charm-
ing and unaffected gayety, and an eager innate courtesy and good-
ness of heart, were its dominant notes. His personality was no less


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CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
4389
fascinating and rare in quality than are the immortal products of
his intellect.
The history of the great works which Darwin produced, and
especially of his theory of the Origin of Species, is best given in
his own words. The passage which is here referred to is a portion
of an autobiographical sketch written by him in 1876, not for publi-
cation but for the use of his family, and is printed in the 'Life and
Letters. Taken together with the statement as to his views on re-
ligion, it gives a great insight both into the character and mental
quality of the writer. It is especially remarkable as the attempt of
a truly honest and modest man to account for the wonderful height
of celebrity and intellectual eminence to which he was no less
astonished than pleased to find himself raised. But it also furnishes
the reader with an admirable catalogue raisonné of his books, arranged
in chronological order.
A few more notes as to Darwin's character will help the reader
to appreciate his work. His friendships were remarkable, character-
ized on his side by the warmest and most generous feeling. Hens-
low, Fitzroy, Lyell, Hooker, and Huxley stand out as his chief
friends and correspondents. Henslow was professor of botany at
Cambridge, and took Darwin with him when a student there for
walks, collecting plants and insects. His admiration for Henslow's
character, and his tribute to his fine simplicity and warmth of feel-
ing in matters involving the wrongs of a down-trodden class or
cruelty to an individual, are evidence of deep sympathy between
the natures of Darwin and his first teacher. Of Fitzroy, the captain
of H. M. S. Beagle--with whom he quarreled for a day because
Fitzroy defended slavery-Darwin says that he was in many ways
the noblest character he ever knew. His love and admiration for
Lyell were unbounded. Lyell was the man who taught him the
method- the application of the causes at present discoverable in
nature to the past history of the earth-by which he was led to the
solution of the question as to the origin of organic forms on the
earth's surface. He regarded Lyell, who with Mrs. Lyell often
visited him at Down, more than any other man as his master and
teacher. Hooker-still happily surviving from among this noble
group of men-was his "dear old friend"; his most constant and
unwearied correspondent; he from whom Darwin could always extract
the most valuable facts and opinions in the field of botanical sci-
ence, and the one upon whose help he always relied. Huxley was for
Darwin not merely a delightful and charming friend, but a "wonder-
ful man," a most daring, skillful champion, whose feats of literary
swordsmanship made Darwin both tremble and rejoice. Samples of
bis correspondence with these fellow-workers are given below. The


## p. 4390 (#160) ###########################################

CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
4390
letter to Hooker (September 26th, 1862) is particularly interesting, as
recording one of the most important discoveries of his later years,—
confirmed by the subsequent researches of Gardiner and others,—and
as containing a pretty confession of his jealous desire to exalt the
status of plants. Often he spoke and wrote in his letters of indi-
vidual plants with which he was experimenting as "little rascals. "
Darwin shared with other great men whose natures approach per-
fection, an unusual sympathy with and power over dogs, and a love
for children. The latter trait is most beautifully expressed in a note
which was found amongst his papers, giving an account of his little
girl, who died at the age of ten years.
Written for his own eyes
only, it is a most delicate and tender composition, and should be pon-
dered side by side with his frank and — necessarily to some readers—
almost terrifying statement of his thoughts on religion.
Darwin's only self-indulgence was snuff-taking. In later years he
smoked an occasional cigarette, but his real "little weakness"> was
snuff. It is difficult to suppose that he did not benefit by the habit,
careful as he was to keep it in check. He kept his snuff-box in the
hall of his house, so that he should have to take the trouble of a
walk in order to get a pinch, and not have too easy an access to the
magic powder.
The impression made on him by his own success and the over-
whelming praise and even reverence which he received from all parts
of the world, was characteristic of his charming nature. Darwin did
not receive these proofs of the triumphs of his views with the solem-
nity of an inflated reformer who has laid his law upon the whole
world of thought. Quite otherwise. He was simply delighted. He
chuckled gayly over the spread of his views, almost as a sportsman
and we must remember that in his young days he was a sports-
man-may rejoice in the triumphs of his own favorite "racer," or
even as a schoolboy may be proud and happy in the success of "the
eleven" of which he is captain. He delighted to count up the
sale of his books, not specially for the money value it represented,
though he was too sensible to be indifferent to that, but because it
proved to him that his long and arduous life of thought, experiment,
and literary work was not in vain. To have been or to have posed
as being indifferent to popular success, would have required a man
of less vivid sympathy with his fellow-men; to have been puffed up
and pretentious would have needed one less gifted with a sense of
humor, less conscious of the littleness of one man, however talented,
in the vast procession of life on the earth's surface. His delight in
his work and its success was of the perfect and natural kind, which
he could communicate to his wife and daughters, and might have
been shared by a child.


## p. 4391 (#161) ###########################################

CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
4391
I, who write of him here, had the great privilege of staying with
him from time to time at Down, and I find it difficult to record
the strangely mixed feeling of reverential admiration and extreme
personal attachment and affection with which I came to regard him.
I have never known or heard of a man who combined with such
exceptional intellectual power so much cheeriness and love of humor,
and such ideal kindness, courtesy, and modesty. Owing to the fact
that my father was a naturalist and man of letters, I as a boy knew
Henslow and Lyell, Darwin's teachers, and have myself enjoyed a
naturalist's walk with the one and the geological discussions of the
other. I first saw Darwin himself in 1853, when he was recommended
to my boyish imagination as "a man who had ridden up a mountain
on the back of a tortoise" (in the Galapagos Islands)! When I began
to work at and write on zoölogy he showed his kindness of heart by
writing to me in praise of my first book: he wrote to me later in
answer to my appeal for guidance, that "physiological experiment on
animals is justifiable for real investigation; but not for mere damna-
ble and detestable curiosity. It is a subject which makes me sick
with horror, so I will not say another word about it, else I shall not
sleep to-night. " When I prosecuted Slade the spiritualistic impostor,
and obtained his conviction at Bow Street as a common rogue, Dar-
win was much interested, and after the affair was over wrote to say
that he was sure that I had been at great expense in effecting
what he considered to be a public benefit, and that he should like to
be allowed to contribute ten pounds to the cost of the prosecution.
He was ever ready in this way to help by timely gifts of money
what he thought to be a good cause, as for instance in the erection
of the Zoological Station of Naples by Dr. Anton Dohrn, to which he
gave a hundred pounds. His most characteristic minor trait which
I remember, was his sitting in his drawing-room at Down in his
high-seated arm-chair, and whilst laughing at some story or joke, slap-
ping his thigh with his right hand and exclaiming, with a quite inno-
cent and French freedom of speech, "O my God! That's very good.
That's capital. " Perhaps one of the most interesting things that I
ever heard him say was when, after describing to me an experiment
in which he had placed under a bell-jar some pollen from a male
flower, together with an unfertilized female flower, in order to see
whether, when kept at a distance but under the same jar, the one
would act in any way on the other, he remarked:-"That's a fool's
experiment. But I love fools' experiments. I am always making
them. " A great deal might be written as comment on that state-
ment. Perhaps the thoughts which it suggests may be summed up by
the proposition that even a wise experiment when made by a fool
generally leads to a false conclusion, but that fools' experiments


## p. 4392 (#162) ###########################################

4392
CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
conducted by a genius often prove to be leaps through the dark
into great discoveries.
As examples of Darwin's writings I have chosen, in addition to
those already mentioned, certain passages from his great book on the
'Origin of Species,' in which he explains what he understands by the
terms "Natural Selection" and the " "Struggle for Existence. " These
terms invented by Darwin - but specially the latter-have become
"household words. " The history of his thoughts on the subject of
the Origin of Species is given in the account of his books, written
by himself and already referred to. His letter to Professor Asa
Gray (September 5th, 1857) is a most valuable brief exposition of his
theory and an admirable sample of his correspondence. The distin-
guished American botanist was one of his most constant correspond-
ents and a dear personal friend.
I have also given as an extract the final pages of the Origin of
Species, in which Darwin eloquently defends the view of nature to
which his theory leads. A similar and important passage on the sub-
ject of 'Creative Design' is also given: it is taken from that wonder-
ful collection of facts and arguments published by Darwin under the
title of The Variation of Plants and Animals under Domestication. '
It cannot be too definitely stated, as Darwin himself insisted, that his
theory of the Origin of Species is essentially an extension of the
argument used by Lyell in his Principles of Geology. ' Just as
Lyell accounted for the huge masses of stratified rocks, the upheaved
mountain chains, the deep valleys, and the shifting seas of the
earth's surface, by adducing the long-continued cumulative action of
causes which are at this present moment in operation and can be
observed and measured at the present day: so Darwin demonstrates
that natural variation, and consequent selection by "breeders" and
"fanciers" at the present day, give rise to new forms of plants and
animals; and that the cumulative, long-continued action of Natural
Selection in the Struggle for Existence, or the survival of favorable
variations, can and must have effected changes, the magnitude of
which is only limited by the length of time during which the process
has been going on.
The style of Darwin's writings is remarkable for the absence of
all affectation, of all attempt at epigram, literary allusion, or rhet-
oric. In this it is admirably suited to its subject. At the same time
there is no sacrifice of clearness to brevity, nor are technical terms
used in place of ordinary language. The greatest pains are obviously
given by the author to enable his reader to thoroughly understand
the matter in hand. Further, the reader is treated not only with
this courtesy of full explanation, but with extreme fairness and
modesty. Darwin never slurs over a difficulty nor minimizes it. He


## p. 4393 (#163) ###########################################

CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
4393
states objections and awkward facts prominently, and without shirk-
ing proceeds to deal with them by citation of experiment or observa-
tion carried out by him for the purpose. His modesty towards his
reader is a delightful characteristic. He simply desires to persuade
you as one reasonable friend may persuade another. He never
thrusts a conclusion nor even a step towards a conclusion upon you,
by a demand for your confidence in him as an authority, or by an
unfair weighting of the arguments which he balances, or by a juggle
of word-play. The consequence is that though Darwin himself
thought he had no literary ability, and labored over and re-wrote his
sentences, we have in his works a model of clear exposition of a
great argument, and the most remarkable example of persuasive
style in the English language-persuasive because of its transparent
honesty and scrupulous moderation.
Darwin enjoyed rather better health in the last ten years of his
life than before, and was able to work and write constantly. For
some four months before his death, but not until then, it was evi-
dent that his heart was seriously diseased. He died on April 19th,
1882, at the age of seventy-three. Almost his last words were, "I
am not the least afraid to die. " In 1879 he added to the manuscript
of his autobiography already referred to, these words:-"As for
myself, I believe that I have acted rightly in steadily following and
devoting my life to Science. I feel no remorse from having com-
mitted any great sin, but have often and often regretted that I have
not done more direct good to my fellow-creatures. "
From his early manhood to old age, the desire to do what was
right determined the employment of his powers. He has done to his
fellow-creatures an imperishable good, in leaving to them his writ-
ings and the example of his noble life.
E. Ray
Lankested)
IMPRESSIONS OF TRAVEL
From A Naturalist's Voyage'
Α
MONG the scenes which are deeply impressed on my mind,
none exceed in sublimity the primeval forests undefaced by
the hand of man; whether those of Brazil, where the pow-
ers of Life are predominant, or those of Tierra del Fuego, where
Death and Decay prevail. Both are temples filled with the
varied productions of the God of Nature; no one can stand in


## p. 4394 (#164) ###########################################

CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
4394
these solitudes unmoved, and not feel that there is more in man
than the mere breath of his body. In calling up images of the
past, I find that the plains of Patagonia frequently cross before
my eyes; yet these plains are pronounced by all wretched and
useless. They can be described only by negative characters:
without habitations, without water, without trees, without mount-
ains, they support merely a few dwarf plants. Why then-
and the case is not peculiar to myself—have these arid wastes
taken so firm a hold on my memory? Why have not the still
more evel, the greener and more fertile pampas, which are
serviceable to mankind, produced an equal impression? I can
scarcely analyze these feelings; but it must be partly owing to
the free scope given to the imagination. The plains of Pata-
gonia are boundless, for they are scarcely passable, and hence
unknown; they bear the stamp of having lasted, as they are
now, for ages, and there appears no limit to their duration
through future time. If, as the ancients supposed, the flat earth.
was surrounded by an impassable breadth of water, or by deserts
heated to an intolerable excess, who would not look at these last
boundaries to man's knowledge with deep but ill-defined sensa-
tions?
Lastly, of natural scenery, the views from lofty mountains,
though certainly in one sense not beautiful, are very memorable.
When looking down from the highest crest of the Cordillera, the
mind, undisturbed by minute details, was filled with the stupen-
dous dimensions of the surrounding masses.
Of individual objects, perhaps nothing is more
create astonishment than the first sight in his native haunt of a
barbarian of man in his lowest and most savage state. One's
mind hurries back over past centuries, and then asks: Could our
progenitors have been men like these? men whose very signs
and expressions are less intelligible to us than those of the
domesticated animals; men who do not possess the instinct of
those animals, nor yet appear to boast of human reason, or at
least of arts consequent on that reason. I do not believe it is
possible to describe or paint the difference between savage and
civilized man. It is the difference between a wild and tame
animal; and part of the interest in beholding a savage is the
same which would lead every one to desire to see the lion in his
desert, the tiger tearing his prey in the jungle, or the rhinoceros
wandering over the wild plains of Africa.


## p. 4395 (#165) ###########################################

CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
4395
Among the other most remarkable spectacles which we have
beheld may be ranked the Southern Cross, the cloud of Magellan,
and the other constellations of the southern hemisphere- the
water-spout—the glacier leading its blue stream of ice, over-
hanging the sea in a bold precipice-a lagoon island raised by
the reef-building corals-an active volcano-and the overwhelm-
ing effects of a violent earthquake. These latter phenomena per-
haps possess for me a peculiar interest, from their intimate
connection with the geological structure of the world. The
earthquake, however, must be to every one a most impressive
event: the earth, considered from our earliest childhood as the
type of solidity, has oscillated like a thin crust beneath our feet;
and in seeing the labored works of man in a moment over-
thrown, we feel the insignificance of his boasted power.
It has been said that the love of the chase is an inherent
delight in man-a relic of an instinctive passion. If so, I am
sure the pleasure of living in the open air, with the sky for a
roof and the ground for a table, is part of the same feeling; it
is the savage returning to his wild and native habits. I always
look back to our boat cruises and my land journeys, when
through unfrequented countries, with an extreme delight, which
no scenes of civilization could have created. I do not doubt that
every traveler must remember the glowing sense of happiness
which he experienced when he first breathed in a foreign clime,
where the civilized man had seldom or never trod.
There are several other sources of enjoyment in a long voy-
age which are of a more reasonable nature. The map of the
world ceases to be a blank; it becomes a picture full of the
most varied and animated figures. Each part assumes its proper
dimensions; continents are not looked at in the light of islands,
or islands considered as mere specks, which are in truth larger
than many kingdoms of Europe. Africa, or North and South.
America, are well-sounding names, and easily pronounced; but
it is not until having sailed for weeks along small portions of
their shores that one is thoroughly convinced what vast spaces
on our immense world these names imply.
From seeing the present state, it is impossible not to look
forward with high expectations to the future progress of nearly
an entire hemisphere. The march of improvement consequent
on the introduction of Christianity throughout the South Sea
probably stands by itself in the records of history. It is the


## p. 4396 (#166) ###########################################

4396
CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
:
more striking when we remember that only sixty years since,
Cook, whose excellent judgment none will dispute, could foresee
no prospect of a change. Yet these changes have now been
effected by the philanthropic spirit of the British nation.
In the same quarter of the globe Australia is rising, or
indeed may be said to have risen, into a grand centre of
civilization, which at some not very remote period will rule as
empress over the southern hemisphere. It is impossible for an
Englishman to behold these distant colonies without a high pride
and satisfaction. To hoist the British flag seems to draw with it,
as a certain consequence, wealth, prosperity, and civilization.
In conclusion, it appears to me that nothing can be more
improving to a young naturalist than a journey in distant coun-
tries. It both sharpens and partly allays that want and craving
which, as Sir J. Herschel remarks, a man experiences although
every corporeal sense be fully satisfied. The excitement from
the novelty of objects, and the chance of success, stimulate him.
to increased activity. Moreover, as a number of isolated facts
soon become uninteresting, the habit of comparison leads to gen-
eralization. On the other hand, as the traveler stays but a short
time in each place, his descriptions must generally consist of
mere sketches instead of detailed observations. Hence arises, as
I have found to my cost, a constant tendency to fill up the wide
gaps of knowledge by inaccurate and superficial hypotheses.
But I have too deeply enjoyed the voyage not to recommend
any naturalist,- although he must not expect to be so fortunate
in his companions as I have been,- to take all chances, and to
start, on travels by land if possible, if otherwise on a long voy-
age. He may feel assured he will meet with no difficulties or
dangers, excepting in rare cases, nearly so bad as he beforehand
anticipates. In a moral point of view the effect ought to be to
teach him good-humored patience, freedom from selfishness, the
habit of acting for himself, and of making the best of every
occurrence. In short, he ought to partake of the characteristic
qualities of most sailors. Traveling ought also to teach him dis-
trust; but at the same time he will discover how many truly
kind-hearted people there are with whom he never before had,
or ever again will have, any further communication, who yet are
ready to offer him the most disinterested assistance.


## p. 4397 (#167) ###########################################

CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
4397
THE GENESIS OF THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES>
From Life and Letters
A
FTER several fruitless searches in Surrey and elsewhere, we
found this house and purchased it. I was pleased with the
diversified appearance of vegetation proper to a chalk dis-
trict, and so unlike what I had been accustomed to in the Mid-
land counties; and still more pleased with the extreme quietness
and rusticity of the place. It is not however quite so retired a
place as a writer in a German periodical makes it, who says that
my house can be approached only by a mule-track! Our fixing
ourselves here has answered admirably in one way which we did
not anticipate,—namely, by being very convenient for frequent
visits from our children.
Few persons can have lived a more retired life than we have
done.
Besides short visits to the houses of relations, and occa-
sionally to the seaside or elsewhere, we have gone nowhere.
During the first part of our residence we went a little into
society, and received a few friends here; but my health almost
always suffered from the excitement, violent shivering and vomit-
ing attacks being thus brought on. I have therefore been com-
pelled for many years to give up all dinner parties; and this has
been somewhat of a deprivation to me, as such parties always
put me into high spirits. From the same cause I have been
able to invite here very few scientific acquaintances.
During the voyage of the Beagle I had been deeply impressed
by discovering in the Pampean formation great fossil animals,
covered with armor like that on the existing armadillos; secondly,
by the manner in which closely allied animals replace one another
in proceeding southwards over the Continent; and thirdly, by the
South-American character of most of the productions of the
Galapagos Archipelago, and more especially by the manner in
which they differ slightly on each island of the group; none of
the islands appearing to be very ancient in a geological sense.
It was evident that such facts as these, as well as many
others, could only be explained on the supposition that species.
gradually become modified; and the subject haunted me. But it
was equally evident that neither the action of the surrounding
conditions, nor the will of the organisms (especially in the case
of plants), could account for the innumerable cases in which


## p. 4398 (#168) ###########################################

4398
CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
organisms of every kind are beautifully adapted to their habits of
life; for instance, a woodpecker or a tree-frog to climb trees,
or a seed for dispersal by hooks or plumes. I had always been
much struck by such adaptations, and until these could be
explained it seemed to me almost useless to endeavor to prove
by indirect evidence that species have been modified.
After my return to England it appeared to me that by fol-
lowing the example of Lyell in Geology, and by collecting all
facts which bore in any way on the variation of animals and
plants under domestication and nature, some light might perhaps
be thrown on the whole subject. My first note-book was opened
in July 1837. I worked on true Baconian principles; and without
any theory collected facts on a wholesale scale, more especially
with respect to domesticated productions, by printed inquiries,
by conversation with skillful breeders and gardeners, and by
extensive reading. When I see the list of books of all kinds
which I read and abstracted, including whole series of Journals
and Transactions, I am surprised at my industry. I soon per-
ceived that selection was the keystone of man's success in making
useful races of animals and plants. But how selection could be
applied to organisms living in a state of nature, remained for
some time a mystery to me.
In October 1838-that is, fifteen months after I had begun
my systematic inquiry-I happened to read for amusement
'Malthus on Population'; and being well prepared to appreciate
the struggle for existence which everywhere goes on from long-
continued observation of the habits of animals and plants, it at
once struck me that under these circumstances favorable varia-
tions would tend to be preserved, and unfavorable ones to be
destroyed. The result of this would be the formation of new
species. Here then I had at last got a theory by which to work;
but I was so anxious to avoid prejudice that I determined not
for some time to write even the briefest sketch of it.
In June
1842 I first allowed myself the satisfaction of writing a very
brief abstract of my theory in pencil in thirty-five pages; and
this was enlarged during the summer of 1844 into one of two
hundred and thirty pages, which I had fairly copied out and
still possess.
But at that time I overlooked one problem of great import-
ance; and it is astonishing to me, except on the principle of
Columbus and his egg, how I could have overlooked it and its


## p. 4399 (#169) ###########################################

CHARLES ROBERT DARWIN
4399
solution. This problem is the tendency in organic beings de-
scended from the same stock to diverge in character as they
become modified. That they have diverged greatly is obvious
from the manner in which species of all kinds can be classed
under genera, genera under families, families under sub-orders,
and so forth: and I can remember the very spot in the road,
whilst in my carriage, when to my joy the solution occurred to
me; and this was long after I had come to Down. The solution,
as I believe, is that the modified offspring of all dominant and
increasing forms tend to become adapted to many and highly
diversified places in the economy of nature.
Early in 1856 Lyell advised me to write out my views pretty
fully, and I began at once to do so on a scale three or four
times as extensive as that which was afterwards followed in my
'Origin of Species'; yet it was only an abstract of the materials.
which I had collected, and I got through about half the work
on this scale. But my plans were overthrown, for early in the
summer of 1858 Mr. Wallace, who was then in the Malay Archi-
pelago, sent me an essay On the Tendency of Varieties to
depart Indefinitely from the Original Type'; and this essay con-
tained exactly the same theory as mine.