Darwin’s First Response to Jefferson
My Dear Mr. Jefferson:
I cannot express how deeply your letter has gratified me. To receive the approval of a man whom one has long sincerely respected, and whose judgment and knowledge are most universally admitted, is the highest reward an author can possibly wish for; and I thank you heartily for your most kind expressions. You do yourself grave injustice by not including the name of Thomas Jefferson among those greatest minds who ever lived. For while my work may have influenced the scientific community, your clarion call for the rights of all mankind has affected the lives of almost every human being on the planet.
I shall first respond to your request for my recollection of the process by which I reached the conclusions set forth in the Origin of Species. After my return from the Voyage of the Beagle, I occupied myself for a number of years in various publications. But all this time I was working on putting my notes together for the purpose of the work, which was to follow, on the transmutation of species. It was evident that all of my observations 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 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.
My first notebook was opened in July 1837. I share with you a profound admiration for Mr. Bacon. Accordingly, 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 enquiries, by conversation with skillful breeders and gardeners and by extensive reading. I soon perceived 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.
Upon reading Malthus on Population, and being well prepared to appreciate the struggle for existence which everywhere goes on, it struck me that under these circumstances favorable variations would tend to be preserved and unfavorable ones to be destroyed. The result of this would be the formation of a 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.
While continuing to work on this theory, which afterwards followed in my Origin of Species, I was forced to expedite my deliberate plans when I received a copy of Wallace’s On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely from the Original Type, an essay which contained exactly the same theory as mine.
In 1857, I had consented to have an abstract of my work published in the Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society along with Wallace’s essay. I was at first, unwilling to consent, as I thought Mr. Wallace might consider my doing so, unjustifiable, for I did not then know how generous and noble was his disposition. Following our joint production, which excited little interest, I set to work over the course of thirteen months to produce the book which was published under the title of Origin of Species in November, 1859. It is no doubt the chief work of my life.
Let me say once again, sir, how delighted I am with the approbation expressed in your letter. As you might expect, my conclusions have not met with universal acceptance. My book has been called “The Law of higgledy-piggledy,” which I may not completely understand but it is evidently, very contemptuous. Even some of my friends and colleagues who have supported my work, generally, have criticized it as only what I believe, and not what I have proven. The book has been described as hard to read. It has been called illogical and unphilosophical and, of course, there are those who find my theories, like those of Newton, opposed to natural religion.
I do not pretend to perfection. Whenever I have found out that I have blundered, or that my work has been imperfect, when I have been contemptuously, criticized, and even when I have been overpraised, so that I have felt mortified, it has been my greatest comfort to say to myself that “I have worked as hard and as well as I could and no man can do more than this.
I remember when In Good Success Bay in Tierra del Fuego, thinking that I could not employ my life better than in adding a little to natural science. This I have done to the best of my abilities. Critics may say what they like, but they cannot destroy this conviction. I have been fortunate that I could concentrate upon this, the love of science – with unbounded patience. With such moderate abilities as I possess, it is truly surprising that I should have influenced to a considerable extent the belief of scientific men on some important points.
I am certain that with your great mind and diverse interests, you would have done greater things than I in the field if you had been able to devote yourself fully to it. But your kind words are greatly appreciated, nonetheless. I invite your further reflections upon this subject and natural science in general, if you should find time to indulge me.
With my warmest and sincere admiration,
Charles Darwin
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