Dear Sir:
No pleasure can exceed that which I received from reading your brilliant work on Origin of Species, which only recently came to hand. The contribution you have thus made to Natural History can only be likened to the contributions of Newton to his field. If it were possible, I should be obliged to commission Mr. Trumbull to add one more portrait to the triumvirate of Bacon, Locke and Newton, representative of the greatest minds that have ever lived. For you sir have provided the heretofore-missing link between the theories of natural classifications and the observed differentiation between and within species.
Prior to your work, at a time when I was able to read and study in the subject, we had observed and believed that no two particles of matter were of exact resemblance. This infinitude of units or individuals being far beyond the capacity of our memory, we were obliged to distribute them into masses, throwing into each of these all the individuals who have a certain degree of resemblance; to subdivide these again into smaller groups, according to certain points of dissimilitude observable in them, and so on until we formed a system of classes, orders, genera and species. Fortunately for science, Linnaeus appeared and conceived modes of classification, which obtained the approbation of the learned of all nations. This classification was indeed liable to the imperfection of bringing into the same group individuals which, though resembling in characteristics, yet have strong marks of dissimilitude in other respects. I remarked to Dr. Manners that, “Nature has not arranged her productions on a single and direct line. They branch at every step and in every direction and he who attempts to reduce them into departments is left to do so by the lines of his own fancy.” But you, my dear sir, have demonstrated that the belief that each species has been independently created is erroneous. This explanation to what had confounded me, as well as many others, is brilliantly simple and yet all encompassing.
If you should find the time to write to me about the process by which you reached your conclusions, beyond those stated in your prodigious scientific work, I would be forever in your debt. I am most curious about the method employed and the process by which you ingeniously reached the conclusions set forth in your scientific journals.
I cannot but repeat my profound admiration for your life’s work and the contribution you have made to the sum of knowledge possessed by the human family. I must in all honesty confess a certain degree of envy for the opportunity, which you had, to devote yourself to this undertaking. Nature intended me also for the tranquil pursuits of science, by rendering them my supreme delight. But the enormities of the time in which I lived, forced me to take a part in resisting them, and to commit myself on the boisterous ocean of political passions. I was thus deprived of the opportunity to follow the course you have taken, but I am gratified that you have done so with such admirable ability and dedication.
I should seem to need apology for these personal remarks to you, who are so more recent and advanced than my own studies, but I hope to be pardoned for intruding some thoughts of my own. Be pleased to accept the assurance of my greatest esteem and consideration.
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