Essays and Criticism (1892)
by St George Jackson Mivart (9780217471770)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: SPECIFIC GENESIS. To The Editor Of The 'north American Review':? Sir,?The rapid growth of physical science, and the constant publication of ever-new observations, make such demands on the time of naturalists that an author actively engaged upon a subject covering the whole field of biology cannot be expected to reply directly to critics, unless under very exceptional circumstances. I have to thank Mr. Chauncey Wright for having been so obliging as to devote much space, and necessarily a considerable portion of his valuable time, to an examination of my recent work, the Genesis of Species. Nevertheless I must confess that, with all respect for his conspicuous talents and for his deserved reputation, I should not have undertaken the following few words of explanation but for his paper's wide circulation in England and elsewhere by Mr. Darwin. Any criticism published by Mr. Darwin himself, or by Professor Huxley, I should always deem it a duty carefully to consider and, if possible, reply to; and the very extensive circulation by Mr. Darwin of a reprint of Mr. Chauncey Wright's remarks, appears to me to amount to such an implied adoption of them, as to demand for them a consideration somewhat similar to that which I should accord them were Mr. Darwin himself their author. Mr. Wright's criticism touches upon so many matters of detail that it is not altogether easy to ascertain his mainobjects. Having, however, considered his remarks with that care which my esteem for his opinions makes incumbent on ine, I venture to express my belief that, neglecting minor matters, his criticism is mainly directed to the assertion of two points. One of these is, that I have misrepresented Mr. Darwin's views, and have been guilty of involuntary injustice with respect to the natural fo...

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