Luck or Cunning?

This book, as I have said in my concluding chapter, has turned out very different from the one I had it in my mind to write when I began it.  It arose out of a conversation with the late Mr. Alfred Tylor soon after his paper on the growth of trees and protoplasmic continuity was read before the Linnean Society—­that is to say, in December, 1884—­and I proposed to make the theory concerning the subdivision of organic life into animal and vegetable, which I have broached in my concluding chapter, the main feature of the book.  One afternoon, on leaving Mr. Tylor’s bedside, much touched at the deep disappointment he evidently felt at being unable to complete the work he had begun so ably, it occurred to me that it might be some pleasure to him if I promised to dedicate my own book to him, and thus, however unworthy it might be, connect it with his name.  It occurred to me, of course, also that the honour to my own book would be greater than any it could confer, but the time was not one for balancing considerations nicely, and when I made my suggestion to Mr. Tylor on the last occasion that I ever saw him, the manner in which he received it settled the question.  If he had lived I should no doubt have kept more closely to my plan, and should probably have been furnished by him with much that would have enriched the book and made it more worthy of his acceptance; but this was not to be.

In the course of writing I became more and more convinced that no progress could be made towards a sounder view of the theory of descent until people came to understand what the late Mr. Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection amounted to, and how it was that it ever came to be propounded.  Until the mindless theory of Charles Darwinian natural selection was finally discredited, and a mindful theory of evolution was substituted in its place, neither Mr. Tylor’s experiments nor my own theories could stand much chance of being attended to.  I therefore devoted myself mainly, as I had done in “Evolution Old and New,” and in “Unconscious Memory,” to considering whether the view taken by the late Mr. Darwin, or the one put forward by his three most illustrious predecessors, should most command our assent.

The deflection from my original purpose was increased by the appearance, about a year ago, of Mr. Grant Allen’s “Charles Darwin,” which I imagine to have had a very large circulation.  So important, indeed, did I think it not to leave Mr. Allen’s statements unchallenged, that in November last I recast my book completely, cutting out much that I had written, and practically starting anew.  How far Mr. Tylor would have liked it, or even sanctioned its being dedicated to him, if he were now living, I cannot, of course, say.  I never heard him speak of the late Mr. Darwin in any but terms of warm respect, and am by no means sure that he would have been well pleased at an attempt to connect him with a book so polemical as the present.  On the other hand, a promise made and received as mine was, cannot be set aside lightly.  The understanding was that my next book was to be dedicated to Mr. Tylor; I have written the best I could, and indeed never took so much pains with any other; to Mr. Tylor’s memory, therefore, I have most respectfully, and regretfully, inscribed it.

Desiring that the responsibility for what has been done should rest with me, I have avoided saying anything about the book while it was in progress to any of Mr Tylor’s family or representatives.  They know nothing, therefore, of its contents, and if they did, would probably feel with myself very uncertain how far it is right to use Mr. Tylor’s name in connection with it.  I can only trust that, on the whole, they may think I have done most rightly in adhering to the letter of my promise.

October 15, 1886.