Charles Darwin Quotes - Page 12

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• Delight itself, however, is a weak term to express the feelings of a naturalist.

  Charles Darwin

  Inspirational, Nature, Feelings

  Charles Darwin (2016). “A Naturalist's Voyage Round the World: the Evolution”, p.9, VM eBooks

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• If I had not been so great an invalid, I should not have done so much as I have accomplished.

  Charles Darwin

  Done, Should, Accomplished

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• I am not very sceptical, — a frame of mind which I believe to be injurious to the progress of science. A good deal of scepticism in a scientific man is advisable to avoid much loss of time, but I have met with not a few men, who, I feel sure, have often thus been deterred from experiment or observations, which would have proved directly or indirectly serviceable .

  Charles Darwin

  Loss, Science, Men

  "The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin: Including an Autobiographical Chapter".

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• I see no good reason why the views given this volume [The Origin of Species] should shock the religious feelings of any one. It is satisfactory, as showing how transient such impressions are, to remember that the greatest discovery ever made by man, namely, the law of attraction of gravity, was also attacked by Leibnitz, 'as subversive of natural, and inferentially of revealed, religion.'

  Charles Darwin

  Religious, Science, Men

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• History shows that the human mind, fed by constant accessions of knowledge, periodically grows too large for its theoretical coverings, and bursts them asunder to appear in new habiliments, as the feeding and growing grub, at intervals, casts its too narrow skin and assumes another.

  Charles Darwin

  Mind, Progress, Skins

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• If worms have the power of acquiring some notion, however rude, of the shape of an object and over their burrows, as seems the case, they deserve to be called intelligent; for they act in nearly the same manner as would man under similar circumstances.

  Charles Darwin

  Intelligent, Men, Rude

  Charles Darwin (2010). “The Works of Charles Darwin, Volume 28: The Formation of Vegetable Mould Through the Action of Worms With Observations on Their Habits”, p.43, NYU Press

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• I agree with Agassiz that dogs possess something very like conscience.

  Charles Darwin

  Dog, Training, Agree

  Charles Darwin (1872). “The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex”, p.75

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• It is scarcely possible to doubt that the love of man has become instinctive in the dog.

  Charles Darwin

  Friendship, Dog, Men

  Charles Darwin (2016). “On the Origin of Species: the Evolution”, p.132, VM eBooks

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• As buds give rise by growth to fresh buds, and these, if vigorous, branch out and overtop on all sides many a feebler branch, so by generation I believe it has been with the great Tree of Life, which fills with its dead and broken branches the crust of the earth, and covers the surface with its ever branching and beautiful ramifications.

  Charles Darwin

  Beautiful, Believe, Broken

  Charles Darwin (2010). “Evolutionary Writings: including the Autobiographies”, p.304, OUP Oxford

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• So great is the economy of nature, that most flowers which are fertilised by crepuscular or nocturnal insects emit their odour chiefly or exclusively in the evening.

  Charles Darwin

  Nature, Flower, Smell

  "The Effects of Cross and Self Fertilisation in the Vegetable Kingdom".

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• Endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved

  Charles Darwin

  Beautiful, Origin Of Life, Theory Of Evolution

  On the Origin of Species ch. 14 (1859)

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• As the sense of smell is so intimately connected with that of taste, it is not surprising that an excessively bad odour should excite wretching or vomitting in some persons.

  Charles Darwin

  Smell, Scent, Taste

  Charles Darwin (1872). “The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals”, p.259

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• I have rarely read anything which has interested me more, though I have not read as yet more than a quarter of the book proper. From quotations which I had seen, I had a high notion of Aristotle's merits, but I had not the most remote notion what a wonderful man he was. Linnaeus and Cuvier have been my two gods, though in very different ways, but they were mere schoolboys to old Aristotle.

  Charles Darwin

  Book, Men, Two

  Charles Darwin (2016). “Life and Letters of Charles Darwin: the Evolution”, p.727, VM eBooks

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• Man tends to increase at a greater rate than his means of subsistence.

  Charles Darwin

  Mean, Men, Survival

  Charles Darwin (2016). “The Descent of Man (Diversion Classics)”, p.807, Diversion Books

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• The noble science of Geology loses glory from the extreme imperfection of the record. The crust of the earth with its embedded remains must not be looked at as a well-filled museum, but as a poor collection made at hazard and at rare intervals.

  Charles Darwin

  Science, Museums, Imperfection

  Charles Darwin (2003). “On the Origin of Species”, p.396, Broadview Press

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• To conclude, therefore, let no man out of a weak conceit of sobriety, or an ill-applied moderation, think or maintain, that a man can search too far or be too well studied in the book of God's word, or in the book of God's works; divinity or philosophy; but rather let men endeavour an endless progress or proficience in both."—Bacon: "Advancement of Learning".

  Charles Darwin

  Philosophy, Book, Science

  Charles Darwin, James T. Costa (2009). “The Annotated Origin: A Facsimile of the First Edition of On the Origin of Species”, p.2, Harvard University Press

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• [Alexander von Humboldt was the] greatest scientific traveller who ever lived.

  Charles Darwin

  Traveller

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• A novel according to my taste, does not come into the moderately good class unless it contains some person whom one can thoroughly love - and if a pretty woman, all the better.

  Charles Darwin

  Class, Pretty Woman, Doe

  Charles Darwin, Francis Darwin (1958). “Autobiography and Selected Letters”, p.54, Courier Corporation

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• The young blush much more freely than the old but not during infancy, which is remarkable, as we know that infants at a very early age redden from passion.

  Charles Darwin

  Passion, Emotional, Age

  Charles Darwin “Charles Darwin: An Anthology”, Transaction Publishers

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• It has been a bitter mortification for me to digest the conclusion that the "race is for the strong" and that I shall probably do little more but be content to admire the strides others made in science.

  Charles Darwin

  Strong, Race, Survival

  Charles Darwin (2015). “Delphi Complete Works of Charles Darwin (Illustrated)”, p.10046, Delphi Classics

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• From the first dawn of life, all organic beings are found to resemble each other in descending degrees, so that they can be classed in groups under groups. This classification is evidently not arbitrary like the grouping of stars in constellations.

  Charles Darwin

  Inspirational, Life, Stars

  Charles Darwin (1861). “On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection; Or, The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life”, p.358

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• May we not suspect that the vague but very real fears of children, which are quite independent of experience, are the inherited effects of real dangers and abject superstitions during ancient savage times?

  Charles Darwin

  Children, Real, Independent

  Charles Darwin “Charles Darwin: An Anthology”, Transaction Publishers

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• We may confidently come to the conclusion, that the forces which slowly and by little starts uplift continents, and that those which at successive periods pour forth volcanic matter from open orifices, are identical.

  Charles Darwin

  Uplifting, Science, May

  Charles Darwin (2016). “The Voyage of the Beagle: the Evolution”, p.224, VM eBooks

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• I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term Natural Selection, in order to mark its relation to man's power of selection. But the expression often used by Mr. Herbert Spencer of the Survival of the Fittest is more accurate, and is sometimes equally convenient.

  Charles Darwin

  Men, Expression, Order

  On the Origin of Species, 5th ed., ch. 3 (1869) See Philander Johnson 1; Herbert Spencer 5; Herbert Spencer 6

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• The instruction at Edinburgh was altogether by lectures, and these were intolerably dull, with the exception of those on chemistry.

  Charles Darwin

  Edinburgh, Dull, Lectures

  Charles Darwin (2015). “Delphi Complete Works of Charles Darwin (Illustrated)”, p.11717, Delphi Classics

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