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Charles Darwin

Charles Darwin Quotes

Naturalist

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Famous Charles Darwin Quotes

“... if variations useful to any organic being do occur, assuredly individuals thus characterized will have the best chance of being perserved in the struggle for life; and from the strong principle of inheritance they will tend to produce offsping similarly characterized. This principle of preservation, I have called, for the sake of brevity, Natural Selection.”

IfsIndividualStrongNaturalChancePrinciplesStruggleProduceSakePreservationSelectionInheritanceVariationNatural SelectionBrevity
Book:The Works of Charles Darwin: On the origin of species 1959
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“The traveler may feel assured, he will meet with no difficulties or dangers, excepting in rare cases, nearly so bad as he beforehand anticipates. In a moral point of view, the effect ought to be, to teach him good-humored patience, freedom from selfishness, the habit of acting for himself, and of making the best of every occurrence.”

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Author:Charles Darwin
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“Traveling ought also to teach him distrust; but at the same time he will discover, how many truly kind-hearted people there are, with whom he never before had, or ever again will have any further communication, who yet are ready to offer him the most disinterested assistance.”

PeopleKindTeachReadyCommunicationOughtOffersAssistanceDistrustHeartedDisinterestedKind Hearted
Book:Delphi Complete Works of Charles Darwin (Illustrated)
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“Who when examining in the cabinet of the entomologist the gay and exotic butterflies, and singular cicadas, will associate with these lifeless objects, the ceaseless harsh music of the latter, and the lazy flight of the former - the sure accompaniments of the still, glowing noonday of the tropics.”

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Book:Journal of Researches Into the Natural History and Geology of the Countries Visited During the Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle Round the World: Under the Command of Capt. Fitz Roy
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“In my most extreme fluctuations I have never been an atheist in the sense of denying the existence of a God ... I think that generally (& more and more so as I grow older) but not always, that an agnostic would be the most correct description of my state of mind.”

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Book:Delphi Complete Works of Charles Darwin (Illustrated)
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“I have watched how steadily the general feeling, as shown at elections, has been rising against Slavery. What a proud thing for England if she is the first European nation which utterly abolishes it! I was told before leaving England that after living in slave countries all my opinions would be altered; the only alteration I am aware of is forming a much higher estimate of the negro character.”

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Book:Delphi Complete Works of Charles Darwin (Illustrated)
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“The more efficient causes of progress seem to consist of a good education during youth whilst the brain is impressible, and of a high standard of excellence, inculcated by the ablest and best men, embodied in the laws, customs and traditions of the nation, and enforced by public opinion.”

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Book:The Descent of Man (Diversion Classics)
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“The western nations of Europe, who now so immeasurably surpass their former savage progenitors, and stand at the summit of civilization, owe little or none of their superiority to direct inheritance from the old Greeks, though they owe much to the written works of that wonderful people.”

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Book:Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex
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“After my return to England it appeared to me that by following the example of Lyell in Geology, and by collecting all facts which bore in any way on the variation of animals and plants under domestication and nature, some light might perhaps be thrown on the whole subject.”

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Book:Life and Letters of Charles Darwin: the Evolution
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“When primeval man first used flint stones for any purpose, he would have accidentally splintered them, and would then have used the sharp fragments. From this step it would be a small one to break the flints on purpose and not a very wide step to fashion them rudely.”

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Book:The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex ... Second Edition, Revised and Augmented, with Illustrations. Tenth Thousand
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“The moral faculties are generally esteemed, and with justice, as of higher value than the intellectual powers. But we should always bear in mind that the activity of the mind in vividly recalling past impressions is one of the fundamental though secondary bases of conscience. This fact affords the strongest argument for educating and stimulating in all possible ways the intellectual faculties of every human being.”

WayShouldMindHumansFactsPastValuesJusticeHuman BeingsMoralBearsHigherActivityIntellectualConscienceArgumentBasesFundamentalsImpressionFacultyStrongestNatural Selection
Book:The Descent of Man
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“Now when naturalists observe a close agreement in numerous small details of habits, tastes and dispositions between two or more domestic races, or between nearly-allied natural forms, they use this fact as an argument that all are descended from a common progenitor who was thus endowed; and consequently that all should be classed under the same species. The same argument may be applied with much force to the races of man.”

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Book:The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex
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“As some of the lowest organisms, in which nerves cannot be detected, are capable of perceiving light, it does not seem impossible that certain sensitive elements in their sarcode should become aggregated and developed into nerves, endowed with this special sensibility.”

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Book:On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, Or The Preservation of Favored Races in the Struggle for Life
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