To Charles Lyell 18 [June 1858]1
Down Bromley Kent
18th.
My dear Lyell
Some year or so ago, you recommended me to read a paper by Wallace in the Annals, which had interested you & as I was writing to him, I knew this would please him much, so I told him.2 He has to day sent me the enclosed & asked me to forward it to you.3 It seems to me well worth reading. Your words have come true with a vengeance that I shd. be forestalled. You said this when I explained to you here very briefly my views of “Natural Selection” depending on the Struggle for existence.—4 I never saw a more striking coincidence. if Wallace had my M.S. sketch written out in 1842 he could not have made a better short abstract!5 Even his terms now stand as Heads of my Chapters.
Please return me the M.S. which he does not say he wishes me to publish;6 but I shall of course at once write & offer to send to any Journal. So all my originality, whatever it may amount to, will be smashed. Though my Book, if it will ever have any value, will not be deteriorated; as all the labour consists in the application of the theory.
I hope you will approve of Wallace’s sketch, that I may tell him what you say.
My dear Lyell | Yours most truly | C. Darwin
Footnotes
Bibliography
Brooks, John Langdon. 1969. Re-assessment of Alfred Russel Wallace’s contribution to the theory of organic evolution. Yearbook, 1968. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society.
Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.
Foundations: The foundations of the Origin of Species. Two essays written in 1842 and 1844 by Charles Darwin. Edited by Francis Darwin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1909. [Reprint edition. New York: Kraus Reprint Co. 1969. Also reprinted in De Beer ed. 1958.]
McKinney, Henry Lewis. 1966. Alfred Russel Wallace and the discovery of natural selection. Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 21: 333–57.
McKinney, Henry Lewis. 1972. Wallace and natural selection. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.
Wallace, Alfred Russel. 1855. On the law which has regulated the introduction of new species. Annals and Magazine of Natural History 2d ser. 16: 184–96.
Wallace, Alfred Russel. 1905. My life: a record of events and opinions. 2 vols. London: Chapman & Hall.
Summary
Encloses MS by A. R. Wallace. CD has been forestalled. " . . . if Wallace had my MS sketch written out in 1842 he could not have made a better short abstract!" Wallace does not say if he wishes CD to publish MS, but CD will offer to send it to journal.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-2285
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- Charles Lyell, 1st baronet
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.152)
- Physical description
- ALS 4pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 2285,” accessed on 1 September 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-2285.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 7