To Charles Lyell 4 [January 1860]
Summary
Praises CL’s work on human species.
A critical review of Origin in Saturday Review [24 Dec 1859].
A letter from J. G. Jeffreys criticises CD’s geological statements.
A note from William Whewell concerning Origin.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Charles Lyell, 1st baronet |
| Date: | 4 [Jan 1860] |
| Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.190) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2637 |
To J. T. Smith 4 January 1860
Summary
Remembers reading Smith’s memoir in Geological Transactions on the anomalous nature of Ventriuculidae. Asks for a copy.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joshua Toulmin Smith |
| Date: | 4 Jan 1860 |
| Classmark: | Indiana University, The Lilly Library (Sieveking MSS) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2637F |
From Leonard Jenyns 4 January 1860
Summary
Has read Origin and considers it one of the most valuable contributions to present-day natural history. Believes, however, that there are difficulties in the extensive generalisation that all taxonomic groups are related by descent. Does not understand how Genesis is to be read unless at least the human species was created independently of other animals. Cannot bring himself to the idea that man’s reasoning and moral sense could have been obtained from "irrational progenitors": the "Divine Image" is the unsurmountable distinction between man and brutes. [See 2644.]
| Author: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 4 Jan 1860 |
| Classmark: | The University of Edinburgh Centre for Research Collections (Lyell collection Coll-203/A3/5: 95–103) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2637A |
| letter | (3) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (2) |
| Blomefield, Leonard | (1) |
| Jenyns, Leonard | (1) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (1) |
| Lyell, Charles | (1) |
| Smith, J. T. | (1) |
| Darwin, C. R. | |
| Blomefield, Leonard | (1) |
| Jenyns, Leonard | (1) |
| Lyell, Charles | (1) |
| Smith, J. T. | (1) |
