future edition. The
corrections that he made are mainly verbal and do not, I think,
affect the argument to any considerable extent. Butler, however,
attached sufficient importance to them to incur the expense of
having the stereos of more than fifty pages cancelled and new
stereos substituted. I have also added a few entries to the index,
which are taken from a copy of the book, now in my possession, in
which Butler made a few manuscript notes.

R. A. STREATFEILD.

_October, 1911._

AUTHOR'S PREFACE

TO

THE SECOND EDITION

Since the proof-sheets of the Appendix to this book left my hands,
finally corrected, and too late for me to be able to recast the first of
the two chapters that compose it, I hear, with the most profound regret,
of the death of Mr. Charles Darwin.

It being still possible for me to refer to this event in a preface, I
hasten to say how much it grates upon me to appear to renew my attack
upon Mr. Darwin under the present circumstances.

I have insisted in each of my three books on Evolution upon the
immensity of the service which Mr. Darwin rendered to that
transcendently important theory. In "Life and Habit," I said: "To the
end of time, if the question be asked, 'Who taught people to believe in
Evolution?' the answer must be that it was Mr. Darwin." This is true;
and it is hard to see what palm of higher praise can be awarded to any
philosopher.

I have always admitted myself to be under the deepest obligations to Mr.
Darwin's works; and it was with the greatest reluctance, not to say
repugnance, that I became one of his opponents. I have partaken of his
hospitality, and have had too much experience of the charming simplicity
of his manner not to be among the readiest to at once admire and envy
it. It is unfortunately true that I believe Mr. Darwin to have behaved
badly to me; this is too notorious to be denied; but at the same time I
cannot be blind to the fact that no man can be judge in his own case,
and that after all Mr. Darwin may have been right, and I wrong.

At the present moment, let me impress this latter alternative upon my
mind as far as possible, and dwell only upon that side of Mr. Darwin's
work and character, about which there is no difference of opinion among
either his admirers or his opponents.

_April 21, 1882._

PREFACE.

Contrary to the advice of my friends, who caution me to avoid all
appearance of singular