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Butler, Samuel, 1835-1902

"The Humour of Homer and Other Essays"

Moreover, as I showed in my last work on
evolution, {259b} in the peroration to his Origin of Species, he
discarded his accidental variations altogether, and fell back on the
older theory, so that the body of the Origin of Species supports one
theory, and the peroration another that differs from it toto coelo.
Finally, in his later editions, he retreated indefinitely from his
original position, edging always more and more continually towards
the theory of his grandfather and Lamarck. These facts convince me
that he was at no time a thoroughgoing Darwinian, but was throughout
an unconscious Lamarckian, though ever anxious to conceal the fact
alike from himself and from his readers.
Not so with Mr. Wallace, who was both more outspoken in the first
instance, and who has persevered along the path of Wallaceism just
as Mr. Darwin with greater sagacity was ever on the retreat from
Darwinism. Mr. Wallace's profounder faith led him in the outset to
place his theory in fuller daylight than Mr.


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