On Fri, 15 Mar 1996, Brian D. Harper wrote:
> At 01:29 PM 3/15/96 -0600, Dave wrote:
>
> > Dennis Durst asked, in response to my initial post in which I
> > commented on Darwin's last line in The Origin of Species:
> >
> > Which edition of the _Origin_ did you have in mind, or did
> > the last line remain constant throughout all editions?
> >
> > I found this to be an interesting question. A search of the OSU library
>
> Wow, you mean you came all the way to Ohio State just to go to the
> library. What dedication ;-).
>
> > revealed that the line is present in all editions owned by OSU. Since all
> > the books are not in the best of shape it was hard, in some cases, to
> tell
> > which edition I was examining and there are probably some of the editions
> > that OSU does not own. One item of interest is that, as far as I could
> > tell, the word "Creator" appears in a second (or later) printing of the
> > first edition but was not in the original version. "Creator" was
> present in
> > all the other editions I found. My own copy is the sixth edition.
>
> Penguin Classics uses the first edition which does not contain "by a
> Creator". Here's how it goes:
>
> There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several
> powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms
> or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling
> on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a
> beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful
> have been, and are being, evolved.
>
> I was really surprised the first time I read this since I had seen
> the quote containing "by a Creator" so many times. I recall hearing
> someone say that Darwin inserted this later as a concession to his
> "critics". Anyone happen to know anything more about this?
>
A couple standard tools from Darwin scholarship you might consider are:
1) The Facsimilie of the 1st Edition of The Origin. Ernst Mayr, ed. U
Harvard Press. It's cheap ($11 Canadian, which is what, $2 US? -;) and
has a very good introduction by Mayr.
2) Concordance to the 1st Ed of The Origin. Paul H. Barrett, et. al.,
eds. Cornell U Press (1981). Yep, just like in theology, a concordance.
Of note, there are 7 unapologetic and positive references to the Creator
(yes, capital "C"). Pp. 186, 188, 189, 413, 413, 435, 488. The word
definitely does not show up in that famous (brilliant . . . oh, oh, I'll
be getting a blast for this from Stephen Jones ;-) last sentence.
3) Morse Peckham, The Origin of Species, A Variorium Text. U Penn Press
(1959). This text goes through all the six editions of The Origin
(1859-1872) showing changes to the text. I tried digging this text out
of the library (yea, I even show up there now and again ;-), but someone
had already taken it out. However, if my memory serves me well, the
addition of "by a Creator" was only in the last edition.
Of course, the truckle theory was once very popular. But the first
Darwin scholars were retired/ing scientists steeped in positivism, and
anything that seemed theological was either disregarded or claimed to be
a truckle. These first works were in reality positivistic
"hagiographies". Recent work has corrected this and Darwin is much more
theological than first anticipated. See the standard commentaries:
a) James R. Moore, The Post-Darwinian Controversies. Cambridge U Press
(1979).
b) David N. Livingstone, Darwin's Forgotten Defenders (I think IVP
1987)
c) Neal C. Gillespie, Charles Darwin and the Problem of Creation.
Chicago U Press (1979).
d) And if this is proper, the third chapter of my PhD
dissertation (Toronto School of Theology, 1991)--a chapter dedicated to
Darwin's Religious Evolution.
--a & b are written by evangelicals and tend to be skewed in that
the are apologetics for that faith.
--c is the best 150 pages on the subject I've read--I just love
that book.
--d needs to be rewritten with a different historiographical paradigm.
Hope this is helpful.
Blessings,
Denis
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Denis O. Lamoureux DDS PhD PhD (cand)
Department of Oral Biology Residence:
Faculty of Dentistry # 1908
University of Alberta 8515-112 Street
Edmonton, Alberta Edmonton, Alberta
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CANADA CANADA
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E-mail: dlamoure@gpu.srv.ualberta.ca
"In all debates, let truth be thy aim, and endeavor to gain
rather than expose thy opponent."
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