The dogma of the infallibility of the Bible is no more self-evident than is that of the infallibility of the popes.

The only objections that have occurred to me are, 1st that you have loaded yourself with an unnecessary difficulty in adopting Natura non facit saltum so unreservedly. . . . And 2nd, it is not clear to me why, if continual physical conditions are of so little moment as you suppose, variation should occur at all. However, I must read the book two or three times more before I presume to begin picking holes.

I have never been able to understand why pigeon-shooting at Hurlingham should be refined and polite, while a rat-killing match in Whitechapel is low.

Regarded anatomically, the resemblances between the foot of Man and the foot of the Gorilla are far more striking and important than the differences... be the differences between the hand and foot of Man and those of the Gorilla what they may the differences between those of the Gorilla and those of the lower Apes are much greater.

I conceive that the leading characteristic of the nineteenth century has been the rapid growth of the scientific spirit, the consequent application of scientific methods of investigation to all the problems with which the human mind is occupied, and the correlative rejection of traditional beliefs which have proved their incompetence to bear such investigation.

Follow humbly wherever and to whatever abyss Nature leads, or you shall learn nothing.

My business is to teach my aspirations to confirm themselves to fact, not to try and make facts harmonize with my aspirations.