If we had scrutinised Mr. Darwin’s title-page as closely as we should certainly scrutinise anything written by Mr. Darwin now, we should have seen that the title did not technically claim the theory of descent; practically, however, it so turned out that we unhesitatingly gave that theory to the author, being, as I have said, carried away by the three large “Origins of Species” (which we understood as much the same thing as descent with modification), and finding, as I shall show in a later chapter, that descent was ubiquitously claimed throughout the work, either expressly or by implication, as Mr. Darwin’s theory.  It is not easy to see how any one with ordinary instincts could hesitate to believe that Mr. Darwin was entitled to claim what he claimed with so much insistance.  If ars est celare artem Mr. Darwin must be allowed to have been a consummate artist, for it took us years to understand the ins and outs of what had been done.

I may say in passing that we never see the “Origin of Species” spoken of as “On the Origin of Species, &c.,” or as “The Origin of Species, &c.” (the word “on” being dropped in the latest editions).  The distinctive feature of the book lies, according to its admirers, in the “&c.,” but they never give it.  To avoid pedantry I shall continue to speak of the “Origin of Species.”

At any rate it will be admitted that Mr. Darwin did not make his title-page express his meaning so clearly that his readers could readily catch the point of difference between himself and his grandfather and Lamarck; nevertheless the point just touched upon involves the only essential difference between the systems of Mr. Charles Darwin and those of his three most important predecessors.  All four writers agree that animals and plants descend with modification; all agree that the fittest alone survive; all agree about the important consequences of the geometrical ratio of increase; Mr. Charles Darwin has said more about these last two points than his predecessors did, but all three were alike cognisant of the facts and attached the same importance to them, and would have been astonished at its being supposed possible that they disputed them.  The fittest alone survive; yes—­but the fittest from among what?  Here comes the point of divergence; the fittest from among organisms whose variations arise mainly through use and disuse?  In other words, from variations that are mainly functional?  Or from among organisms whose variations are in the main matters of luck?  From variations into which a moral and intellectual system of payment according to results has largely entered?  Or from variations which have been thrown for with dice?  From variations among which, though cards tell, yet play tells as much or more?  Or from those in which cards are everything and play goes for so little as to be not worth taking into account?  Is “the survival of the fittest” to be taken as meaning “the survival of the luckiest” or “the survival of those who know best how to turn fortune to account”?  Is luck the only element of fitness, or is not cunning even more indispensable?