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Herbert Spencer to Charles Darwin (16th November, 1872)

Thomas Maston to Charles Darwin (5th February, 1879)

A stonemason who has read Origin and Descent would like to read Charles Darwin’s other books but is too poor to afford them

St. George Mivart, ‘Man and Apes’, Popular Science Review, A Quarterly Miscellany of Entertaining and instructive articles on scientific subjects (London, 1873)

St George Jackson Mivart (1827–1900) was a comparative anatomist and one of Darwin’s most vigorous English critics. In this essay from 1873, he rejects any similarities between humans and apes, criticising the arguments of Descent and of Expression, while also using a visual technique and illustrations.

'Now […] the tendency is to accept without examination and without criticism the statements of every advocate of the essential unity of man and beasts.'

'I have delayed somewhat longer than I intended, acknowledging the copy of your new volume, which you have been kind enough to send me. I delayed partly in the hope of being able to read more of it before writing to you; but my reading powers are so small, and they are at present so much employed in getting up materials for work in hand, that I have been unable to get on far with it. I have, however, read quite enough to see what an immense mass of evidence you have brought to bear in proof of your propositions.

I will comment only on one point on which I see you differ from me; namely the explanation of musical expression […]'