Reactions to On the Origin of Species the "species question" divides with Italy and the Volunteers the attention of general society. Everybody has read Mr. Darwin's book, or, at least, has given an opinion upon its merits or demerits; pietists, whether lay or ecclesiastic, decry it with the mild railing which sounds so charitable; bigots denounce it with ignorant invective; old ladies of both sexes consider it a decidedly dangerous book, and even savants, who have no better mud to throw, quote antiquated writers to show that its author is no better than an ape himself; while every philosophical thinker hails it as a veritable Whitworth gun
On the Tendency of Species to form Varieties; and on the Perpetuation of Varieties and Species by Natural Means of Selection of science on which they bear". Years later, Darwin could only recall one review; Professor Haughton of Dublin claimed that "all that was new in them was false, and what was true was old." Despite illness, Darwin pressed on with writing the "abstract" of his "big book" on "Natural Selection"; this condensed version was published in November 1859 as "On the Origin of Species". In a largely overlooked passage from Wallace's essay, he says of the evolutionary principle: The action of this principle is exactly like that of the centrifugal governor of the steam engine, which checks and corrects any