Charles Darwin

From the first dawn of life, all organic beings are found to resemble each other in a greater or less degree.

The more we know of the fixed laws of nature, the more incredible do miracles become.

The strongest bonds of sympathy, are formed by the mutual aid and protection which the members of the same community afford to each other.

The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it.

The natural selection of the fittest is a process of elimination, not of creation.

There is a natural and necessary connection between the development of the intellect and the development of the moral sense.

The greatest discovery of all time is that a person can change his future by merely changing his attitude.

I am almost convinced (quite contrary to the opinion I started with) that species are not (it is like confessing a murder) immutable.

It is a grand thing to be able to look at the world with a new eye.

If I have seen further than others, it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants.

I am quite conscious that my speculations run quite beyond the bounds of true science.

What a book a Devil's Chaplain might write on the clumsy, wasteful, blundering, low, and horridly cruel works of nature!

Man in his arrogance thinks himself a great work worthy of the interposition of a deity. More humble and I believe truer to consider him created from animals.

I have steadily endeavoured to keep my mind free so as to give up any hypothesis, however much beloved (and I cannot resist forming them), as soon as facts are shown to be opposed to it.

There is a 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 have no great quickness of apprehension or wit, but am patient in observing and collecting facts, and in meditating over them.

I am quite content to be called a 'theorist' by those who do not understand what theory means.

The love of a dog for his master is a more pure emotion than any other.

I see no good reason why the views given in this volume should shock the religious feelings of anyone.

If the misery of the poor be caused not by the laws of nature, but by our institutions, great is our sin.