Charles Darwin

An American monkey, after getting drunk on brandy, would never touch it again, and thus is much wiser than most men.

But I am very poorly today & very stupid & I hate everybody & everything. One lives only to make blunders.

But I am very poorly today & very stupid & I hate everybody & everything. One lives only to make blunders.

I own that I cannot see as plainly as others do, and as I should wish to do, evidence of design and beneficence on all sides of us. There seems to me too much misery in the world. I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created the Ichneumonidæ with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of Caterpillars, or that a cat should play with mice... I feel most deeply that the whole subject is too profound for the human intellect.

I own that I cannot see as plainly as others do, and as I should wish to do, evidence of design and beneficence on all sides of us. There seems to me too much misery in the world. I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created the Ichneumonidæ with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of Caterpillars, or that a cat should play with mice... I feel most deeply that the whole subject is too profound for the human intellect.

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

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

A scientific man ought to have no wishes, no affections – a mere heart of stone.

Blushing is the most peculiar and most human of all expressions.

Blushing is the most peculiar and most human of all expressions.

A dog might as well speculate on the mind of Newton.

A dog might as well speculate on the mind of Newton.

The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble by us; and I for one must be content to remain an agnostic.

If I had my life to live over again, I would have made a rule to read some poetry and listen to some music at least once every week.

I hate a Barnacle as no man ever did before, not even a Sailor in a slow-sailing ship.

I hate a Barnacle as no man ever did before, not even a Sailor in a slow-sailing ship.

A man who dares to waste one hour of time has not discovered the value of life.

Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science.

I am not apt to follow blindly the lead of other men.

The love for all living creatures is the most noble attribute of man.