Ɛpsilon

From G. C. Wallich   25 March 1882

3 Christchurch Road. Roupel Park.

March 25, 1882.

My dear Sir.

In a lecture I am about to give on the Threshold of Evolution, in which I dispute, in toto. Haeckel’s statements concerning the “Protista”, I am anxious to show that a statement put forward by him & others—that ‘Spontaneous generation, as necessary to the completeness of Evolution as a doctrine”—has nowhere received your sanction.1

Should you not consider the question an objectionable one, would you kindly inform me if my interpretation of your published views is, to this extent, a correct one? I would not, of course, think of mentioning that I had your authority for denying the statement, or that I would have even addressed you at all on the point without your express sanction.

It has alwas been my opinion that you had intentionally left the question of the ‘Origin of Life’ uncanvassed as being ‘ultra vires’ in the present state of our knowledge, & dealt only with the manner of its Succession.2

I restrict myself, in my small way, to the attempt to prove, as I believe I shall be able to do beyond reach of doubt, that the Protista furnish no trustworthy evidence, one way or the other; & that their very existence, as an independent group of organisms, is a fiction, resulting from hasty & imperfect observation.

I will with your permission send you a copy of my lecture as soon as it is in print.3

Hoping, meanwhile, that you will excuse me for troubling you under the circumstances, | I remain | Yours faithfully | G. C. Wallich.

A Contemporary Copy S

1
Ernst Haeckel’s kingdom Protista included various single-celled organisms such as rhizopods and diatoms, as well as a division called Monera, a taxon of unicellular organisms without nuclei or organelles; in his phylogenetic tree, it was depicted as the central kingdom with Plantae and Animalia on either side (see Haeckel 1866, 1: 203–6; 2: plate 1). In the first part of his Biologische Studien (Biological studies; Haeckel 1870–7, 1: 60), Haeckel stated that the oldest original forms of all Monera, simple structureless protoplasmic clumps, had arisen by spontaneous generation (generatio aequivoca). Wallich had countered Haeckel’s views in an article, ‘The threshold of evolution’ (G. C. Wallich 1880), published in Popular Science Review, April 1880. His lecture ‘On the fallacy of the materialistic origin of life’ was read at the Victoria Institute, 17 April 1882, but not published in full (see Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute, or Philosophical Society of Great Britain 16 (1882–3): 344). A report of the lecture appeared in the Morning Post, 18 April 1882, p. 5.
2
In Origin 6th ed., p. 98, CD had referred to spontaneous generation as an unproven belief.
3
No printed version of the lecture has been identified.

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-13739,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-13739