On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life.

DARWIN, Charles.

Item Number: 115740

London: John Murray, 1859.

First edition of “certainly the most important biological book ever written” (Freeman), one of 1250 copies, from the Darwin family estate. Octavo, bound in contemporary full calf, half-title, one folding lithographed diagram, without advertisements. In near fine condition with the text exceptionally clear. From the Darwin family estate, Elston Hall, Nottinghamshire. Elston Hall became the home of the Darwin family in 1680 when William Darwin of Cleatham in North Lincolnshire married Anne Waring, the stepdaughter of George Lascelles of Elston. The estate remained in the family until it was sold shortly after the end of the Second World War. Its most famous resident was Erasmus Darwin, Charles Darwin’s grandfather. Erasmus was the founder of the Lunar Society of Birmingham, whose members included Matthew Boulton and Benjamin Franklin. A very nice example, with noted provenance.

Darwin “revolutionized our methods of thinking and our outlook on the natural order of things. The recognition that constant change is the order of the universe had been finally established and a vast step forward in the uniformity of nature had been taken” (PMM 344). “Without question a watershed work in the history of modern life sciences, Darwin’s Origin elaborated a proposition that species slowly evolve from common ancestors through the mechanism of natural selection. As he himself expected, Darwin’s theory became, and continues to be in some circles, the object of intense controversy” (American Philosophical Society). “The five years [of Darwin’s voyage on the Beagle] were the most important event in Darwin’s intellectual life and in the history of biological science. Darwin sailed with no formal training. He returned a hard-headed man of science… The experiences of his five years in the Beagle, how he dealt with them, and what they led to, built up into a process of epoch-making importance in the history of thought” (PMM).