Ferdinand von Mueller

Whitsunday 16/5/80.

Since writing my first letter for this mail to you,

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M to A. Gray, 13 May 1880.

revered friend, I have received the volume of the two lectures,

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A. Gray (1880). The copy in the library at the Royal Botanic Gardens Melbourne is inscribed: 'Sir Ferd. Müller with kind regards of the Author'.

which you so considerately presented to me. These discourses are worthy of an Asa Gray; the thoughts & the language are equally powerful in these discourses, and the views of the science of the day are blended with deep religious persuasion.

Much will we and the next generations yet have to learn, before the history of the bodily creation will be revealed to us, though the origin and nature of the godlike vital force will be concealed for ever to mortal eyes! To discuss the great questions of these essays of yours with so great a man as yourself is not within the scope of a letter, even if a younger and far less authorative observer dared to express himself frankly on the subject. But this I might venture to say, that the so called protoplasm

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Conceived as the basic constituent of cells and therefore of all living organisms, 'the physical basis of life' according to T. H. Huxley.

is to my view not an uniform substance through the great empires of living beings, and that the present creation does not entirely comprise forms of higher perfection , but many of less development than those of the past, both animal and vegetable. Nor do I think it possible, that the present plants & animals in their marvellous diversity and copiousness could have sprung from one or few types, and I feel satisfied, that no mechanical efforts of nature would give us in ages back again the Dodo, the Moas, the extinct plants of St Helena and other byegone organism, even of the simpler types.

It is good for mankind, for our earthly happiness, that we cannot penetrate to the greatness of godlike power by any human investigations. But a religion, built on observations on the beauty & wisdom displayed in nature, preached in churches of her own or in the freegods world, would greatly elevate the spirit of those, who cannot cling to christian revelations.

Homo sapiens remains after the study of thousands of years an unalterable species; and I feel convinced, that in the same manner other true species move within defined absolute limits, but our observations are as yet far too scanty to circumscribe their real specific boundaries; that will be the work of coming centuries. Herbert's early observations on the fertility of hybrids

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Herbert (1837). Gray referred to Herbert's work in the first of his two lectures, pp. 43-4.

when extended will give us many a new insight also into the value of specific forms, now often kept very apart. I rejoyce to understand from your discourses, that you do not deem the mere idea of selection sufficient to account for the development of higher organized from lower creatures. How could any one from a medical point alone! To my mind we must grasp the question of the creation of organized species from considerations of the whole creation of the universe . Could the eye of the mere housefly with its thousands of lenses & optic adjuncts gradually originate by evolution? And even if so, which I do not believe, is not our world of organisms, wonderfully varied as it is, a mere speck in the universe, "with worlds without ends"

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The source that M is quoting here has not been identified, the phrase having been used by several contemporary scientific authors. (It was also widely used in a religious context, especially in writings associated with the Mormon church.) The idea of a plurality of worlds, long a subject of speculation, became more soundly based during the middle decades of the 19th century as evidence accumulated that stars are bodies similar to the Sun and so may very well have their own planetary systems.

? Must not the grandest planets with their sun originate from the same godly power, which called forth the wondrous optic apparatus of insects, neither the one nor the other having changed in the least since science began to record its observations! I fancy, that it is god's own breath as well in us human beings as in the simplest of organism, which gives vitality. Under the ordinance of such a ruler we may rest secure, that we are watched & may anticipate a happy futurity, of which Religion gives us an earthly forethought. And why should we poor mortals try to narrow Gods creative power on this mere atom of the world down to a primordial germ, without support and evidence. Can we not in religious belief concede to the supreme power the might of calling forth distinctly the organic species? The primordial germ, if such existed, must be the most marvellous of earthly wonders anyhow, to be capable to develop in hundreds of thousands of species, easily recognized & classified even by human understanding.

It must be a great consolation to you, dear & honored friend, that after the toils of enquiries through a long life you can still like Brewster

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Sir David Brewster.

and so many others of the wise, cling to the comforts and assurances of religion.