"The limit of man s knowledge in any subject possesses a high interest which is perhaps increased by its close neighbourhood to the realms of imaginati...
[Alexander von Humboldt was the] greatest scientific traveller who ever lived.
~ Charles Darwin ~
Photo by Ákos Szabó
Photo by Ian Turnell
[Alexander von Humboldt was the] greatest scientific traveller who ever lived.
More Charles Darwin quotes
"To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light,...
"But when on shore, & wandering in the sublime forests, surrounded by views more gorgeous than even Claude ever imagined, I enjoy a delight which none ...
"We cannot fathom the marvelous complexity of an organic being; but on the hypothesis here advanced this complexity is much increased. Each living crea...
"A grand and almost untrodden field of inquiry will be opened, on the causes and laws of variation, on correlation of growth, on the effects of use and...
"Freedom of thought is best promoted by the gradual illumination of men’s minds which follows from the advance of science.
"One day, on tearing off some old bark, I saw two rare beetles, and seized one in each hand. Then I saw a third and new kind, which I could not bear to...
"It is difficult to believe in the dreadful but quiet war lurking just below the serene facade of nature.
"False facts are highly injurious to the progress of science, for they often endure long; but false views, if supported by some evidence, do little har...
"When I view all beings not as special creations, but as the lineal descendants of some few beings which lived long before the first bed of the Cambria...
"I fully agree with all that you say on the advantages of H. Spencer's excellent expression of 'the survival of the fittest.' This, however, had not oc...
"We can allow satellites, planets, suns, universe, nay whole systems of universe, to be governed by laws, but the smallest insect, we wish to be create...
"The following proposition seems to me in a high degree probable—namely, that any animal whatever, endowed with well-marked social instincts, the paren...
"Man with all his noble qualities, with sympathy which feels for the most debased, with benevolence which extends not only to other men but to the humb...
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, not those who know much, who so positively assert that t...