Alfred Russel Wallace Quotes & Sayings

I think I have fairly heard and fairly weighed the evidence on both sides, and I remain an utter disbeliever in almost all that you consider the most sacred truths [ ... ] I can see much to admire in all religions [ ... ] But whether there be a God and whatever be His nature; whether we have an immortal soul or not, or whatever may be our state after death, I can have no fear of having to suffer for the study of nature and the search for truth. — Alfred Russel Wallace

In less than eight years "The Origin of Species" has produced conviction in the minds of a majority of the most eminent living men of science. New facts, new problems, new difficulties as they arise are accepted, solved, or removed by this theory; and its principles are illustrated by the progress and conclusions of every well established branch of human knowledge. — Alfred Russel Wallace

Our mastery over the forces of nature has led to a rapid growth of population, and a vast accumulation of wealth; but these have brought with them such an amount of poverty and crime, and have fostered the growth of so much sordid feeling and so many fierce passions, that it may well be questioned, whether the mental and moral status of our population has not on the average been lowered, and whether the evil has not overbalanced the good. — Alfred Russel Wallace

In my solitude I have pondered much on the incomprehensible subjects of space, eternity, life and death. — Alfred Russel Wallace

Why do some die and some live? The answer was clearly, that on the whole the best fitted live. From the effects of disease the most healthy escaped; from enemies, the strongest, swiftest, or the most cunning; from famine, the best hunters or those with the best digestion; and so on. Then it suddenly flashed upon me that this self-acting process would necessarily improve the race, because in every generation the inferior would inevitably be killed off and the superior would remain-that is, the fittest would survive. — Alfred Russel Wallace

In one of my latest conversations with Darwin he expressed himself very gloomily on the future of humanity, on the ground that in our modern civilization natural selection had no play, and the fittest did not survive. Those who succeed in the race for wealth are by no means the best or the most intelligent, and it is notorious that our population is more largely renewed in each generation from the lower than from the middle and upper classes. — Alfred Russel Wallace

{Letter to his brother, 1861}

... I remain an utter disbeliever in almost all that you consider the most sacred truths... But whether there be a God and whatever be His nature; whether we have an immortal soul or not, or whatever may be our state after death, I can have no fear of having to suffer for the study of nature and the search for truth, or believe that those will be better off in a future state who have lived in the belief of doctrines inculcated from childhood, and which are to them rather a matter of blind faith than intelligent conviction. — Alfred Russel Wallace

I am decidedly of the opinion that in very many instances we can trace such a necessary connexion, especially among birds, and often with more complete success than in the case which I have here attempted to explain. — Alfred Russel Wallace

To expect the world to receive a new truth, or even an old truth, without challenging it, is to look for one of those miracles which do not occur. — Alfred Russel Wallace

Civilisation has ever accompanied emigration and conquest - the conflict of opinion, of religion, or of race. — Alfred Russel Wallace

The foregoing considerations lead us to the very important conclusion, that matter is essentially force, and nothing but force; that matter, as popularly understood, does not exist, and is, in fact, philosophically inconceivable. — Alfred Russel Wallace

There is, I conceive, no contradiction in believing that mind is at once the cause of matter and of the development of individualised human minds through the agency of matter. — Alfred Russel Wallace

To say that mind is a product or function of protoplasm, or of its molecular changes, is to use words to which we can attach no clear conception. — Alfred Russel Wallace

There might have been a hundred or a thousand life-bearing planets, had the course of evolution of the universe been a little different, or there might have been none at all. They would probably add, that, as life and man have been produced, that shows that their production was possible; and therefore, if not now then at some other time, if not here then in some other planet of some other sun, we should be sure to have come into existence; or if not precisely the same as we are, then something a little better or a little worse. — Alfred Russel Wallace

Mars, therefore, is not only uninhabited by intelligent beings such as Mr. Lowell postulates, but is absolutely uninhabitable. — Alfred Russel Wallace

What birds can have their bills more peculiarly formed than the ibis, the spoonbill, and the heron? — Alfred Russel Wallace

Modification of form is admitted to be a matter of time. — Alfred Russel Wallace

I am thankful I can see much to admire in all religions. — Alfred Russel Wallace

If this is not done, future ages will certainly look back upon us as a people so immersed in the pursuit of wealth as to be blind to higher considerations. — Alfred Russel Wallace

There is a tendency in nature to the continued progression of certain classes of varieties further and further from the original type. — Alfred Russel Wallace

I spent, as you know, a year and a half in a clergyman's family and heard almost every Tuesday the very best, most earnest and most impressive preacher it has ever been my fortune to meet with, but it produced no effect whatever on my mind. — Alfred Russel Wallace

The white men in our colonies are too frequently the savages — Alfred Russel Wallace

I hold with Henry George, that at the back of every great social evil will be found a great political wrong. — Alfred Russel Wallace

What we need are not prohibitory marriage laws, but a reformed society, an educated public opinion which will teach individual duty in these matters. — Alfred Russel Wallace

I have since wandered among men of many races and many religions. — Alfred Russel Wallace

To the mass of mankind religion of some kind is a necessity. — Alfred Russel Wallace

[I]t is indisputably the mediocre, if not the low, both as regards morality and intelligence, who succeed in life and multiply the fastest. — Alfred Russel Wallace

On the spiritual theory, man consists essentially of a spiritual nature or mind intimately associated with a spiritual body or soul, both of which are developed in and by means of a material organism. — Alfred Russel Wallace

Truth is born into this world only with pangs and tribulations, and every fresh truth is received unwillingly. — Alfred Russel Wallace

In all works on Natural History, we constantly find details of the marvellous adaptation of animals to their food, their habits, and the localities in which they are found. — Alfred Russel Wallace

The five cells are silky-white within, and are filled with a mass of firm, cream-coloured pulp, containing about three seeds each. This pulp is the eatable part, and its consistence and flavour are indescribable. A rich custard highly flavoured with almonds gives the best general idea of it, but there are occasional wafts of flavour that call to mind cream-cheese, onion-sauce, sherry-wine, and other incongruous dishes. Then there is a rich glutinous smoothness in the pulp which nothing else possesses, but which adds to its delicacy. It is neither acid nor sweet nor juicy; yet it wants neither of these qualities, for it is in itself perfect. It produces no nausea or other bad effect, and the more you eat of it the less you feel inclined to stop. In fact, to eat Durians is a new sensation worth a voyage to the East to experience. — Alfred Russel Wallace

As well might it be said that, because we are ignorant of the laws by which metals are produced and trees developed, we cannot know anything of the origin of steamships and railways. — Alfred Russel Wallace

But naturalists are now beginning to look beyond this, and to see that there must be some other principle regulating the infinitely varied forms of animal life. — Alfred Russel Wallace

It has been generally the custom of writers on natural history to take the habits and instincts of animals as the fixed point, and to consider their structure and organization as specially adapted to be in accordance with them. — Alfred Russel Wallace