Transcribed from the 1922 Jonathan Cape edition by DavidPrice,
Luck, or Cunning
As the Main Means of
Organic Modification?
Jonathan Cape
Eleven Gower Street, London
First Published | 1887 |
Second Edition | 1920 |
Re-issued | 1922 |
TO THEMEMORY OF
THE LATE
ALFRED TAYLOR, Esq., &c.
WHOSEEXPERIMENTS AT CARSHALTON
IN THE YEARS 1883 AND 1884
ESTABLISHED THAT PLANTS ALSO ARE ENDOWEDWITH
INTELLIGENTIAL AND VOLITIONALFACULTIES
THIS BOOK
BEGUN AT HIS INSTIGATION
IS GRATEFULLY AND AFFECTIONATELYINSCRIBED
p.6Note
This second edition of Luck,or Cunning? is a reprint of the first edition, dated 1887,but actually published in November, 1886. The onlyalterations of any consequence are in the Index, which has beenenlarged by the incorporation of several entries made by theauthor in a copy of the book which came into my possession on thedeath of his literary executor, Mr. R. A. Streatfeild. Ithank Mr. G. W. Webb, of the University Library, Cambridge, forthe care and skill with which he has made the necessaryalterations; it was a troublesome job because owing to there-setting, the pagination was no longer the same.
Luck, or Cunning? is the fourth ofButler’s evolution books; it was followed in 1890 by threearticles in The Universal Review entitled “TheDeadlock in Darwinism” (republished in The Humour ofHomer), after which he published no more upon thatsubject.
In this book, as he says in his Introduction, he insists upontwo main points: (1) the substantial identity between heredityand memory, and (2) the reintroduction of design into organicdevelopment; and these two points he treats as though they havesomething of that physical life with which they are so closelyassociated. He was aware that what he had to say was likelyto prove more interesting to future generations than to hisimmediate public, “but any book that desires to see out aliterary three-score years and ten must offer something to futuregenerations as well as to its own.” By next year onehalf of the three-score years and ten will have passed, and thenew generation by their constant enquiries for the work havealready begun to show their appreciation of Butler’s methodof treating the subject, and their readiness to listen to whatwas addressed to them as well as to their fathers.
HENRY FESTING JONES.
March, 1920.
p.7Author’s Preface to First Edition
This book, as I have said in myconcluding chapter, has turned out very different from the one Ihad it in my mind to write when I began it. It arose out ofa c