Nikhil Dharmaraj - 2019 Mitra Scholar

2018-19 Mitra FAMILY GRANT Recipient The Evolution of Evolution: Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura and Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species Nikhil Dharmaraj

The Evolution of Evolution: Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura and Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species

Nikhil Dharmaraj 2019 Mitra Family Scholar Mentors: Mr. Clifford Hull, Ms. Meredith Cranston April 12, 2019

Dharmaraj 2 Sometime in the first century BCE, a scientific treatise that would quite literally change the course of history was born to the mind of the Roman poet Titus Lucretius Carus — De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things). Written in hexameter verse in the style of the Greek epos (epic), De Rerum Natura is a classic example of a didactic poem, in its dual aim to simultaneously extol the famed beliefs of the Greek philosopher Epicurus and impart newfound academic knowledge. 1 To consider Lucretius’ poetic masterpiece without its heavily Epicurean influences gives a seriously incomplete picture of De Rerum Natura. In fact, in company with other philosophes (a term for the new echelon of classical thinkers to which Lucretius belonged), Epicurus was literally deified for hatching the following idea: “everything that has ever existed and everything that will ever exist is put together out of indestructible building blocks, irreducibly small in size, unimaginably vast in number.” 2 Specifically, De Rerum Natura drew from On Nature, a now-lost Epicurean composition; thus inspired by Epicurus’ atomistic and scientific musings, Lucretius’ masterwork aimed to replace irrational superstitions and religious convictions with true knowledge. 3 Celebrated by Cicero and Virgil alike, De Rerum Natura and the life of its author was unfortunately lost to the modern reader for centuries, due to the revisionist efforts of vehemently anti-Pagan clergyman St. Jerome whose “biographical claims [of Lucretius’ suicide] should be taken with a heavy dose of skepticism.” 4 In January of 1417, however, Poggio Bracciolini, an Italian humanist, managed to bring the ancient text to light once Stuart Gillespie and Philip Hardie, introduction to The Cambridge Companion to Lucretius, Cambridge Companions to Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 1.

1

2

Stephen Greenblatt, The Swerve: How the World Became Modern, paperback ed. (New York: Norton, 2012), 73.

Monte Johnson and Catherine Wilson, "Lucretius and the History of Science," in The Cambridge Companion to Lucretius, ed. Stuart Gillespie and Philip Hardie, Cambridge Companions to Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 131.

3

4

Greenblatt, The Swerve, 54.

Dharmaraj 3 more, having tracked down the poem in a remote German monastery. 5 Upon its rediscovery, De Rerum Natura incited intrigue, but also apprehension, for a Christian humanist audience. 6 Almost immediately, the Roman author’s classical ideas entered mainstream thought, and its impact soon grew to be pervasively observable.

It was in this context, then, that Dr. Erasmus Darwin, the grandfather of evolutionist Charles Darwin, bore his own seminal works, The Botanical Garden, Zoonomia, and The Temple of Nature. A renowned author and doctor, Dr. Erasmus Darwin enjoyed university-level education at the Universities of Cambridge and Edinburgh, and later in life, he found himself avidly discussing forthcoming issues within the liberal arts as a member of a Midlands group of academics. 7 His appreciation and esteem for Lucretius are evident in the first pages of almost any one of his major works. However, for a multitude of reasons, by the end of the eighteenth century, Erasmus Darwin had become a foe of the British government, and in 1802, he died, seven years before the birth of his grandson Charles. 8 On February 12, 1809, the man considered the father of evolution was born in Shrewsbury, England. 9 In his childhood years, Charles Darwin grew up with his physician father, Robert. 10 Upon entering young adulthood, Darwin studied at the University of Edinburgh,

5

Greenblatt, 15.

6

Johnson and Wilson, "Lucretius and the History," 131.

C.U.M. Smith, "Like Grandfather, Like Grandson: Erasmus and Charles Darwin on Evolution," Perspectives in Biology and Medicine 53, no. 2 (2010): 186.; David Bardell, "Erasmus Darwin Expressed His Concept of Evolution in Poetry," Bios 72, no. 2 (May 2001): 63.

7

8

Smith, "Like Grandfather," 186.

9 Alexander Scott, "Darwin, Charles," in Encyclopedia of Environmental Issues, Revised Edition (Hackensack: Salem, 2011).

10

Smith, "Like Grandfather," 189.

Dharmaraj 4 but soon transferred to Christ’s College. 11 There, he came into acquaintance with Professor John Stevens Henslow, a botanist who helped Darwin secure a spot on the voyage of the HMS Beagle, the very voyage which would later provide the evidentiary basis for his evolutionary ideas in On the Origin of Species. 12 Charles Darwin’s obvious claim to fame is the formalization of evolutionary thinking, specifically regarding natural selection, sexual selection, and other evolutionary phenomena. As crucial as Darwin was to the history of Western science, however, the classical influences that molded his ideas are commonly overlooked. Given that On the Origin of Species is proven using first-hand observations made on Darwin’s global voyage, it is all too easy to ignore the invisible forces that instrumentally influenced — and perhaps even inspired — Darwin’s theories, namely the writings of his grandfather, which were in turn inspired by the writings of Lucretius. As author Christopher Upham Murray Smith asserts, “[Erasmus Darwin’s] influence on Charles is not widely appreciated;” the lack of significant scholarship on the subject makes it all the more difficult to unveil Charles Darwin’s ideological inspirations. 13 To prove that Darwin’s theories were not as radically novel as commonly thought would be a profound testament to the truly undying legacy of Lucretius’ (and his compatriot philosophes’) work. Ironically enough, these ideas quite literally evolved into the evolutionary treatise celebrated by academics all over the world today; several portions of Darwin’s theory can be indirectly traced back to Lucretius’ poetic verse. Thus, despite the fact that Charles Darwin is often seen as the pioneer of evolutionary thought, it was Lucretius’ ideas in De Rerum Natura, relayed via Erasmus Darwin’s

11

Scott, "Darwin, Charles"

12

Scott.

13

Smith, "Like Grandfather," 186.

Dharmaraj 5 works, which shaped Charles’s theories on species’ extinction and survival of the fittest in On the Origin of Species.

Proof of Lucretius’ Indirect Influence on Charles Darwin Lucretius’ Influence on Erasmus Darwin Before examining the specific ways in which Lucretius’ ancient theories touched Charles Darwin’s modern ones, it must first be established that some sort of ideological link connected the two authors. Notably, this proof must be indirect: for, when asked near the end of his life, Darwin vehemently denied having read Lucretius himself (a statement which classics professor John Talbot compares to “Milton claiming never to have read Genesis”). 14 As such, Lucretius’ proto-evolutionary ideas in De Rerum Natura indirectly reached, and thereby influenced, Charles Darwin via the poetic works of the latter’s grandfather, Dr. Erasmus Darwin.

Firstly, the ideas Lucretius put forth obviously and indisputably came to bear in Dr. Erasmus Darwin’s work. Unfortunately, as scholar Irwin Primer observes, “[t]he profound influence of Lucretius on eighteenth-century poetry has received relatively light attention from scholars.” 15 Still, the proof is ample. Look no further than his writings, each of which teems with references to De Rerum Natura. For instance, Canto I of Erasmus Darwin’s masterpiece The Temple of Nature includes the following famous Lucretian quote as a footnote: “Alma Venus!…per te quoniam genus omne animantum…Concipitur, visitque exortum lumina…coeli.” 16 In fact, English professor Martin Priestman explains that The Temple of Nature

William Harris, "Lucretius: The Roman Epicurean Scientist," Humanities and the Liberal Arts, accessed January 24, 2019.; John Talbot, "Poet Laureate of Atoms," The Weekly Standard, June 15, 2009, accessed September 3, 2018.

14

Irwin Primer, "Erasmus Darwin's Temple of Nature: Progress, Evolution, and the Eleusinian Mysteries.," Journal of the History of Ideas 25, no. 1 (1964): 73.

15

16

Erasmus Darwin, The Temple of Nature, ed. Rickard Berghorn (Charlestown: Timaios Press, 2014), 49.

Dharmaraj 6 actually “began life as a projected imitation of [De Rerum Natura] 5’s social history, originally titled ‘The Progress of Society;’” Priestman even refers to it as “his most Lucretian poem.” 17 Likewise, The Botanic Garden is full of quotations from and allusions to Lucretius’ work, and Zoonomia clearly favored Epicurean atomistic ideas. 18 Written in rhyming couplets of iambic pentameter, Erasmus Darwin’s poems are even metrically connected to De Rerum Natura, the contemporaneous English translations of which were also published in heroic couplets. 19 Emblems from Erasmus Darwin’s personal life as well testify to the intense influence Lucretius exerted on him. Painted boldly on the door of his carriage and then his bookplate was his famously controversial slogan “E conchis omnia” (“all from shells”), expressing the all-tooEpicurean conviction in the natural, spontaneous, and anti-teleological origin of life (see Fig. 1). 20

Figure 1. Erasmus Darwin’s bookplate (1771), Erasmus Darwin: A life of Unequalled Achievement.

Martin Priestman, "Lucretius in Romantic and Victorian Britain," in The Cambridge Companion to Lucretius, ed.

Stuart Gillespie and Philip Hardie, Cambridge Companions to Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 291.

17

18

Johnson and Wilson, "Lucretius and the History," 143; Priestman, "Lucretius in Romantic," 291.

Kirsten Anne Martin, "Erasmus Darwin's Deistic Dissent and Didactic Epic Poetry: Promoting Science Education to a Mixed Audience under the Banner of Tolerance" (PhD diss., Queen's University, 2012), 182.

19

Smith, "Like Grandfather," 191; Desmond King-Hele, Erasmus Darwin: A Life of Unequalled Achievement (London: DLM, 1999), 89.

20

Dharmaraj 7

In fact, this publicly visible slogan was too Epicurean in nature for some: upon noticing it, English doctor and author Thomas Seward explicitly and disgustedly compared Darwin to Epicurus in a satirical poem: He too renounces his Creator, And forms all sense from senseless matter.

Great wizard he! by magic spells Can all things raise from cockle shells….

O Doctor, change thy foolish motto, Or keep it for some lady’s grotto. 21 The fact that a contemporary independently connected Erasmus Darwin to Epicureanism, paired with the fact that Epicurus’s tenets were mainly available to the nineteenth-century reader in the pages of De Rerum Natura, offers resounding proof that the alleged “Doctor” was undoubtedly and deeply shaped by Lucretius. 22 In that same vein, The Botanical Garden was actually taken into the public limelight several times for alleged plagiarism from other contemporary Western treatises, including Universal Beauty by Henry Brooke and Mine by John Sargent. 23 Associate professor Noel Jackson at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology posits that these claims of plagiarism actually serve as powerful evidence that all these works shared a common ideological basis, namely “broadly conceived Lucretian lines.” 24 Indeed, such accusations simply further verify 21

King-Hele, Erasmus Darwin, 89.

22

Rebecca Stott, Darwin's Ghosts: The Secret History of Evolution (Spiegel & Grau, 2012), 41.

Noel Jackson, "Rhyme and Reason: Erasmus Darwin's Romanticism," Modern Language Quarterly 70, no. 2 (June 1, 2009): 177, accessed September 3, 2018.

23

24

Jackson, "Rhyme and Reason," 177.

Dharmaraj 8 Lucretius’ influence on the literary heritage of the nineteenth century and give credence to the claim that Erasmus Darwin himself must have been inspired by De Rerum Natura. In sum, given both the literary and biographical evidence above, although Erasmus Darwin’s work is definitively more elaborate and accurate than Lucretius’, it is almost impossible to deny that the Western author heavily drew from the Roman poet.

Erasmus Darwin’s Influence on Charles Darwin From this point, all that remains to complete this indirect ideological link is evidence that Erasmus Darwin influenced his grandson’s writings. Some of this legacy was transmitted through Charles’ father, Robert. Records show that, aside from Josiah Wedgewood, Erasmus wrote more letters to Robert than any other person, and so, as Smith asserts, Robert very well may have regularly and fondly discussed Erasmus’s life work with a young Charles at The Mount (the family’s house in Shrewsbury). 25 Elizabeth, Erasmus Darwin’s second wife, was probably responsible for conveying the rest of his legacy. Growing up, Charles enjoyed a fairly close relationship with Elizabeth (who resided at Breadsall Priory, near Derby), and on one of his many visits, she apparently pointed out the armchair that Erasmus often used as well as his deathbed; through these relics and other presumed exchanges about Erasmus Darwin taking place at the Hall, Charles must have further absorbed the ideas and life of his learned grandfather. 26 All the above evidence, however, is merely biographical and assumptive in nature, by no means powerful enough to truly confirm that Erasmus Darwin had a profound influence on his

25

Smith, "Like Grandfather," 189.

26

Smith, 190.

Dharmaraj 9 grandson. Incontestable proof of this relationship can only be found in first-hand sources.

Charles Darwin definitively studied his grandfather’s works several times. The first historical record of this lies in a conversation between Charles and University of Edinburgh acquaintance Dr. Robert Grant. 27 In the autobiographical chapter that introduces The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, he writes: “[Dr. Grant] one day, when we were walking together burst forth in high admiration of Lamarck & his views on evolution…I had previously read the ‘Zoonomia’ of my grandfather, in which similar views are maintained.” 28 As psychiatrist Ralph Colp Jr. notes, one important consequence of this conversation was that it forged a connection between the work of his grandfather and that of Lamarck in Darwin’s mind, one that would come to bear when responding to the criticism surrounding On the Origin of Species later on. 29 For context, JeanBaptiste Lamarck was a French biologist who formulated the incorrect, albeit important theory that acquired traits are passed down generation-to-generation. 30 Next, archived reading lists in Charles Darwin’s notebooks offer ample evidence that he studied his grandfather’s work. 31 Across two selections from a notebook entitled “Books Read,” Darwin lists three of his grandfather’s major works, as marked in the figures below (see Fig. 2 & Fig. 3). Even more, the title Zoonomia can be found scrawled across the very first page of

27

Smith, 190.

Charles Darwin, "Autobiography," 1887, in The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, ed. Francis Darwin (London, 1887), 1:38, accessed January 30, 2019.

28

Ralph Colp, Jr., "The Relationship of Charles Darwin to the Ideas of His Grandfather, Dr. Erasmus Darwin," Biography 9, no. 1 (Winter 1986): 2, 5.

29

30

"Jean-Baptiste Lamarck," in Biology, ed. Richard Robinson (New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2009).

31

Smith, "Like Grandfather," 190.

Dharmaraj 10 Charles Darwin’s first notebook, followed by references to Erasmus’s theories on sexual variation, sex assignment, and evolution. 32

Figure 2. Charles Darwin, "Books to Be Read and Books Read," 1851, 12v.

32

Colp, "The Relationship," 3.

Dharmaraj 11

Figure 3. Charles Darwin, "Books to Be Read and Books Read," 1851, 4v-5r.

Dharmaraj 12 Indeed, in all the evidence presented thus far, Charles has acknowledged reading the works of his grandfather and generally adopted a positive tone in discussing them. However, as Colp asserts, Charles began to consciously repudiate any connection with — and even condemn the theories of — his grandfather, post-publication of On the Origin of Species. 33 Almost immediately after its release, critics began to hurl claims of plagiarism and banality at Darwin’s work. Notably, John Edward Gray claimed that Charles had “just produced Lamarck’s doctrine and nothing else,” and consequently, Darwin began to worry that “his theory would also be compared to the ideas of his grandfather.” 34 In light of that anxiety, Charles then began an ideological crusade to disassociate his forward-looking evolutionary theories from the supposedly incorrect ramblings of both his predecessors, from a footnote citing the “erroneous views in [Erasmus Darwin’s] Zoonomia” to a letter remarking on “how exactly and accurately my Grandfather…gives Lamarck’s theory.” 35 Indeed, Colp correctly asserts, “[i]n order to…protect his identity as the discoverer of a new evolutionary theory it was essential that he disassociate himself from his grandfather and Lamarck.” 36 Eventually, Charles Darwin simply decided to untangle himself from this public dispute surrounding his work, and it was only after doing so that he returned to holding those initially favorable views of his grandfather. Therefore, despite the evidence above, it is clear that Charles Darwin did in fact draw quite heavily from his grandfather; any allegations otherwise can only be attributed to the petty politics of the 19thcentury publishing world.

33

Colp, 5.

34

Colp, 6.

35

Colp, 6-7.

36

Colp, 7.

Dharmaraj 13 In 1877, after all the publishing drama had quietened down, German doctor Ernst Krause asked Charles to assist with Life of Erasmus Darwin, a request which actually honored Darwin, and for research purposes, he once again read his grandfather’s masterwork and likened it to “having communion with the dead….The more I read of Dr. D. the higher he rises in my estimation,” he wrote in a letter to a relative. 37 After much research, Darwin finished his lengthy foreword, and in it lies even more evidence that Charles Darwin was shaped by his grandfather’s ideas early on: As I have private materials for adding to the knowledge of Erasmus Darwin’s character, I have written a preliminary notice. These materials consist of a large collection of letters written by him…of some notes made shortly after his death, by my father, Dr. Robert Darwin, together with what little I can clearly remember that my father said about him. 38 Indeed, this example is just one of many; to discuss all the various allusions and memos that lie within Life of Erasmus Darwin would most likely take the better part of another paper entirely.

Nonetheless, the point remains: that it contains pages upon pages of Charles’s curation of and thoughts on sources regarding Erasmus Darwin is decisive proof of Charles intimate familiarity with his grandfather’s life and work.

Perhaps the most convincing piece of evidence lies in Charles Darwin’s Autobiography, where he wrote what Colp calls “the most balanced — and the truest — statement about the influence of his grandfather that he would ever make.” 39 After the above conversation with Dr. Grant, Charles writes, “It is probable that the hearing rather early in life such views maintained

37

Colp, 11.

38

Ernst Krause, Life of Erasmus Darwin, trans. W.S. Dallas (London, 1879), iii-iv, accessed January 29, 2019.

39

Colp, "The Relationship," 8.

Dharmaraj 14 and praised may have favoured my upholding them under a different form in my ‘Origin of Species.’” 40 Herein lies perhaps the most conclusive proof of all, all other disputes, altercations, and claims otherwise aside: Darwin himself conceding that his grandfather’s view probably shaped his writings in On the Origin of Species. Obviously, Charles Darwin’s view of evolution was more complex and advanced than Erasmus’; to argue otherwise would be impossible.

However, there is undeniably something to be said for the latter’s deep influence on the former.

Connecting the Dots While reviewing the various published works of Erasmus Darwin, Charles Darwin was in effect absorbing the Lucretian strain of thought. Be it through reading a footnote in Zoonomia explicitly referring to De Rerum Natura or studying an entire passage by Erasmus inspired by a selection from Lucretius’ poem, there is no doubt that the Lucretian view on the universe penetrated Charles’s subconscious. To be sure, it is uncertain whether Charles himself flipped through the ancient pages of De Rerum Natura. However, Lucretius’ ideas had already been incorporated into the Western scientific corpus, and so anything Charles drew from the existing body of knowledge most likely found a basis in the ancient poet’s work. As the renowned classicist Stephen Greenblatt asserts, “That the ancient poem could now be safely left unread… [was only a sign] of Lucretius’ absorption into the mainstream of modern thought.” 41 The Extinction of Species, from Lucretius to Charles Darwin Now that the problem of how Lucretius influenced Darwin has been resolved, a new question arises: on what specific matters did Lucretian thought come to bear in On the Origin of Species? The answer is two-fold. Firstly, connected by Erasmus Darwin’s ideas on biological

40

Darwin, "Autobiography," in The Life, 1:38.

41

Greenblatt, The Swerve, 262.

Dharmaraj 15 disappearance, Lucretius’ Epicurean convictions in the permanence of nothing matured into Darwin’s theories on the extinction of species.

Lucretius’ Belief in the Permanence of Nothing As a stout Epicurean, Lucretius held an extremely atomistic view of the world, and a critical part of this atomism was the belief in destruction. In an article in The New Yorker by Greenblatt entitled “The Answer Man,” that very belief is explained as follows: “[n]othing — from our own species to the sun — lasts forever. Only the atoms are immortal.” 42 As it turns out, Lucretius’ destructionist view of the universe gradually matured into Charles Darwin’s theories on extinction, again relayed via Erasmus Darwin. Although this may seem incredulous, given the centuries-wide gap between the two authors, a side-by-side passage analysis offers persuasive proof of the point.

Indeed, on many occasions throughout De Rerum Natura, Lucretius espoused his conviction in the ephemerality of the world and its inhabitants. This destruction did not discriminate: in his mind, all that humans have ever seen and known would eventually return to dust. For instance, in Book V of De Rerum Natura, he writes: [E]arth and fire are mortal, and are bound to pass away …[A]ir and water perish, and arise again and grow …Besides which, everything Earth nourishes and makes to grow Is returned accordingly… …And thus you see Earth dwindles; but increased, she grows anew. 43

42

Stephen Greenblatt, "The Answer Man," The New Yorker, August 8, 2011, accessed September 3, 2018.

43

Titus Lucretius Carus, The Nature of Things, trans. Alicia Stallings (London: Penguin, 2007), 155.

Dharmaraj 16 Evidently, alongside the belief in destruction, Lucretius also held a belief in regeneration; therefore, even though all that existed around him would eventually perish, the undying atoms that composed those beings would take new form. In this way, Lucretius maintained, the universe continued to propagate itself throughout the ages. No doubt, such a view is somewhat similar to the Darwinian view of extinction. Lucretius continues: For Time changes the nature of the whole world, and one phase Must be succeeded by the next; there is no thing that stays The same. Everything flows. Nature makes everything alter, For as one thing grows feeble with old age and starts to falter, Another strengthens, emerging from obscurity. So…one stage Of the Earth gives way to another; she cannot bear any more What once she could, but now brings forth what she could not before. 44 This passage, albeit brief, nonetheless offers up a perfect encapsulation of the Lucretian view on life, and moreover, how eerily similar that view is to the Darwinian idea that species will die out one after another, only to be replaced. The phrase perhaps most central to this school of thought is “Everything flows,” for it is that very fluidity which eventually grew into Darwin’s notion of adaptability in On the Origin of Species.

In fact, such cyclical processes were not just reserved for that which was living; it applied to the inanimate too: Thus you can know that things require an ever-renewed supply Of light, because wave after wave the previous shafts die, And the only way things in the sun appear before our sight

44

Carus, The Nature, 174.

Dharmaraj 17 Is they are ever replenished by that fountainhead of light. 45 Obviously, here, Lucretius does not explicitly refer to the generation and regeneration of life.

However, his description of the constant renewal of sun rays shining down is undeniably analogous to the process by which Earth “ever replenishe[s]” life, “because wave after wave the previous” species die. 46 However, if those passages were not proof enough, within Book V of De Rerum Natura, Lucretius actually describes the process by which species, specifically, go extinct. In a famously progressive couplet, Lucretius asserts, “many kinds of creatures must have vanished with no trace / Because they could not reproduce or hammer out their race.” 47 Perhaps even more convincing, he writes: But those Nature did not endow with suchlike qualities Could neither make a living by their own efforts, nor please Us with some kind of useful service by which they could reap The benefit of our protection and could earn their keep.

So it was open season on those brutes, for prey or gain By others, hobbled utterly by their own doomful chain Until Nature finally drove their species to extinction. 48 Obviously, the use of the word “extinction” is a choice of the translator, but regardless, it is apparently clear that here Lucretius did no less than describe that very phenomenon.

45

Carus, 156.

46

Carus, 156.

47

Carus, 174.

48

Carus, 175.

Dharmaraj 18 Furthermore, in the phrases “open season” and “hobbled utterly by their own doomful chain,” Lucretius captures the mercilessness and inevitability of extinction. In fact, not only did he detail the processes by which species perished, but he made sense of the destruction. Those species which perished were, as it turns out, those which could not find a means to ensure their survival, be that through instinctive traits or compatibility with man. All those ideas are best crystallized in this final passage, as he describes all the life forms that must have gone extinct and the reasons for their disappearance: …some Bereft of feet, or orphaned of their hands, and others dumb, Being devoid of mouth; and others yet, with no eyes, blind.

Some had their limbs stuck to the body, tightly in a bind, And couldn’t do anything, or move, and so could not evade Harm, or forage for bare necessities. And the Earth made Other kinds of monsters too, but in vain, since with each, Nature frowned upon their growth. 49 In describing all the various reasons why species go extinct, from being “[b]ereft of feet” to having “limbs stuck to the body, tightly in a bind,” Lucretius actually touches upon natural selection as well. Nonetheless, the idea of “Nature frown[ing] upon...growth” communicates a keen understanding of species’ disappearance. It is simply inarguable that even in the first century BCE, Lucretius did in fact conceive of species’ extinction or at least some variation of it.

Ultimately, the Lucretian view on extinction and ephemerality is most accurately described by Greenblatt: “species existed and vanished before we came onto the scene; our kind, too, will

49

Carus, 174.

Dharmaraj 19 vanish one day.” 50 Compounded together, these views no doubt had a powerful effect on the writing of Erasmus, and subsequently, on that of Charles Darwin.

Erasmus’ Remarks on Evanescence of Life and Life Forms Drawing from Lucretius on the subject of mortality, Erasmus Darwin further formalized the view that all life and life forms must eventually perish, especially those somehow unfit. More so, his postulations on the cyclical regeneration of life is unmistakably taken from the Lucretian doctrine. Take Book II of The Temple of Nature, where he pontificates on life’s brevity: How short the span of Life! …When Time’s cold hands the languid senses seize, Chill the dull nerves, the lingering currents freeze; Organic matter, unreclaim’d by Life, Reverts to elements by chemic strife. …Reproduction with ethereal fires New Life rekindles, ere the first expires 51 This passage particularly resembles Lucretian verse, and no doubt, Erasmus Darwin probably absorbed these ideas after reading De Rerum Natura numerous times. The very concept of “[o]rganic matter…/[r]evert[ing] to elements by chemic strife” particularly resembles Lucretius’ “Everything flows” passage and, more broadly, the belief that living things all return to atoms in the end. More so, the idea of life “rekindl[ing]” when other life “expires” evinces a conviction that atoms always take on new forms — a conviction that exactly reflects Lucretius’ verse, “For as one thing grows feeble with old age and starts to falter, / Another strengthens, emerging from

50

Greenblatt, "The Answer.”

51

Darwin, The Temple, 29.

Dharmaraj 20 obscurity.” 52 Indeed, that same notion of atomistic cyclical regeneration reappears several times throughout the course of Erasmus’s work: Thus while new forms reviving tribes acquire Each passing moment, as the old expire; Like insects swarming in the noontide bower, Rise into being, and exist an hour; The births and deaths contend with equal strife 53 Here, Erasmus Darwin truly gets at the idea of ephemerality, as suggested by phrases like “each passing moment” and “exist an hour.” 54 However, he is not just discussing the birth and death of a single being here; rather, he describes the rise and fall of collective species. Consider the phrases “new forms” and “the old.” 55 Both of these ideas are too similar to the Lucretian passage describing how “one stage / Of the Earth gives way to another” not to have been inspired by them. 56 Meanwhile, Book IV of The Temple of Nature is filled with verse describing the inevitable death and destruction of all life: Soon the fair forms with vital being bless’d, Time’s feeble children, lose the boon possess’d; …And thus, alternating with death, fulfil

52

Carus, The Nature, 174.

53

Darwin, The Temple, 98-99.

54

Darwin, 99.

55

Darwin, 99.

56

Carus, The Nature, 174.

Dharmaraj 21 The silent mandates of the Almighty Will; Whose hand unseen the works of nature dooms By laws unknown — WHO GIVES, AND WHO RESUMES. 57 What Erasmus Darwin describes here constitutes an even more elaborated theory of extinction than that of Lucretius. In capitalizing “WHO GIVES, AND WHO RESUMES,” he draws emphasis to the idea of conditional survival, and by extension, conditional extinction. 58 Taken with the assertion that the death of certain life forms satisfies “Almighty Will” through hidden “works of nature,” this passage is one step closer to the modernly accepted notion of extinction.59 Nonetheless, his basis in Epicureanism is clear, as this verse is reminiscent of the following lines from De Rerum Natura: “[Nature] cannot bear any more / What once she could, but now brings forth what she could not before.” 60 The rhetorical question “WHO GIVES, AND WHO RESUMES” could even be considered an editorialized paraphrase of those lines from Lucretius, and the phrase “alternating with death” exactly captures the cyclical process that Lucretius described. 61 Finally, the passage in De Rerum Natura that specifically discusses the extinction of species is clearly imitated in The Temple of Nature: When no new Sex with glands nutritious feeds, Nurs’d in her womb, the solitary breeds;

57

Darwin, The Temple, 97-98.

58

Darwin, 98.

59

Darwin, 98.

60

Carus, The Nature, 174.

61

Darwin, The Temple, 98.

Dharmaraj 22 No Mother’s care in their early steps directs, Warms in her bosom, with her wings protects; The clime unkind, or noxious food instills To embryon nerves hereditary ills; The feeble births acquired diseases chase, Till Death extinguish the degenerate race. 62 Indeed, the “suchlike qualities” that Lucretius considers essential to survival are apparent here: Erasmus Darwin’s phrases “hereditary ills” and “disease chase” summarize Lucretius’ statements on blindness, defective limbs, and dumbness in his long Book V passage regarding the “freaks” of the Earth. 63 Lucretius’ “monsters” whose “[growth] Nature frowned upon” are equivalent to Erasmus Darwin’s “degenerate race[s]” which “Death [will] extinguish.” 64 Granted, Erasmus Darwin does add some of his own points, namely the idea of orphanage, food poisoning, and defects being spawned in the womb, but still, the resemblance to Lucretius’ ideas is uncanny and only attributable to the close ideological relationship between the two authors. Therefore, it is abundantly clear that throughout The Temple of Nature, Erasmus Darwin describes a theory of extinction that takes it basis in the writings of Lucretius.

The Culmination of Ideas on Extinction in Charles Darwin The proto-evolutionary ideas present in De Rerum Natura and then elaborated upon in The Temple of Nature took final form in Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species, and they were obviously inspired by Darwin’s two predecessors. In truth, Charles Darwin did not write

62

Darwin, 34.

63

Darwin, 34.; Carus, The Nature, 174.

64

Darwin, The Temple, 34.; Carus, The Nature, 174.

Dharmaraj 23 much about extinction specifically; however, his numerous passages describing natural selection mention the idea. Interestingly, in the section entitled “Natural Selection,” Charles Darwin explicitly notes that “[extinction] must be here alluded to from being intimately connected with natural selection.” 65 As mentioned earlier, Lucretius and Erasmus Darwin both subtly made that very same connection between the two concepts, and so in a sense, Charles Darwin was just stating that which had already been implied.

From here, Darwin explains, “as new forms are continually and slowly being produced, unless we believe that the number of specific forms goes on perpetually and almost indefinitely increasing, numbers inevitably must become extinct.” 66 In that same vein, he contends, “the appearance of new forms and the disappearance of old forms, both natural and artificial, are bound together.” 67 Indubitably, what Charles Darwin writes about in these statements is uncannily similar to Erasmus Darwin’s statement that “births and deaths contend with equal strife,” which in turn is taken from Lucretius’ views on Nature’s constant flux. 68 Of course, Charles Darwin’s view on the rise and fall of an ecosystem’s species is the most accurate and nuanced, but the thread of inspiration, that life forms come and go cyclically, can still be clearly traced back to Lucretius.

Similarly, Charles Darwin notes that “the increase of every living being is constantly being checked by unperceived injurious agencies; and…these same unperceived agencies are

Charles Darwin, On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection: Or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life, ed. William Bynum (New York: Penguin Group, 2011), 104.

65

66

Darwin, 105.

67

Darwin, 284.

68

Darwin, The Temple, 98-99.

Dharmaraj 24 amply sufficient to cause rarity, and finally extinction.” 69 In this statement, Lucretius’ influence is clearly visible. What Charles Darwin terms “unperceived injurious agencies” is simply a more nuanced version of what Erasmus Darwin named “hereditary ills,” which, as has been proven above, is a summary of Lucretian ideas on anatomical defectiveness. 70 By way of concession, Darwin, here, does inject his own observed expertise, bringing in the idea of “rarity” preceding extinction and clarifying that said defects were actually “check[s]” on population. 71 Even then, though, the obvious progression of ideas on extinction’s causes, starting with Lucretius and extending down to Charles Darwin, simply cannot be disputed.

In conclusion, Lucretius’ ideas on extinction, particularly on the fluidity of nature and the inevitable downfall of defective-bodied species, subtly but surely made their way into Charles Darwin’s final work, with Erasmus Darwin playing the role of a middleman, of sorts. Scholars Monte Johnson and Catherine Wilson perhaps sum it up best: “Lucretius did not technically elaborate a theory of evolution…[b]ut he did develop the older atomistic idea that extinctions play a key role in determining what life is now present on earth, a view developed by Erasmus’ grandson, Charles Darwin.” 72 Survival of the Fittest, from Lucretius to Charles Darwin As noted, however, it would be essentially vacuous to discuss extinction without mentioning what is known today as natural selection, a term coined by, and largely attributed to, Darwin himself and one that will be used synonymously with “survival of the fittest” for the

69

Darwin, On the Origin, 283.

70

Darwin, 283; Darwin, The Temple, 34.

71

Darwin, On the Origin, 283.

72

Johnson and Wilson, "Lucretius and the History," 143.

Dharmaraj 25 balance of this paper. However, in the same way that his ideas on extinction were not entirely original, Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection too takes its roots in Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura, with Erasmus Darwin’s rhyming couplets once again bridging centuries of thought.

Lucretius’ Primitive Conception of “Survival of the Fittest” As English biologist J.B.S Haldane posits, “[t]he fact of natural selection was quite well recognized before Darwin’s time,” going on to cite a passage from Book V of De Rerum Natura as evidence. 73 Indeed, Haldane is correct, as Lucretius’ references to the idea of natural selection are almost innumerable. To start out with, Lucretius enumerates all the various characteristics that make a certain organism fit for reproduction, namely: …a supply Of food, first, and a means for the engendering seed to flow Throughout the body and out of the lax limbs; and also so The female and the male can mate. 74 Essentially, Lucretius here postulates, in poetic terms, that all living things need sources of nourishment, including food and water, and anatomical organs for sexual reproduction to survive.

What follows is perhaps one of the most widely cited examples of Lucretius’ evolutionary prescience: For any beast you look upon that drinks life-giving air, Has either wits, or bravery, or fleetness of foot to spare,

J.B.S. Haldane, "Natural Selection," in Darwin's Biological Work: Some Aspects Reconsidered, ed. Peter R. Bell (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 102, accessed September 3, 2018.

73

74

Carus, The Nature, 174.

Dharmaraj 26 Ensuring its survival from its genesis to now.

And many other animals survive because of how Useful they are to us — entrusted to the care of Man. 75 In just five lines, Lucretius summarizes the foundational basics of both natural selection (which, he claims, operates upon the parameters of intelligence, cunning, and speed) and artificial selection (the notion that species subsist because of their benefit to humankind). From here, he presents example after example of natural selection: “take the savage race of lions, that ferocious clan — / They’ve been preserved by courage; foxes by craftiness; stags, flight.” 76 Significantly, Johnson and Wilson note that “Lucretius’ selection principle, arguing that currently existing species of animals are those which, unlike their counterparts, had apt combinations of organs and were thus able to survive and reproduce…was common amongst the philosophes,” suggesting that these ideas have other classical bases as well. 77 Furthermore, the idea of being “entrusted to the care of Man” segues perfectly to the following passage, which continues to expand upon the subject of artificial selection: But the dog, steadfast of heart, whose sleep is vigilant and light, …The sheep of woolly fleece, and oxen of the hornèd head — We’ve taken under our protection, Memmius, all of these, For they were happy to flee from predators, and longed for peace, And to feast on food not got by their own labour at our board — Which for their usefulness we offered them as their reward. 78 75

Carus, 174-175.

76

Carus, 175.

77

Johnson and Wilson, "Lucretius and the History," 143.

78

Carus, The Nature, 175.

Dharmaraj 27 With a litany of examples, ranging from dogs to sheep to oxen, Lucretius presents a clear-cut view of artificial selection: animals that adapt to the needs of humans are preserved “under our protection,” receiving harmony, free sustenance, and safety in exchange for their utility.

However, if those ideas themselves were not advanced enough, Lucretius even comments on the concept of habitation, as it relates to natural selection: Again, a tree can’t live up in the sky, a cloud can’t scud In the deep sea, a fish can’t live out in the fields, nor blood Pulse through bark and branches, nor does sap flow through a stone But each thing has a fixed place where it grows to call its own. 79 The idea of habitation based on natural selection is by no means formalized in this passage, but in presenting obviously outrageous organism-habitat combinations and stating that every organism “grows” in “a fixed place,” Lucretius at least anticipates it. All in all, in De Rerum Natura, Lucretius lays out the groundwork for the Darwinian conception of “survival of the fittest,” while also alluding to artificial selection and habitation. In the first century BCE, such ideas were impressive, to say the least.

Erasmus Darwin’s Proto-Evolutionary Theories regarding “Survival of the Fittest” As they did with extinction, Lucretius’ ideas on natural selection found new life in the words of Erasmus Darwin. Having picked up on the ideas presented in De Rerum Natura, Erasmus too presents a dichotomy between natural and artificial selection within Zoonomia, citing “the great changes introduced into various animals by artificial or accidental

79

Carus, 95.

Dharmaraj 28 cultivation.” 80 Zeroing in on natural selection, specifically, Erasmus Darwin formalizes Lucretius’ list of animalian examples into “the three great objects of desire, which have changed the forms of many animals by their exertions to gratify them,” namely “those of lust, hunger, and security.” 81 Closer analysis of his writings on the subjects reveal a profound connection to the very characteristics Lucretius had written about centuries earlier.

In describing the necessity of sexual intercourse for living things, Erasmus Darwin asserts that “the strongest and most active animal should propagate the species, which should thence become improved,” a claim not too far off from Lucretius’ notion that organisms require “a means for the engendering seed to flow / Throughout the body and out of the lax limbs; and also so / The female and the male can mate.” 82 At another point in De Rerum Natura, Lucretius refers to procreation as “the act of Venus,” essentially the Roman term for the realization of “lust.” 83 Next, Erasmus Darwin postulates that the survival of animal species is also contingent upon their ability to satiate their hunger. He writes: The nose of the swine has become hard for the purpose of turning up the soil in search of insects and of roots...which seem to have been gradually produced during many generations by the perpetual endeavour during many generations of the creatures to supply want of food 84

Erasmus Darwin, Zoonomia, or the Laws of Organic Life, Classic Reprint Series (London: Forgotten Books, 2017), 1:369.

80

81

Darwin, Zoonomia, or the Laws, 1:371.

82

Darwin, 1:371; Carus, The Nature, 174.

83

Carus, 174; Darwin, Zoonomia, or the Laws, 1:371.

84

Darwin, 1:371.

Dharmaraj 29 Strikingly, the phrase “supply want of food” is almost exactly the same as Lucretius’ “supply of food.” 85 Erasmus Darwin inserts his own example of a swine’s nose, but the passage must have been inspired by Lucretius’ theory that the ability to procure food is one of the requisite components of any animal’s survival.

The final characteristic Erasmus Darwin delineates is “security, which seems much to have diversified the forms of [animals’] bodies, and the colour of them: these consist in the means of escaping other animals more powerful than themselves.” 86 Indeed, the concept of “security” seems to be adapted from the following lines of Lucretius: “any beast… / Has either wits, or bravery, or fleetness of foot to spare” that “[ensures] its survival from its genesis to now.” 87 As such, Erasmus Darwin’s term “security” encompasses the Lucretian concepts of intelligence, cunning, and speed. This idea also seems to be in part inspired by Lucretius’ list of animalian examples (“lion…preserved by courage; foxes by craftiness; stags, flight”), each of which would also fall under the umbrella of “security.” 88 Following this list in Zoonomia, Erasmus Darwin injects a new aspect to evolutionary theory, namely that “one and the same kind of living filaments is, and has been the cause of all organic life.” 89 Lucretius does not explicitly present such a unified view of life’s origin; however, when it comes to Erasmus Darwin’s explanation of the characteristics by which life diversified, Lucretius’ influence is ever-present.

85

Darwin, 1:371; Carus, The Nature, 174.

86

Darwin, Zoonomia, or the Laws, 1:371.

87

Carus, The Nature, 174-175; Darwin, Zoonomia, or the Laws, 1:371

88

Carus, The Nature, 175; Darwin, Zoonomia, or the Laws, 1:371

89

Darwin, 1:371

Dharmaraj 30 Likewise, The Temple of Nature contains myriad fragments of Lucretian thought. To start, it is best to consider one of the most famously modern passages in the work: Organic Life beneath the shoreless waves Was born and nurs’d in Ocean’s pearly caves; First forms minute, unseen by spheric glass, Move on the mud, or pierce the watery mass; These, as successive generations bloom, New powers acquire, and larger limbs assume; Whence countless groups of vegetation spring, And breathing realms of fin, and feet, and wing. 90 Many Lucretian concepts inform this verse. For instance, the very idea of “limbs” as an evolutionary parameter is definitely taken from the pontifications on defective “limbs” found within De Rerum Natura. 91 As with the previous example, the “new powers” that animals “acquire” also appear to be a more advanced iteration of Lucretius’ theory on “wits, or bravery, or fleetness of foot.” 92 Novel, however, is the idea of life originating “in Ocean’s pearly caves” and continuously evolving into the “breathing realms of fin, and feet, and wing.” Directly following this passage, Erasmus Darwin writes: Thus the tall Oak, the giant of the wood, …The Whale, unmeasured monster of the main, The lordly Lion, monarch of the plain,

90

Darwin, The Temple, 11.

91

Carus, The Nature, 174.

92

Darwin, The Temple, 11; Carus, The Nature, 174

Dharmaraj 31 The Eagle soaring in the realms of air, …Imperious man, who rules the bestial crowd, …Arose from rudiments of form and sense, An embryon point, or microscopic ens! 93 Indeed, the phrase “[t]he lordly Lion, monarch of the plain” simply must have been inspired by Lucretius’ reference to “the savage race of lions, that ferocious clan.” 94 Moreover, the list of evolutionarily fit organisms here (from oak trees to eagles) is presented in the exact same format and context as the list in De Rerum Natura (covering deer, foxes, and more), further proof that the latter work exerted tremendous influence on the former. In listing each animal alongside its usual dwelling (i.e. “the tall Oak, the giant of the wood”), this verse also gets at the concept of habitation, which Lucretius referred to in his work.

Not only were Erasmus Darwin’s ideas on natural selection inspired by Lucretius, however; they also, in turn, greatly inspired his grandson. With the two passages from The Temple of Nature in mind, Professor David Bardell observes that Erasmus Darwin discusses life from the primordial emergence of nanoscopic organisms to the ultimate appearance of homo sapiens and, in doing so, propounds a theory of evolution that is both clear and comprehensive. 95 Taken together, these ideas are clear predecessors to the specific concepts “which Charles was to make famous in The Origin: struggle for survival and selection of the ‘fittest.’” 96 The one main difference, however, was that Erasmus Darwin believed evolution had some greater goal or was,

93

Darwin, The Temple, 11-12.

94

Darwin, 12; Carus, The Nature, 175.

95

Bardell, "Erasmus Darwin," 63-64.

96

Smith, "Like Grandfather," 186.

Dharmaraj 32 in a word, teleological. 97 Meanwhile, his grandson was famous for holding the exact opposite conviction.

Charles Darwin’s Finalized Notion of Natural Selection Survival of the fittest, or natural selection, has long been considered the most novel, revolutionary component of Charles Darwin’s theory. However, by turning to the works of Lucretius and Charles’s own grandfather, it is clear that even that idea was not fully original. To begin with, it is worth reviewing Darwin’s operating definition of the concept: “[t]his preservation of favourable variations and the rejection of injurious variations, I call Natural Selection.” 98 On that same subject, he elaborates, “every slight modification, which in the course of ages chanced to arise, and which in any way favoured the individuals of any of the species, by better adapting them to their altered conditions, would tend to be preserved.” 99 Even just within these few statements, Lucretius’ influence is present. The very concept of “modification[s] …favour[ing] the individuals of any species” is akin to Erasmus Darwin’s “new powers” and “survival” instincts, which, as proven, were taken directly from Lucretius’ lists. 100 The next significant section of On the Origin of Species that retains the influence of Lucretius and Erasmus Darwin is as follows: Let us take the case of a wolf, which preys on various animals, securing some by craft, some by strength, and some by fleetness; and let us suppose that the fleetest prey, a deer for instance, had from any change in the country increased in numbers, or that other prey

97

Smith, 193.

98

Darwin, On the Origin, 81.

99

Darwin, 81.

100

Darwin, 81; Darwin, The Temple, 11; Darwin, Zoonomia, or the Laws, 1:371

Dharmaraj 33 had decreased in numbers…the swiftest and slimmest wolves would have the best chance of surviving, and so be preserved or selected 101 In giving an example of natural selection favoring quick, trim wolves, Charles Darwin draws upon Lucretius’ centuries-old list of examples, which incidentally includes the very turn of phrase “foxes [preserved] by craftiness;” the larger point, however, is that the use of a list of animalian examples to prove “Survival of the Fittest” started with Lucretius and reached Charles Darwin through Erasmus. 102 Next, Charles Darwin comments on artificial selection in a way that is clearly, albeit indirectly, influenced by the Lucretian doctrine. Specifically, he asserts: “Man can improve the fleetness of his greyhounds by careful and methodical selection, or by that unconscious selection which results from each man trying to keep the best dogs without any thought of modifying the breed.” 103 Interestingly, Lucretius uses the very example of dogs to describe a primitive version of artificial selection (that those species which are beneficial to mankind are more likely to survive) — an idea which was then translated into Erasmus Darwin’s claim in Zoonomia that biological changes can stem from “artificial…cultivation,” and presumably, into the much more detailed account of the phenomenon here. 104 Finally, Lucretius’ early ideas on habitation, a direct consequence of natural selection, made their way into On the Origin of Species as well. In fact, chapter 11, “Geographical Distribution,” of the latter begins with the given that there is a “distribution of organic beings

101

Darwin, On the Origin, 89.

102

Carus, The Nature, 175.

103

Darwin, On the Origin, 89.

104

Carus, The Nature, 175; Darwin, Zoonomia, or the Laws, 1:371

Dharmaraj 34 over the face of the globe.” 105 Darwin goes on to spend the balance of the chapter discussing the various attributes that inform habitation and habitat selection —theories which must have been derived from Erasmus Darwin’s description of various organisms flourishing within their habitats, which was, in turn, definitely derived from Lucretius’ description of how ludicrous it would be if that were not the case. 106 Thus, on the topic of “Survival of the Fittest” (and, consequently, artificial selection and habitation), many of Charles Darwin’s ideas seem to have blossomed from Lucretius’ on the same subjects, transmitted via Erasmus Darwin’s works Zoonomia and The Temple of Nature. Of course, as previously stated, Charles’ ideas are more complex than his predecessors’, but the influence is still undeniable.

Ultimately, the ideas Lucretius presented in De Rerum Natura were advanced well beyond their age, and they came to bear on Charles Darwin indirectly through Erasmus Darwin’s works. Given an array of almost indisputable literary and biographical evidence, it is clear that Lucretius was a literary hero for Erasmus Darwin. Next, Erasmus Darwin obviously exerted great influence on his grandson, considering the evidence from Charles’ childhood as well as the notes supporting his work. With both these individual links in mind, it is easy to demonstrate that Lucretius did in fact have a tangible, although indirect, influence on Charles Darwin.

Specifically, Lucretius’ atomistic view of the universe informed Charles’ concept of extinction, with Erasmus’ ideas serving as a link. The Epicurean belief in the return to nothingness so prominent in the pages of De Rerum Natura clearly parallels select verses from Erasmus’ The Temple of Nature, a book that Charles Darwin is known to have read given the

105

Darwin, On the Origin, 306.

106

Darwin, The Temple, 11-12; Carus, The Nature, 95.

Dharmaraj 35 evidence found in his notebooks. These ideas took final form in Charles Darwin’s theory of extinction: he draws from Lucretius’ theory on the inevitable flow of natural processes and formalizes Lucretius’ preliminary list of reasons for the extinction of species into scientific terms.

More so, Lucretius’ proto-evolutionary ideas concerning animalian survival shaped Charles Darwin’s famous sections on Natural Selection in On the Origin of Species. In De Rerum Natura, Lucretius discusses the qualities that any given species needs to survive, therein predicting the process of natural selection. These qualities are refined and further detailed by Erasmus Darwin in his Zoonomia and The Temple of Nature and then finalized by Charles Darwin in his famous evolutionary treatise. Additionally, the ideas of habitation and artificial selection are presented alongside every instance of natural selection, in the works of all three authors.

In this paper, only the content within these poems has been compared, not the context or reception. Indeed, all three of the poems examined above suffered through periods of intense backlash for their controversial and vehemently anti-Creationist positions; as such, it would be interesting and potentially quite enlightening to investigate the similarities between the intense reactions to the three different works in different eras. Regardless, that Lucretius either directly or indirectly exerted influence on the work produced by Charles Darwin is practically indisputable, and more broadly, a testament to the legacy of the works of all of the ancient philosophes, even in a modern world.

Dharmaraj 36 Bibliography Bardell, David. "Erasmus Darwin Expressed His Concept of Evolution in Poetry." Bios 72, no. 2 (May 2001). https://www-jstor-org.puffin.harker.org/stable/4608594?pqorigsite=summon&seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents.

A biology professor at Kean University, Dr. David Bardell has written several articles for the Bios journal and others, specifically regarding the history of biology. In this four-page article, Bardell discusses the highly advanced evolutionary ideas that can be found in Erasmus Darwin's poetry, and he concludes with the speculation that these ideas may have come to bear in Charles Darwin's writing.

Carus, Titus Lucretius. The Nature of Things. Translated by Alicia Stallings. London: Penguin, 2007.

Around 50 B.C.E, Titus Lucretius Carus wrote his only known work, De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things), a didactic treatise on atoms, humankind, morality, nature, and the universe as a whole. Written in dactylic hexameter, the poem puts forth Lucretius' many musings, all inspired by Epicurean thought. Although ancient, it is undeniable that the poem impacted later Roman and Western works in style and content. The Penguin Classics version is translated by A. E. Stallings and includes an introduction by Richard Jenkyns.

Colp, Ralph, Jr. "The Relationship of Charles Darwin to the Ideas of His Grandfather, Dr. Erasmus Darwin." Biography 9, no. 1 (Winter 1986): 1-24. https://muse-jhuedu.puffin.harker.org/article/372633/pdf.

Ralph Colp Jr. is a late psychiatrist and Ph.D. from Columbia University, and he penned the famous work To Be an Invalid: The Illnesses of Charles Darwin. In this particular scholarly article, Colp tracks the melodramatic relationship between Charles and his grandfather's legacy, highlighting all the major inflection points on Charles's journey.

Darwin, Charles. "Autobiography." In The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, edited by Francis Darwin, 26-108. Vol. 1. London, 1887. Accessed January 30, 2019. http://darwinonline.org.uk/content/frameset?pageseq=1&itemID=F1452.1&viewtype=side.

Charles Darwin's son, Francis Darwin, edited and compiled this anthology of letters from the life of his famous father. Cited here is Volume I, which begins with a preface written

by Francis himself; notably, a few of the letters reveal Charles making direct reference to his grandfather's works.

———. "Books to Be Read and Books Read." 1851. Accessed September 27, 2018. http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?viewtype=text&itemID=CUL-DAR119.&pageseq=1.

Available on the Darwin-Online archive, this transcribed of Charles Darwin's contains a lengthy list of 'Books to be Read' and 'Books Read.' Such a primary source is incredibly important for this paper, as the 'Books Read' includes three of his grandfather's masterworks. The transcription was carried out by Dr. Kees Rookmaker of the National University of Singapore.

Dharmaraj 37 ———. On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection: Or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. Edited by William Bynum. New York: Penguin Group, 2011.

Published in 1859, On the Origin of Species sold out the day it was released, and since then, has remained an indisputably seminal work in the history of Western science.

Having toured the world as a naturalist after receiving a degree from Christ's College, Charles Darwin formulated his theory of all living things, based on his first-hand observations of the natural world, in this treatise; the book, complete with an explanation of descent through natural selection, is now the basis for modern-day evolutionary thought.

Darwin, Erasmus. The Temple of Nature. Edited by Rickard Berghorn. Charlestown: Timaios Press, 2014.

Originally published in 1803, The Temple of Nature was Erasmus Darwin's famously didactic, proto-evolutionary, and epic poem. Scholars have consistently described it as incredibly Lucretian in nature, content-wise and style-wise; moreover, it can be interpreted as an important influence on Charles Darwin's work.

———. Zoonomia, or the Laws of Organic Life. Vol. 1. Classic Reprint Series. London: Forgotten Books, 2017.

One of Erasmus Darwin's masterworks, Zoonomia (in two volumes) discusses many facets of medicine and human anatomy, and in so doing, touches upon evolutionary theory. In 1794, the first copy was published, and certain verses from it are eerily similar to the ideas presented in On the Origin of Species.

Gillespie, Stuart, and Philip Hardie. Introduction to The Cambridge Companion to Lucretius, 115. Cambridge Companions to Literature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.

In 2007, author Stuart Gillespie and Professor Philip Hardie of the University of Cambridge co-edited The Cambridge Companion to Lucretius, a comprehensive guide covering the context and reception of Lucretius' groundbreaking poem. In this introduction chapter, they cover the basic Epicurean inspiration for Lucretius' famous De Rerum Natura and briefly preview the great impacts the ancient poem had on many areas of later Western thought. As such, these pages prove useful for introducing Lucretius and setting the stage for an argument about his influence on Charles Darwin.

Greenblatt, Stephen. "The Answer Man." The New Yorker, August 8, 2011. Accessed September 3, 2018. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/08/08/the-answer-man-stephengreenblatt.

Stephen Greenblatt is Harvard University's John Cogan University Professor of the Humanities, and he has written extensively on Lucretius' De Rerum Natura. Published in a 2011 issue of the New Yorker, this personal article covers Lucretius' legacy and how it relates to some aspects of Greenblatt's personal life. In some of the article's contextual foreground lies valuable insight into Lucretius' main philosophies.

———. The Swerve: How the World Became Modern. Paperback ed. New York: Norton, 2012.

Dharmaraj 38 In 2011, Harvard professor Stephen Greenblatt published The Swerve: How the World Became Modern, analyzing the reintroduction of Lucretius into mainstream culture and its impacts on the European intellectual revolution. The book is highly acclaimed, having won a Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award for non-fiction.

Haldane, J.B.S. "Natural Selection." In Darwin's Biological Work: Some Aspects Reconsidered, edited by Peter R. Bell. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. Accessed September 3, 2018. https://books.google.com/books?id=y7zTCmZAvtMC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs _ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false.

Edited by botanist Peter Bell, this anthology of essays includes discussion of several important Darwinian postulates. In particular, this essay by English scientist John Burdon Sanderson Haldane focuses on the concept of Natural Selection and its ideological predecessors. The anthology was published in 1959.

Harris, William. "Lucretius: The Roman Epicurean Scientist." Humanities and the Liberal Arts.

Accessed January 24, 2019. http://wayback.archiveit.org/6670/20161201175931/http://community.middlebury.edu/~harris/LatinAuthors/Lu cretius.html.

A Professor Emeritus of the classics at Middlebury College, William Harris wrote much on the humanistic output of various authors throughout several eras. This website serves as a memorial to Harris' legacy, and it includes an archival list of several of his noteworthy essays and texts. The page cited dives deeply into Lucretius and can be found in the "Latin Author Index."

Jackson, Noel. "Rhyme and Reason: Erasmus Darwin's Romanticism." Modern Language Quarterly 70, no. 2 (June 1, 2009): 171-94. Accessed September 3, 2018. https://dspace.mit.edu/openaccess-disseminate/1721.1/53717.

Noel Jackson is an associate professor of literature at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and he specializes in British Romanticism. This article, included within the Modern Language Quarterly 2009 Issue, considers Romanticism as it applies to the works of Erasmus Darwin. Within this discussion is the observation that Lucretian ideology informed not only the work of Erasmus Darwin, but of many of his contemporaries as well.

"Jean-Baptiste Lamarck." In Biology, edited by Richard Robinson. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2009. http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=BIC&u=harker&id=GALE%7CK2642110010&v=2.1 &it=r&sid=summon#.

Biology is a well-known basic encyclopedia, published by Macmillan Reference USA. Specifically, the entry on Jean-Baptiste Lamarck goes over the biography of that famous French naturalist, information crucial to understanding how Darwin set out to define his intellectual image.

Dharmaraj 39 Johnson, Monte, and Catherine Wilson. "Lucretius and the History of Science." In The Cambridge Companion to Lucretius, edited by Stuart Gillespie and Philip Hardie, 13148. Cambridge Companions to Literature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.

Authored by philosophy professors Monte Johnson of the University of California, San Diego and Catherine Wilson of the City University of New York, this chapter of The Cambridge Companion to Lucretius explores the manifold ways in which De Rerum Natura shaped Western science, in disciplines ranging from physics to medicine. Within this discussion is a section specifically outlining Lucretius' ideological relationship to both Erasmus and Charles Darwin as well as the exact ways in which his ideas came to bear on evolutionary theory.

King-Hele, Desmond. Erasmus Darwin: A Life of Unequalled Achievement. London: DLM, 1999.

Dr. Desmond King-Hele is largely considered the world's leading scholar on Erasmus Darwin, having held various academic positions and having authored several books on the history of science. In this work, he provides a comprehensive biography of Erasmus's life and work, citing an impressive array of historical details. Indeed, some of these notes are incredibly relevant to proving Erasmus' ideological relationship to Lucretius.

Krause, Ernst. Life of Erasmus Darwin. Translated by W.S. Dallas. London, 1879. Accessed January 29, 2019. http://darwinonline.org.uk/content/frameset?pageseq=1&itemID=F1319&viewtype=text.

In the late 1800s, German scientist Ernst Krause, an editor of Darwinian magazine Kosmos, asked Charles Darwin for a contribution about his grandfather. Honored, Charles Darwin spent the next couple of years finding materials on his grandfather and writing what would eventually become the preface to Life of Erasmus Darwin. This selection is profoundly important, given that it includes first-hand evidence of all that Darwin knew about his grandfather.

Martin, Kirsten Anne. "Erasmus Darwin's Deistic Dissent and Didactic Epic Poetry: Promoting Science Education to a Mixed Audience under the Banner of Tolerance." PhD diss., Queen's University, 2012. https://search-proquestcom.puffin.harker.org/pqdt/docview/1951300133/previewPDF/8D3DD227CB3F4F81PQ /1?accountid=618.

Submitted as a Ph.D. thesis at Queen's University, this statement goes over the didactic poetry of Erasmus Darwin and the implications of his choice of medium. In so doing, it spends a fair deal of time examining the influence of Lucretius' De Rerum Natura (particularly in terms of meter and form) on Erasmus.

Priestman, Martin. "Lucretius in Romantic and Victorian Britain." In The Cambridge Companion to Lucretius, edited by Stuart Gillespie and Philip Hardie, 289-305. Cambridge Companions to Literature. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.

This particular chapter of The Cambridge Companion to Lucretius is written by Roehampton University English Professor Martin Priestman, an expert on literature of the Romantic era. In explicating the impact of De Rerum Natura on Romantic and Victorian

Dharmaraj 40 Britain, Priestman specifically touches upon Erasmus Darwin and his Lucretian inspirations.

Primer, Irwin. "Erasmus Darwin's Temple of Nature: Progress, Evolution, and the Eleusinian Mysteries." Journal of the History of Ideas 25, no. 1 (1964): 58-76. https://www-jstororg.puffin.harker.org/stable/2708085?pqorigsite=summon&seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents.

Irwin Primer was a professor at Rutgers University, focusing on English literature. In this widely cited article published in the Journal of the History of Ideas, Primer takes on the task of broadly analyzing the masterworks of Erasmus Darwin from a myriad of perspectives. Although he does not specifically discuss Lucretius much, the few mentions that are present of the Roman poet are nonetheless insightful.

Scott, Alexander. "Darwin, Charles." In Encyclopedia of Environmental Issues, Revised Edition, edited by Craig W. Allin. Hackensack: Salem, 2011. https://online-salempresscom.puffin.harker.org/articleDetails.do?articleName=EnvIs_119746701197.

Biographical in nature, this article from the Encyclopedia of Environmental Issues examines the life of Charles Darwin. Indeed, the biographical details presented here are useful in providing context for the argument being made in this paper.

Smith, C.U.M. "Like Grandfather, Like Grandson: Erasmus and Charles Darwin on Evolution."

Perspectives in Biology and Medicine 53, no. 2 (2010): 186-99. https://search-proquestcom.puffin.harker.org/docview/366304130?pq-origsite=summon.

Christopher Upham Murray (C.U.M.) Smith, a faculty member and later fellow at Aston University, wrote extensively on biology and, with that, the history of science. Here, Smith substantiates the argument that Erasmus Darwin exerted tremendous influence on his famous grandson, citing specific contextual and literary evidence (with the goal of bringing some new credit to the former's work).

Stott, Rebecca. Darwin's Ghosts: The Secret History of Evolution. Spiegel & Grau, 2012. https://books.google.com/books/about/Darwin_s_Ghosts.html?id=5Z0AjsXyveAC. A professor of literature at the University of East Anglia, Rebecca Stott has explored the history of science in her lifetime, with a focus on Charles Darwin. In this comprehensive book, Stott discusses the list of Charles Darwin's predecessors (albeit focusing in on European writers more modern than Lucretius). Still, she spends a few valuable paragraphs discussing Lucretius, Epicurus, and the Romans.

Talbot, John. "Poet Laureate of Atoms." The Weekly Standard, June 15, 2009. Accessed September 3, 2018. https://www.weeklystandard.com/john-talbot/poet-laureate-of-atoms.

In 2009, Brigham Young University literature professor John Talbot published an article in The Weekly Standard describing Lucretius and his tremendous impact on history (specifically, European intellectual history). Within this article lies a discussion of the Roman poet's influence on the Darwinian revolution.

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