Charles Darwin

We can allow satellites, planets, suns, universe, nay whole systems of universes, to be governed by laws, but the smallest insect, we wish to be created at once by special act.

An American Monkey after getting drunk on Brandy would never touch it again, and thus is much wiser than most men.

It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.
Charles Darwin - Voyage of the Beagle
If the misery of our poor be caused not by the laws of nature, but by our institutions, great is our sin.

A scientific man ought to have no wishes, no affections, -- a mere heart of stone.

The fact of evolution is the backbone of biology, and biology is thus in the peculiar position of being a science founded on an improved theory, is it then a science or faith?

We must, however, acknowledge as it seems to me, that a man with all his noble qualities...still bears in his bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin.
Charles Darwin - The Descent of Man 1871
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 humblest living creature, with his god-like intellect which has penetrated into the movements and constitution of the solar system- with all these exalted powers- Man still bears in his bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin.

Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science.

Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowlege: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science.
Charles Darwin - The Origin of Species 1859
In the struggle for survival, the fittest win out at the expense of their rivals because they succeed in adapting themselves best to their environment.

- Charles Darwin