万物简史 第563期:达尔文的非凡见解(12)

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but increasingly fell from scientific favor by taking up dubious² interests such as spiritualism and the possibility of life existing elsewhere in the universe. 但渐渐对科学失去了兴趣，将自己的研究转向了降魂术以及宇宙中存在别的生命可能性等方面。

So the theory became, essentially³ by default, Darwin's alone. 因此，达尔文主要是因为人家放弃而独自拥有了进化论的发明权。

Darwin never ceased being tormented⁴ by his ideas. 达尔文终其一生都为自己的观点而感到苦恼。

He referred to himself as "the Devil's Chaplain" and said that revealing the theory felt "like confessing a murder." 他称自己是“魔鬼的牧师”，说披露进化论使他觉得就像“招认自己是一名杀人犯”。

Apart from all else, he knew it deeply pained his beloved and pious⁵ wife. 除此之外，他还深深地伤害了他虔诚的爱妻。

Even so, he set to work at once expanding his manuscript into a book-length work. 尽管这样，他还是立即着手将他的手稿扩充成一本书。

Provisionally he called it An Abstract of an Essay on the Origin of Species and Varieties through Natural Selection, 一开始他给这本书取名为《物种起源和自然选择的多样性概论》，

a title so tepid⁶ and tentative that his publisher, John Murray, decided⁷ to issue just five hundred copies. 这个书名过于冗长和含混，出版该书的约翰·莫瑞决定只印500册。

But once presented with the manuscript, and a slightly more arresting title, Murray reconsidered and increased the initial print run to 1,250. 但是在拿到手稿以后，再加上使书名稍具吸引力，莫瑞决定将初版的印数增加到l250册。

On the Origin of Species was an immediate⁸ commercial success, but rather less of a critical one. 《物种起源》在商业上立刻取得成功，但却没有激起多大反响。

Darwin's theory presented two intractable difficulties. 达尔文的理论面临两个很棘手的困难：

It needed far more time than Lord Kelvin was willing to concede, and it was scarcely supported by fossil evidence. 一方面，要过很多年以后，它才最终得到开尔文勋爵的承认；另一方面，化石方面所提供的证据也少得可怜。

Where, asked Darwin's more thoughtful critics, were the transitional forms that his theory so clearly called for? 有一些善于思考的批评家提出这样的疑问，达尔文的理论中如此明确地强调的物种的过渡形态在哪里呢？

 

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