Charles Darwin

From Sun Wen Hsueh Shu by Sun Yat-sen, 1919

The theory of evolution became popularly known in the latter part of the 19th century* when Darwin�s On the Origin of Species was published. The world then knew that all forms of life grow through the process of evolution. Many indeed are the intellectual leaders of all ages who seek to understand the origin of life, yet all have failed to penetrate the puzzle. About 2,000 years ago the Greek philosophers Empedocles and Democritus had ventured the theory that everything in the universe is a process of evolution. Their teachings unfortunately were neglected by their successors. When the philosophical school of Socrates and Plato was established, the theory of evolution became overshadowed. Free thinking was gradually revived in Europe after the inauguration of the Period of Renaissance. The two German philosophers, Spinoza and Leibnitz, began to quest truth in a scientific spirit, thus paving the way for the revival of the theory of evolution. The grand-father of Darwin belonged to the school of Leibnitz. With the development of science in later years many discoveries were recorded. Among those well-known discoverers we may mention Laplace, the astronomer, Lily, the geologist and Lamarck the zoologist, whose individual researches threw enormous light on the origin of life and may be called the forerunners of the evolutionary doctrine.

      * The work by Herbert Spencer preceded Darwin�s by a couple of years. Some sorts of a general theory of evolution were rather popular among the natural philosophers in France etc. at much earlier dates. — (WPT)

Charles Darwin devoted himself to the study of animal life for twenty years, as a result of which his book known as On the Origin of Species was written to expound the theory of struggle for existence and natural selection. With the publication of this volume a flood of light poured on the subject of evolution. The intellectual world went through a revolution. All branches of science thenceforth were revised to conform to evolutionary principles.

The cult of Dr. Sun;
Sun W�n hsueh shu ... by Dr. Sun Yat-sen;
the translation by Wei Yung.
Shanghai : The Independent Weekly, 1931, pages 88 - 90.