Evolution Quotes
Observe constantly that all things take place by change, and accustom thyself to consider that the nature of the Universe loves nothing so much as to change the things which are, and to make new things like them.
Aurelius, Marcus
The stream of tendency in which all things seek to fulfill the law of their being.
Carruth, William Herbert
A fire-mist and a planet, A crystal and a cell, A jellyfish and a saurian, And caves where the cavemen dwell; Then a sense of law and beauty, And a face turned from the clod-- Some call it Evolution, And others call it God.
D'Angelo, Anthony
Promise yourself to live your life as a revolution and not just a process of evolution.
Darwin, Charles
I have called this principle, by which, each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of Natural Selection.
Darwin, Charles
The expression often used by Mr. Herbert Spencer of the Survival of the Fittest is more accurate, and is sometimes equally convenient.
Darwin, Erasmus
Till o'er the wreck, emerging from the storm, Immortal Nature lifts her changeful form: Mounts from her funeral pyre on wings of flame, And soars and shines, another and the same.
Gould, Stephen Jay
Creationist critics often charge that evolution cannot be tested, and therefore cannot be viewed as a properly scientific subject at all. This claim is rhetorical nonsense.
Gurdjieff
The evolution of man is the evolution of his consciousness, and "consciousness" cannot evolve unconsciously. The evolution of man is the evolution of his will, and "will" cannot evolve involuntarily. The evolution of man is the evolution of his power of doing, and "doing" cannot be the result of things which "happen."
Hayes, Judith
If we are going to teach creation science as an alternative to evolution, then we should also teach the stork theory as an alternative to biological reproduction.
Herford, Oliver
Children, behold the Chimpanzee; He sits on the ancestral tree From which we sprang in ages gone. I'm glad we sprang: had we held on, We might, for aught that I can say, Be horrid Chimpanzees to-day.
Kabbalah
The Breath becomes a stone; the stone, a plant; the plant, an animal; the animal, a man; the man, a spirit; and the spirit, a god.
King, Benjamin Franklin
We seem to exist in a hazardous time, Driftin' along here through space; Nobody knows just when we begun, Or how fur we've gone in the race.
Koestler, Arthur
The evolution of the brain not only overshot the needs of prehistoric man, it is the only example of evolution providing a species with an organ which it does not know how to use.
Pratchett, Terry
Most species do their own evolving, making it up as they go along, which is the way Nature intended. And this is all very natural and organic and in tune with mysterious cycles of the cosmos, which believes that there’s nothing like millions of years of really frustrating trial and error to give a species moral fiber and, in some cases, backbone.
Shaw, George Bernard
All evolution in thought and conduct must at first appear as heresy and misconduct.
Smith, Langdon
When you were a tadpole, and I was a fish, In the Palaeozoic time, And side by side in the sluggish tide We sprawled in the ooze and slime.
Spencer, Herbert
Civilization is a progress from an indefinite, incoherent homogeneity toward a definite, coherent heterogeneity.
Spencer, Herbert
This survival of the fittest, which I have here sought to express in mechanical terms, is that which Mr. Darwin has called "natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life."
Tennyson, Lord Alfred
The Lord let the house of a brute to the soul of a man, And the man said, "Am I your debtor?" And the Lord--"Not yet: but make it as clean as you can, And then I will let you a better."
Tennyson, Lord Alfred
Is there evil but on earth? Or pain in every people sphere? Well, be grateful for the sounding watchword "Evolution" here.
Tennyson, Lord Alfred
Evolution ever climbing after some ideal good And Reversion ever dragging Evolution in the mud.
Twain, Mark
While the rest of the species is descended from apes, redheads are descended from cats.
Tzu, Lao
The reason why the universe is eternal is that it does not live for itself; it gives life to others as it transforms.
Watson, James
Today, the theory of evolution is an accepted fact for everyone but a fundamentalist minority, whose objections are based not on reasoning but on doctrinaire adherence to religious principles.