George Jackson Mivart
Encyclopedia
St. George Jackson Mivart PhD
M.D.
FRS (30 November 1827 – 1 April 1900) was an English biologist
. He is famous for starting as an ardent believer in natural selection
who later became one of its fiercest critics. Trying to reconcile Darwin
's theory of evolution with the beliefs of the Catholic Church, he ended up being condemned by both parties.
). His education started at the Clapham
Grammar School, and continued at Harrow School
and King's College London
. Later he was instructed at St Mary's, Oscott
(1844–1846); he was confirmed
there on 11 May 1845. His conversion to Roman Catholicism automatically excluded him from the University of Oxford
, then open only to members of the Anglican faith.
, but he devoted himself to medical and biological studies. In 1862 he was appointed to the Chair in Zoology at St Mary's Hospital medical school. In 1869 he became a Fellow of the Zoological Society of London
, and in 1874 he was appointed by Mgr Capel as Professor of Biology at the short-lived (Catholic) University College
, Kensington a post he held until 1877.
He was Vice-President of the Zoological Society twice (1869 and 1882); Fellow of the Linnean Society from 1862, Secretary from 1874–80, and Vice-President in 1892. In 1867 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society for his work "On the Appendicular skeleton of the Primates". This work was communicated to the Society by T.H. Huxley. Mivart was a member of the Metaphysical Society
from 1874. He received the degrees of Doctor of Philosophy from Pope Pius IX in 1876, and of Doctor of Medicine from the University of Louvain in 1884.
Even before Mivart's publication of On the genesis of species in 1871, he had published his new ideas in various periodicals and Huxley, Lankester and Flower
had come out against him. According to O'Leary, "their initial reaction to Genesis of Species was tolerant and impersonal".
Darwin prepared a point-by-point refutation which appeared in the sixth edition of Origin of Species.
But Mivart's hostile review of the Descent of Man in the Quarterly Review
, aroused fury from his former intimates, including Darwin himself, who described it as "grossly unfair". Mivart had quoted Darwin by shortening sentences and omitting words, causing Darwin to say: "Though he means to be honourable, he is so bigoted that he cannot act fairly.". Relationships between the two men were near breaking point. In response, Darwin arranged for the reprinting of a pamphlet by Chauncey Wright
, previously issued in the USA, which severely criticised the Genesis. Wright had, under Darwin's guidance, clarified what was, and was not, "Darwinism".
The quarrel reached a climax when Mivart lost his usual composure over what should have been a minor incident. In 1873, George Darwin
(Charles' son) published a short article in Contemporary Review
suggesting that divorce should be made easier in cases of cruelty, abuse or mental disorder. Mivart reacted with horror, using phrases like "hideous sexual criminality" and "unrestrained licentiousness". Huxley wrote a counter-attack, and both Huxley and Darwin broke off connections with Mivart. Huxley blackballed Mivart's attempt to join the Athenaeum Club
.
Mivart was someone Darwin took seriously. One of his criticisms, to which Darwin responded in later editions of the Origin of Species, was a perceived failure of natural selection to explain the incipient stages of useful structures. Taking the eye as an example, Darwin was able to show many stages of light sensitivity and eye development in the animal kingdom as proof of the utility of less than perfect sight (argument by intermediate stages). Another was the supposed inability of natural selection to explain cases of parallel evolution, to which Huxley responded that the effect of natural selection in places with the same environment would tend to be similar.
Though admitting evolution
in general, Mivart denied its applicability to the human intellect (a view also taken by Wallace). His views as to the relationship between human nature and intellect and animal nature in general were given in Nature and thought (1882), and in the Origin of human reason (1889).
From 1885 to 1892 five articles in the Nineteenth century brought him into conflict with Church authorities: "Modern Catholics and scientific freedom" (July 1885), "The Catholic Church and biblical criticism" (July 1887), "Catholicity and Reason" (December 1887), "Sins of Belief and Disbelief" (October 1888) and "Happiness in Hell" (December 1892). These articles were placed on the Index Expurgatorius. Later articles in January 1900 led to his being placed under interdict
by Cardinal Vaughan.
Catholic cemetery on 18 January 1904.
Also, many publications in serials, popular, scientific and religious in content.
PHD
PHD may refer to:*Ph.D., a doctorate of philosophy*Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*PHD finger, a protein sequence*PHD Mountain Software, an outdoor clothing and equipment company*PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
M.D.
Doctor of Medicine
Doctor of Medicine is a doctoral degree for physicians. The degree is granted by medical schools...
FRS (30 November 1827 – 1 April 1900) was an English biologist
Biologist
A biologist is a scientist devoted to and producing results in biology through the study of life. Typically biologists study organisms and their relationship to their environment. Biologists involved in basic research attempt to discover underlying mechanisms that govern how organisms work...
. He is famous for starting as an ardent believer in natural selection
Natural selection
Natural selection is the nonrandom process by which biologic traits become either more or less common in a population as a function of differential reproduction of their bearers. It is a key mechanism of evolution....
who later became one of its fiercest critics. Trying to reconcile Darwin
Charles Darwin
Charles Robert Darwin FRS was an English naturalist. He established that all species of life have descended over time from common ancestry, and proposed the scientific theory that this branching pattern of evolution resulted from a process that he called natural selection.He published his theory...
's theory of evolution with the beliefs of the Catholic Church, he ended up being condemned by both parties.
Early life
Mivart was born in London. His parents were Evangelicals, and his father was the wealthy owner of Mivart's Hotel (now Claridge'sClaridge's
Claridge's is a luxury hotel in Mayfair, central London. It is located at the corner of Brook Street and Davies Street.-History:Claridge's is a traditional grand hotel. Its extensive and old connections with royalty have led to it being referred to as an "extension to Buckingham Palace"...
). His education started at the Clapham
Clapham
Clapham is a district in south London, England, within the London Borough of Lambeth.Clapham covers the postcodes of SW4 and parts of SW9, SW8 and SW12. Clapham Common is shared with the London Borough of Wandsworth, although Lambeth has responsibility for running the common as a whole. According...
Grammar School, and continued at Harrow School
Harrow School
Harrow School, commonly known simply as "Harrow", is an English independent school for boys situated in the town of Harrow, in north-west London.. The school is of worldwide renown. There is some evidence that there has been a school on the site since 1243 but the Harrow School we know today was...
and King's College London
King's College London
King's College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and a constituent college of the federal University of London. King's has a claim to being the third oldest university in England, having been founded by King George IV and the Duke of Wellington in 1829, and...
. Later he was instructed at St Mary's, Oscott
St. Mary's College, Oscott
St Mary's College, Oscott, often called Oscott College, is the Roman Catholic seminary of the Archdiocese of Birmingham, England, though it admits students for the priesthood from various dioceses of England & Wales, as well as some overseas students...
(1844–1846); he was confirmed
Confirmation (Christian sacrament)
Confirmation is a rite of initiation in Christian churches, normally carried out through anointing and/or the laying on of hands and prayer for the purpose of bestowing the Gift of the Holy Spirit....
there on 11 May 1845. His conversion to Roman Catholicism automatically excluded him from the University of Oxford
University of Oxford
The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
, then open only to members of the Anglican faith.
Appointments
In 1851 he was called to the bar at Lincoln's InnLincoln's Inn
The Honourable Society of Lincoln's Inn is one of four Inns of Court in London to which barristers of England and Wales belong and where they are called to the Bar. The other three are Middle Temple, Inner Temple and Gray's Inn. Although Lincoln's Inn is able to trace its official records beyond...
, but he devoted himself to medical and biological studies. In 1862 he was appointed to the Chair in Zoology at St Mary's Hospital medical school. In 1869 he became a Fellow of the Zoological Society of London
Zoological Society of London
The Zoological Society of London is a charity devoted to the worldwide conservation of animals and their habitats...
, and in 1874 he was appointed by Mgr Capel as Professor of Biology at the short-lived (Catholic) University College
Catholic University College, Kensington
This short lived institution was founded as a result of the ban on Catholic students attending the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge.On the 21 November 1873 Cardinal Manning announced that the Roman Catholic Bishops had agreed to form a College of Higher Studies for Catholics. The College was...
, Kensington a post he held until 1877.
He was Vice-President of the Zoological Society twice (1869 and 1882); Fellow of the Linnean Society from 1862, Secretary from 1874–80, and Vice-President in 1892. In 1867 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society for his work "On the Appendicular skeleton of the Primates". This work was communicated to the Society by T.H. Huxley. Mivart was a member of the Metaphysical Society
Metaphysical Society
The Metaphysical Society was a British society, founded in 1869 by James Knowles. Many of its members were prominent clergymen.Papers were read and discussed at meetings on such subjects as the ultimate grounds of belief in the objective and moral sciences, the immortality of the soul, etc...
from 1874. He received the degrees of Doctor of Philosophy from Pope Pius IX in 1876, and of Doctor of Medicine from the University of Louvain in 1884.
Controversy
Mivart met Huxley in 1859, and was initially a close follower and a believer in natural selection. "Even as a professor he continued to attending Huxley's lectures... they became close friends, dining together and arranging family visits." However, Huxley was always strongly anti-Catholic and no doubt this attitude led to Mivart becoming disenchanted with him. Once disenchanted, he lost little time in reversing on the subject of natural selection. In short, he now believed that a higher teleology was compatible with evolution.- "As to 'natural selection', I accepted it completely and in fact my doubts & difficulties were first excited by attending Prof. Huxley's lectures at the School of Mines."
Even before Mivart's publication of On the genesis of species in 1871, he had published his new ideas in various periodicals and Huxley, Lankester and Flower
William Henry Flower
Sir William Henry Flower KCB FRCS FRS was an English comparative anatomist and surgeon. Flower became a leading authority on mammals, and especially on the primate brain...
had come out against him. According to O'Leary, "their initial reaction to Genesis of Species was tolerant and impersonal".
Darwin prepared a point-by-point refutation which appeared in the sixth edition of Origin of Species.
But Mivart's hostile review of the Descent of Man in the Quarterly Review
Quarterly Review
The Quarterly Review was a literary and political periodical founded in March 1809 by the well known London publishing house John Murray. It ceased publication in 1967.-Early years:...
, aroused fury from his former intimates, including Darwin himself, who described it as "grossly unfair". Mivart had quoted Darwin by shortening sentences and omitting words, causing Darwin to say: "Though he means to be honourable, he is so bigoted that he cannot act fairly.". Relationships between the two men were near breaking point. In response, Darwin arranged for the reprinting of a pamphlet by Chauncey Wright
Chauncey Wright
Chauncey Wright , American philosopher and mathematician, was born at Northampton, Massachusetts.In 1852 he graduated at Harvard, and became computer to the American Ephemeris and Nautical Almanac. He made his name by contributions on mathematical and physical subjects in the Mathematical Monthly...
, previously issued in the USA, which severely criticised the Genesis. Wright had, under Darwin's guidance, clarified what was, and was not, "Darwinism".
The quarrel reached a climax when Mivart lost his usual composure over what should have been a minor incident. In 1873, George Darwin
George Darwin
Sir George Howard Darwin, FRS was an English astronomer and mathematician.-Biography:Darwin was born at Down House, Kent, the second son and fifth child of Charles and Emma Darwin...
(Charles' son) published a short article in Contemporary Review
Contemporary Review
-Foundation:It was founded in 1866 by Alexander Strahan and a group of intellectuals anxious to promote intelligent and independent opinion about the great issues of their day. They intended it to be the church-minded counterpart of the resolutely secular Fortnightly Review, which was founded by...
suggesting that divorce should be made easier in cases of cruelty, abuse or mental disorder. Mivart reacted with horror, using phrases like "hideous sexual criminality" and "unrestrained licentiousness". Huxley wrote a counter-attack, and both Huxley and Darwin broke off connections with Mivart. Huxley blackballed Mivart's attempt to join the Athenaeum Club
Athenaeum Club, London
The Athenaeum Club, usually just referred to as the Athenaeum, is a notable London club with its Clubhouse located at 107 Pall Mall, London, England, at the corner of Waterloo Place....
.
Mivart was someone Darwin took seriously. One of his criticisms, to which Darwin responded in later editions of the Origin of Species, was a perceived failure of natural selection to explain the incipient stages of useful structures. Taking the eye as an example, Darwin was able to show many stages of light sensitivity and eye development in the animal kingdom as proof of the utility of less than perfect sight (argument by intermediate stages). Another was the supposed inability of natural selection to explain cases of parallel evolution, to which Huxley responded that the effect of natural selection in places with the same environment would tend to be similar.
Though admitting evolution
Evolution
Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...
in general, Mivart denied its applicability to the human intellect (a view also taken by Wallace). His views as to the relationship between human nature and intellect and animal nature in general were given in Nature and thought (1882), and in the Origin of human reason (1889).
From 1885 to 1892 five articles in the Nineteenth century brought him into conflict with Church authorities: "Modern Catholics and scientific freedom" (July 1885), "The Catholic Church and biblical criticism" (July 1887), "Catholicity and Reason" (December 1887), "Sins of Belief and Disbelief" (October 1888) and "Happiness in Hell" (December 1892). These articles were placed on the Index Expurgatorius. Later articles in January 1900 led to his being placed under interdict
Interdict
The term Interdict may refer to:* Court order enforcing or prohibiting a certain action* Injunction, such as a restraining order...
by Cardinal Vaughan.
Death
Mivart died of diabetes in London on 1 April 1900. His late heterodox opinions were a bar to his burial in consecrated ground. However, Sir William Broadbent gave medical testimony that these could be explained by the gravity and nature of the diabetes from which he had suffered. After his death, a long final struggle took place between his friends and the church authorities, which resulted in his burial in Kensal GreenKensal Green
Kensal Green, also referred to as Kensal Rise is an area of London, England. It is located on the southern edge of the London Borough of Brent and borders the City of Westminster to the East and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea to the South....
Catholic cemetery on 18 January 1904.
Publications
Mivart's chief works are the following:- One point of controversy with the agnostics. In Manning (ed) Essays on religion and literature (1868)
- On the genesis of species (London 1871)
- An examination of Mr. Herbert Spencer's Psychology.
- Lessons in elementary anatomy (London 1873)
- The common frog in Nature Series (1873)
- Man and apes: an exposition of structural resemblances and differences bearing upon questions of affinity and origin. (Robert Hardwicke, London 1873)
- Lessons from nature (London 1876)
- Contemporary evolution (London 1876)
- Address to the Biological Section of the British Association (1879)
- The cat: an introduction to the study of backboned animals, especially mammals. (Murray London 1881)
- Nature and thought (London 1882)
- A philosophical catechism (London 1884)
- On truth (London 1889)
- The origin of human reason (London 1889)
- Dogs, jackals, wolves and foxes: Monograph of the Canidæ 2 vols in one (Taylor & Francis for R.H. Porter and Dulau & Co. London 1890)
- Introduction générale à l'etude de la nature: Cours professé à l'Université de Louvain (Louvain and Paris 1891)
- Birds (Taylor & Francis, London 1892)
- Essays and criticisms 2 vols (London 1892)
- Types of animal life (London 1893)
- Introduction to the elements of science (London 1894)
- Castle and manor (London 1900)
- A monograph of the Lories, or brush-tongued parrots (London 1896)
- The groundwork of science: a study of epistemology (London 1898)
- The helpful science (London 1898)
- Ape, in Encyclopædia Britannica
Also, many publications in serials, popular, scientific and religious in content.