My life : a record of events and opinions - Wallace-online.org

312 MY LIFEand even novel and attractive article.As the subjectwas fresh in my mind, and I had the authorities athand, it did not take me very long to sketch out andwrite a paper of the required length, which appearedsimultaneously in the Independent and in the FortnightlyReview, and, to my great surprise, createdquite a sensation ; and, still more to my surprise, aconsiderable amount of antagonism and rather contemptuouscriticism by astronomers and physicists, towhich I replied in a subsequent article.But as soon as my agent, Mr. Curtis Brown, readthe MSS. he suggested that I should write a volumeon the subject, which he was sure would be veryattractive and popular, and for which he undertook tomake arrangements both in England and America,and secure me liberal terms. After a little considerationI thought I could do so, and terms werearranged for the book before the article itself waspublished. This enabled me to get together all thenecessary materials and to begin work at once, andafter six months of the stiffest reading and studyI ever undertook, the book, " Man's Place in theUniverse," was completed in September, and publishedin November of the same year. In Novemberof 1904 a cheaper edition was published, with anadditional chapter in an Appendix. This chaptercontained an entirely new argument, founded on thetheory of organic evolution, which I had not time tointroduce into the first edition. This argument isitself so powerful that, when compounded with thearguments founded on astronomical, physical, andphysiological phenomena, it renders the improbabilityof there having been two independent developmentsof organic life, each culminating in man, so great asto be absolutely inconceivable.