The Origin of Species: By Means of Natural Selection or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life (Bantam Classic) - Softcover

The volume had taken Darwin more than twenty years to publish, in part because he envisioned the storm of controversy it was certain to unleash. Indeed, selling out its first edition on its first day, The Origin of Species revolutionized science, philosophy, and theology.

Darwin's reasoned, documented arguments carefully advance his theory of natural selection and assertion that species were not created all at once by a divine hand but started with a few simple forms that mutated and adapted over time. Whether commenting on his own ill health, discussing his experiments to test instinct in bees, or relating a conversation about a South American burrowing rodent, Darwin's monumental achievement is surprisingly personal and delightfully readable. Its ideas remain extremely profound even today, making it the most influential book in the natural sciences ever written -- a work not just important to its time, but to the history of humankind.