Jamaican science in the 1870s: Response by a Jesuit missionary to Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species

Abstract

James Splaine (1834–1901) was a Jesuit missionary working in Jamaica in the early 1870s whose manuscript Diary is an important source on Jamaican history. The marginalia in his copy of the fifth edition of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species, which are available for viewing on Darwin Online, are here transcribed and analysed within their historical context. Although he was not a scientist, Splaine’s marginalia are a sharp and well-informed critique of Darwin’s logic and arguments for natural selection. They also make clear Splaine’s preference for divine intervention in the process of speciation.