ABSTRACT
Nowhere is there a clue about why Robert made the decision to write Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation during a rest cure in St Andrews in his fortieth year. Some scholars have suggested that Vestiges was long in Robert’s mind, that it was the natural outcome of the general current belief in progress, and particularly of the assumptions of the liberal Whig politics of his Edinburgh circle, centering on George Combe. The difficulty about reading Vestiges – and it is a short book which can be read in a day – is that it has lost the shocking impact it had in 1844. The transition theory was what Vestiges was all about, as opposed to the creationism of current thinking. The Vestiges of Creation tried to steer a delicate course through the seas of prejudice and ignorance that surrounded the story of life on earth, but without much success.
