In the beginning: what Darwin really believed

IN his letter (September 20), Con Hayes is not quite correct in describing the theory of evolution as being Darwin’s alone.

It was widely proclaimed and rejected in Darwin’s time — his grandfather having written on the subject in the early 1790s. Mr Hayes also asserts that “order in living things and cosmic order can be explained without resort to any designer”.

This would appear to conflict with Darwin’s own opinion when he wrote the first edition of Origin of Species.