Herbert Spencer was an English polymath active as a philosopher, psychologist, biologist, sociologist, and anthropologist. Spencer originated the expression "survival of the fittest", which he coined in Principles of Biology after reading Charles Darwin's 1859 book On the Origin of Species. Though reference was made in a note on the first page of the original preface, to certain Essays entitled Progress: its Law and Cause, and Transcendental Physiology, as containing generalizations which were to be elaborated in the System of Philosophy there set forth in programme, yet the dates of these Essays were not given; nor was there any indication of their cardinal importance as containing, in a brief form, the general Theory of Evolution. No clear evidence to the contrary standing in the way, there has been very generally uttered and accepted the belief that this work, and the works following it, originated after, and resulted from, the special doctrine contained in Mr. Darwin's Origin of Species.
