i've heard it said that charles darwin did not want to publish his ideas because he felt it would hurt his wife whom he loved she was not an evolutionist that could be part of the answer at least so much can be read in darwin's original autobiography which was first published in esp in footnotes in the chapter about the development of his own religious convictions another reason also clear from his ab might be his frequent illnesses and his zealous drive to publish as much as possible about other biological zoological fields of research he was always frustrated he could not do more fact is he produced an enormous amount of work a third reason darwin waited years was that he simply was afraid of being 'prejudiced' word quoted literally his theory needed more time to ripen so to speak anyway maybe this is of some help anyone with more knowledge about it please go ahead imho the first sentence contrary should only appear later one who does not know anything about darwin reading this page should have a short introduction as first paragraph not a negation of something assumed to be publicly known yes i am picky framework is now in place for a good article but a lot more work needs to be done i'm going to get to this on and off over the next few weeks hopefully but anyonelse should feel free to wade in however make sure your facts come from works in the history of biology not from popular works as these often make sweeping generalizations about darwin john lynch