258 DARWINIANA. 



to prevail, on scientific grounds. It may be well to 

 remember that, " of the two great minds of the sev- 

 enteenth century, ISTewton and Leibnitz, both pro- 

 foundly religious as well as philosophical, one pro- 

 duced the theory of gravitation, the other objected to 

 that theory that it was subversive of natural religion ; 

 also that the nebular hypothesis — a natural conse- 

 quence of the theory of gravitation and of the sub- 

 sequent progress of physical and astronomical dis- 

 covery — ^has been denounced as atheistical even down 

 to our day." It has now outlived anathema. 



It is undeniable that Mr. Darwin lays himself open 

 to this kind of attack. The propounder of natural 

 selection might be expected to make the most of the 

 principle, and to overwork the law of parsimony in 

 its behalf. And a system in which exquisite adapta- 

 tion of means to ends, complicated interdependences, 

 and orderly sequences, appear as results instead of be- 

 ing introduced as factors, and in which special design 

 is ignored in the particulars, must needs be obnoxious, 

 unless guarded as we suppose Mr. Darwin might have 

 guarded his ground if he had chosen to do so. Our 

 own opinion, after long consideration, is, that Mr. 

 Darwin has no atheistical intent ; and that, as respects 

 the test question of design in ^N^ature, his view may 

 be made clear to the theological mind by likening it 

 to that of the " believer in general but not in particu- 

 lar Providence." There is no need to cull passages in 

 support of this interpretation from his various works 

 while the author — the most candid of men — retains 



• 



through all the editions of the " Origin of Species" 



