| ↑ 3 blocks not present in 1859 1860; present in 1861 1866 1869 1872 |
| It is no valid objection that science as yet throws no light on the far higher problem of the essence or origin of life.
Who can explain what is the essence of the attraction of gravity?
No one now objects to following out the results consequent on this unknown element of attraction;
notwithstanding that Leibnitz formerly accused Newton of introducing "occult qualities and miracles into philosophy." |
|
| ↑ 1 blocks not present in 1859 1860; present in 1861 1866 1869 1872 |
| It is satisfactory, as showing how transient such impressions are, to remember that the greatest discovery ever made by man, namely, the law of the attraction of gravity, was also attacked by Leibnitz, "as subversive of natural
and inferentially of revealed
religion."
|
|
| → have 1859 1860 1861 1866 |
| until recently did nearly 1869 1872 |
|
| → rejected this view of 1859 1860 1861 1866 |
| reject this view of 1869 |
| disbelieve in 1872 |
|
|
the several large classes of facts above specified. ↑
I see no good reason why the views given in this volume should shock the religious feelings of any one. ↑
A celebrated author and divine has written to me that "he has gradually learnt to see that it is just as noble a conception of the Deity to believe that He created a few original forms capable of self-development into other and needful forms, as to believe that He required a fresh act of creation to supply the voids caused by the action of His laws."
Why, it may be asked,
→have
the most eminent living naturalists and geologists
→rejected this view of
the mutability of
It cannot be asserted that organic beings in a state of nature are subject to no variation; it cannot be proved that the amount of variation in the course of long ages is a limited quantity; no clear distinction has been, or can be, drawn between species and well-marked varieties. It cannot be maintained that species when intercrossed are invariably sterile, and varieties invariably fertile; or that sterility is a special endowment and sign of creation. The belief that species were immutable productions was almost unavoidable as long as the history of the world was thought to be of short duration; and now that we have acquired some idea of the lapse of time, we are too apt to assume, without proof, that the geological record is so perfect that it would have afforded us plain evidence of the mutation of species, if they had undergone mutation. |
|
| But the chief cause of our natural unwillingness to admit that one species has given birth to other and distinct species, is that we are always slow in admitting
great
of which we do not see the
steps. The difficulty is the same as that felt by so many geologists, when Lyell first insisted that long
|
