The Natural Theology of Evolution (Classic Reprint)

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Excerpt from The Natural Theology of Evolution Most persons who are disposed to be religious find it an easy thing to see the hand of God in the works of nature. To them it is pleasant and profitable to contemplate the world as Gods handiwork, and they are disposed to offer the marks of design which it shows as a convincing proof of His existence. The attempt to present this proof in a clear and orderly way has given rise to Natural Theology, a study which, until quite recently, was in high repute and esteem. It attained, perhaps, to its maximum of influence with the publication of Paley's Natural Theology, a remarkable work which put the argument from design in the plainest and clearest terms, and which was everywhere accepted as conclusive. It was accompanied and followed by many other works from which we may learn how highly Natural Theology was esteemed and how widely it was studied, of these the Bridgwater Treatises are, perhaps, the most famous. But this era of exceptional triumph and brilliancy did not last long. It may be said to have come to an end with the publication on the 24th of November, 1859, of Darwin's Origin of Species. As that book became well known the influence of Natural Theology declined. It was felt that the whole argument had lost its force, and that the appearance of plan and contrivance in Nature was fully and satisfactorily accounted for without any necessity for attributing it to conscious design. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully, any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.