Skip to main content Accessibility help
×
Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-fqc5m Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-28T22:40:48.968Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

21 - Charles Darwin and the Darwinians

from Part IV - Classical Modernity: Philosophical and Scientific Currents

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 September 2021

Michael Ruse
Affiliation:
Florida State University
Stephen Bullivant
Affiliation:
St Mary's University, Twickenham, London
Get access

Summary

In 1879, Darwin wrote to John Fordyce, a Scottish-born congregationalist minister and author, who had asked about the state of the evolutionist’s religious beliefs. Darwin wrote that his judgement often fluctuated. ‘In my most extreme fluctuations’, Darwin told Fordyce, ‘I have never been an atheist in the sense of denying the existence of a God. – I think that generally (and more and more so as I grow older) but not always, that an agnostic would be the most correct description of my state of mind’ (Darwin Correspondence Project, Letter no. 12041). Since this was just three years before Darwin’s death, this can be taken as a fairly definitive statement of his mature views. Darwin, and many of the Darwinians who supported his evolutionary theory, depicted themselves as agnostics. But both critics on their right and on their left accused them of trying to use agnosticism as a disguise for their true position: materialistic atheism.

Type
Chapter
Information
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anon, . 1874. ‘The approach of dogmatic atheism’. Spectator 47, 1525–7.Google Scholar
Anon, . 1880. ‘The popular view of atheism’. The Saturday Review 49, 819–20.Google Scholar
Blackie, J. S. 1877. The Natural History of Atheism. London: Daldy, Isbister & Co.Google Scholar
Blauvelt, A. 1873. ‘Modern skepticism’. Scribner’s Monthly 6, 424–32, 582–96, 725–39.Google Scholar
Cobbe, F. P. 1877. ‘Magnanimous atheism’. The Theological Review 14, 447–89.Google Scholar
Conway, M. D. 1872. ‘Theism, atheism, and the problem of evil’. Theological Review 9, 207–20.Google Scholar
Curteis, G. H. 1879. ‘Atheism and the Church’. Contemporary Review 34, 230–44.Google Scholar
Darwin Correspondence Project, ‘Letter no 8149’. Available at: www.darwinproject.ac.uk/DCP-LETT-8149 (accessed 18 June 2019).Google Scholar
Darwin Correspondence Project. ‘Letter no. 2653A.’ Available at: www.darwinproject.ac.uk/DCP-LETT-2653A (accessed 18 June 2019).Google Scholar
Darwin Correspondence Project. ‘Letter no. 12041’. Available at: www.darwinproject.ac.uk/DCP-LETT-12041 (accessed 18 June 2019).Google Scholar
Dawkins, R. 2006. The God Delusion. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin.Google Scholar
Dawson, G. 2007. Darwin, Literature and Victorian Respectability. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Holyoake, G. J. 1874. The Limits of Atheism: Or, Why Should Sceptics Be Outlaws? London: J. A. Brooke & Co.Google Scholar
Hutton, R. H. H. 1888. Theological Essays, 3rd edition. London: Macmillan & Co.Google Scholar
Huxley, L. 1903. The Life and Letters of Thomas Huxley. 3 vols. London: Macmillan.Google Scholar
Huxley, T. 1859. ‘Science and religion’. Builder 18, 35–6.Google Scholar
Huxley, T. 1909. Science and Christian Tradition. London: Macmillan & Co.Google Scholar
Jenkins, E. E. 1877. Modern Atheism: Its Position and Promises. London: Wesleyan Conference Office.Google Scholar
Lenin, V. 1970 [1908]. Materialism and Empirio-criticism: Critical Comments on a Reactionary Philosophy. Moscow: Progress.Google Scholar
Lightman, B. 1987. The Origins of Agnosticism: Victorian Unbelief and the Limits of Knowledge. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lightman, B. 2015. ‘Nineteenth-century science and western materialisms’, in Kanjirakkat, J. M., McOuat, G., and Sarukkai, S. (eds.) Science and Narratives of Nature: East and West. New York: Routledge, 174–94.Google Scholar
Mallock, W. H. 1877. ‘Modern atheism: its attitude towards morality’. Contemporary Review 29, 169–86.Google Scholar
Mallock, W. H. 1884. Atheism and the Value of Life: Five Studies in Contemporary Literature. London: Richard Bentley & Son.Google Scholar
Mallock, W. H. 1950 [1877]. The New Republic: or, Culture, Faith, and Philosophy in an English Country House, ed. Max Patrick, J.. Gainesville, FL: University of Florida Press.Google Scholar
Spencer, H. 1886. Letter to T. H. Huxley, 3 November 1886. Scientific and General Correspondence, Imperial College, p. 185.Google Scholar
Stephen, L. 1903. An Agnostic’s Apology and Other Essays. London: Smith, Elder, and Co.Google Scholar
Tyndall, J. 1874. Royal Institution of Great Britain, Tyndall Papers, British Correspondence of John Tyndall at the Royal Institution, 3413.Google Scholar
Tyndall, J. 1892. Fragments of Science: Series of Detached Essays, Addresses, and Reviews. 2 vols. London: Longmans, Green and Co.Google Scholar
Upton, C. B. 1880. ‘Fervent atheism.’ The Modern Review 1, 98124.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure coreplatform@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×