Help! The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin? ?

Question

1. Darwin was agnostic and I need to find specific passages in the book that darwin wrote that were planned to counteract all the religious controversy. In other words, How was Darwin trying to expand spiritual consciousness in a way that would allow acceptance of his ideas.

2. I also need to find the only definitive passage that shows Darwin was thinking about human beings when he put forth his theory of evolution. And I also need examples about the possibility in a more indirect way.

Thank you so much for your time, any help is always appreciated!!!

Answer 1

Prior to the first chapter, he quoted Sir Francis Bacon:  "To conclude, therefore, let no man out of a weak conceit of sobriety, or an ill-applied moderation, think or maintain, that a man can search too far or be too well studied in the book of God's word, or in the book of God's works; divinity or philosophy; but rather let men endeavour an endless progress or proficience in both."

From the end of Chapter 5: "He who believes that each equine species was independently created, will, I presume, assert that each species has been created with a tendency to vary, both under nature and under domestication, in this particular manner...To admit this view is, as it seems to me, to reject a real for an unreal, or at least for an unknown, cause.  **It makes the works of God a mere mockery and deception**; I would almost as soon believe with the old and ignorant cosmogonists, that fossil shells had never lived, but had been created in stone so as to mock the shells now living on the sea-shore." (emphasis added.)

Answer 2

The entire text is online at:

http://www.literature.org/authors/darwin...

Try a scan of each chapter for keywords that may provide your answer.

I don't have time this evening to read it for you to answer your question.

Hope this helps.