In this quote from his "Origin of Species," Charles Darwin reconciles evolution and divine creation.

 

Twice in the PBS series on evolution - once toward the beginning, and once at the end - the narrator gives the following quote from Charles Darwin, written in a late edition (1859) of his "Origin of Species":

“There is grandeur in this [evolutionary] view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.”

However, some readers felt that there was not enough "grandeur" to "the view of life" offered by Darwin.  He found it necessary, therefore, to insert an additional "creationist" phrase into the paragraph in the 1860 edition of the book.  It then read: "There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one . . ."

Personally, I like the first version best because it imports more sense of mystery into the original creative act. I also prefer it because people so readily interpret the word "Creator" in an overly simplistic and anthropomorphic manner.  While I - as a contemplative - view God as a supremely personal presence, I'm convinced that thinking of God as "a person"  has a tendency to limit the Divine Presence to our usual sense of creaturely personhood: one that includes an overly particularized sense of self, with discrete boundaries that set it off from everything else - the so-called "billiard-ball" view of self.  By contrast, my experience of God consists instead in a sense of loving Presence that is expansive enough to be able to permeate all things.

Photo: Bull elk next to Poudre Lake; Rocky Mountain National Park, CO; August 17, 2013

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