In
his last work, "The Old Faith and the New," he admits "that Darwin's
doctrine is a mere hypothesis; that it leaves the main points
unexplained (Die Hupt und Cardinal-punkte noch unerklaert sind);
nevertheless, as he has shown how miracles may be excluded, he is to be
applauded as one of the greatest benefactors of the human race." (p.
177) By "Wunder," or miracle, Strauss means any event for which natural
causes are insufficient to account. "We philosophers and critical
theologians," he says, "have spoken well when we decreed the abolition
of miracles; but our decree (macht-spruch) remained without effect,
because we could not show them to be unnecessary, inasmuch as we were
unable to indicate any natural force to take their place. Darwin has
provided or indicated this natural force, this process of nature; he has
opened the door through which a happier posterity may eject miracles
forever." Then follows the sentence just quoted, "He who knows what
hangs on miracle, will applaud Darwin as one of the greatest benefactors
of the human race." With Strauss and others of his class, miracles and
design are identical, because one as well as the other assumes
supernatural agency. He quotes Helmholtz, who says, "Darwin's theory,
that adaptation in the formation of organisms may arise without the
intervention of intelligence, by the blind operation of natural law;"
and then adds, "As Helmholtz distinguishes the English naturalist as the
man who has banished design from nature, so we have praised him as the
man who has done away with miracles.
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