Charles Darwin in the 19th Century Essay
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5 Pages
During the Victorian Era many discoveries and conquests conveyed a promising future for the British Empire. In 1859 British scientist Charles Darwin published one of the most important and controversial books of all time widely known as the On the Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection. It became one of the greatest accomplishments of science during the 19th century. The work of Darwin revolutionized natural science and biology and influenced other scientific areas as well. Evolution began to stretch beyond science and was accounted for the raise of a new conflict with religion, causing doubt among common people and anger between scholars and the clergy. Another movement late in the Victorian era emerged because of Darwin’s theory
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“Darwin’s ideas mark how extraordinary a step Darwin took on humanity’s behalf” (Bland, pgph 2), the Origin of Species rapidly grew widely known across Europe, marking the transformation of the modern man and nature simultaneously highlighting the boundaries broken by Darwin for humanity as a whole in Victorian England. Although Darwin’s work was mainly targeted to the scientific society, it had a major impact on religion, especially Christianity. The controversy agitated within weeks of its publication, evolution challenging the Christian belief of creation and unintentionally proving it scientifically erroneous. Charles theory triggered a new battle between science and religion, as several religious critics began to question Darwin and originating Anti-Darwinian and sacro-scientific movements in England and across Europe. Eventually gave birth to a Catholic movement known as “Academia”, created by the Church to defend Catholicism. Darwin’s theory had an immense repercussion on Christianity, and in response several reviews critiqued the thinker’s job heavily. “Man’s relation to nature was basically altered. He was no longer a fallen angel but a great ape trying to make good” (Appleman, 415), religious scholars and ecclesiastic men from across Europe referred to evolution as gibberish and gloomy as well as an attempt to propagate a disbelief in the Bible. The