Quote

A man who has no assured and ever present belief in the existence of a personal God or of a future existence with retribution and reward, can have for his rule of life, as far as I can see, only to follow those impulses and instincts which are the strongest or which seem to him the best ones

Charles Darwin

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Charles Darwin
Age: 73 †
Born: 1809
Born: February 12
Died: 1882
Died: April 19
Beekeeper
Botanist
Carcinologist
Entomologist
Ethologist
Explorer
Geologist
Naturalist
Philosopher
Travel Writer
The Mount
Shrewsbury
Charles Robert Darwin
Charles R. Darwin
Darwin
Future
Rule
Impulses
Seems
Follow
Instincts
Best
Ones
Assured
Ever
Seem
Reward
Men
Personal
Strongest
Life
Present
Impulse
Existence
Rewards
Belief
Instinct
Retribution

More quotes by Charles Darwin

Image
Nature will tell you a direct lie if she can.
Charles Darwin
Image
Life is nearly over with me. I have taken no pains about my style of writing.
Charles Darwin
Image
Among the scenes which are deeply impressed on my mind, none exceed in sublimity the primeval [tropical] forests, ... temples filled with the varied productions of the God of Nature. No one can stand in these solitudes unmoved, and not feel that there is more in man than the mere breath of his body.
Charles Darwin
Image
It is not the conscience which raises a blush, for a man may sincerely regret some slight fault committed in solitude, or he may suffer the deepest remorse for an undetected crime, but he will not blush... It is not the sense of guilt, but the thought that others think or know us to be guilty which crimsons the face.
Charles Darwin
Image
People complain of the unequal distribution of wealth [but it is a far greater] injustice that any one man should have the power to write so many brilliant essays... There is no one who writes like [Thomas Huxley].
Charles Darwin
Image
The traveler may feel assured, he will meet with no difficulties or dangers, excepting in rare cases, nearly so bad as he beforehand anticipates. In a moral point of view, the effect ought to be, to teach him good-humored patience, freedom from selfishness, the habit of acting for himself, and of making the best of every occurrence.
Charles Darwin
Image
If I had not been so great an invalid, I should not have done so much as I have accomplished.
Charles Darwin
Image
What a book a devil's chaplain might write on the clumsy, wasteful, blundering, low, and horribly cruel work of nature!
Charles Darwin
Image
We will now discuss in a little more detail the Struggle for Existence.
Charles Darwin
Image
I see no good reasons why the views given in this volume should shock the religious views of anyone.
Charles Darwin
Image
The Times is getting more detestable (but that is too weak word) than ever.
Charles Darwin
Image
Our descent, then, is the origin of our evil passions!! The devil under form of Baboon is our grandfather.
Charles Darwin
Image
The fact of evolution is the backbone of biology, and biology is thus in the peculiar position of being a science founded on an improved theory, is it then a science or faith?
Charles Darwin
Image
A grand and almost untrodden field of inquiry will be opened, on the causes and laws of variation, on correlation of growth, on the effects of use and disuse, on the direct actions of external conditions, and so forth.
Charles Darwin
Image
I can indeed hardly see how anyone ought to wish Christianity to be true for if so the plain language of the text seems to show that the men who do not believe, and this would include my father, brother and almost all of my friends, will be everlastingly punished. And this is a damnable doctrine.
Charles Darwin
Image
The season of love is that of battle. The roots of these fights run deep.
Charles Darwin
Image
Not one great country can be named, from the polar regions in the north to New Zealand in the south, in which the aborigines do not tattoo themselves.
Charles Darwin
Image
On the ordinary view of each species having been independently created, we gain no scientific explanation.
Charles Darwin
Image
The main conclusion arrived at in this work, namely that man is descended from some lowly-organised form, will, I regret to think, be highly distasteful to many persons. But there can hardly be a doubt that we are descended from barbarians.
Charles Darwin
Image
To kill an error is as good a service as, and sometimes even better than, the establishing of a new truth or fact.
Charles Darwin