Darwin's Spiritual Conclusion?

In Darwin’s “Racapitulation and Conclusion,” Darwin illustrates his awareness of the immense consequences his theory will have. Beginning on page 422, Darwin enumerates the various branches of science that will benefit or change as a result of his theory. “When the views entertained in this volume…are generally admitted, we can dimly foresee that there will be a considerable revolution in natural history” (422). Of course, we know that Darwin’s prediction was absolutely correct, and present scientific work is still effected, and often organized, by his theories. This amazing statement begins Darwin’s final thrust, in which he predicts the changes that will occur as a result of his book and finally addresses what may be called the “spiritual” aspect of his theory. The concluding pages are deeply impressive and somewhat surprising. One of the rhetorically interesting aspects of Darwin’s closing pages is his extraordinarily confident tone. Throughout the book, as we have noted in class, Darwin maintained a modest, humble tone and intentionally cultivated an inquiring (yet expert) authorial persona. But as Darwin builds his argument, he becomes more critical of his possible detractors and more confident in his theory and its implications. By the conclusion, Darwin’s harsh, condescending tone in his criticisms of creationists’ has become thinly veiled. Once again, Darwin addresses the possible “difficulties” readers may have with his theory, but he repeatedly expresses an assured belief that the supportive facts and evidence far outweighs the possible trouble.

As Darwin moves towards the closure of his theory, he begins to address the more abstract characteristics of belief. In an effort to diminish the spiritual importance of the creationist view, and to once again bolster his theory, Darwin claims abstracted aspects of belief for himself: “When I view all beings not as special creations, but as the lineal descendants of some few beings which lived long before the first bed of the Silurian system was deposited, they seem to me to become ennobled”(426). This statement foreshadows the extraordinary final paragraph, in which Darwin moves to supplant the grandeur of the creation of individual species by God to the grandeur of his theory:

"Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of higher animals, directly follows. There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or 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" (427)

Darwin evokes a sort of spiritual wonder here, a move I didn’t necessarilly expect. However, in my opinion, it is rhetorically effective and genuinely fascinating. This passage reminded me of some of the theories of ideology and belief I have been reading for another class this semester. One of the significant themes running through these theories of belief is the necessity of something sublime, or some “fantasy-support” behind ideologies, whether they are rational or even “believable” in the conventional sense. Slavoj Zizek, in particular, emphasizes the irrational nature of belief. Reading Darwin’s final passage in this context can illuminate what could otherwise be viewed as a troubling or problematic turn in Darwin’s prose and tone. Perhaps Darwin was aware of the importance of that “something more” people often attach to belief, and felt that by pointing out the elegant, beautful, and maybe miraculous nature of what he describes, he would enable more people to be persuaded to his point of view. I am not dismissing the possibility that Darwin actually believed, personally, what he states in his concluding paragraphs. The authentic belief and the use of it as a rhetorical device are not mutually exclusive. In fact, believing that Darwin was himself moved by the abstract beauty of the natural system he describes makes his final statement all the more effective.

(I couldn’t help but wonder, when I read this final paragraph, what Alex would think of the word “beautiful” in the closing line of the book- I am anticipating some interesting discussion today in class.)