The Science vs God
Charles Darwin vs Religion Faith
Debate or Controversy

We feel that the Science vs God or Charles Darwin vs Religion and Faith furore, although less intense than previously, has yet to be settled and that we have something to contribute to the debate or controversy.

Our extensive Spiritual and Poetry insights quotations pages are bursting at the seams with examples of how profound truths are recognised, and applauded, by a Spiritual-Poetical aspect that seems to be innate to Human Nature. To demonstrate this We have developed three brief and impact-full introductory reviews that are intended to demonstrate something of the depth of reliable Wisdoms and Insights available here at Age-of-the-Sage.
We hope that you will be very seriously intrigued by assessing how the "Poetical" wisdoms, the "Interfaith" wisdoms and the "Christian" wisdoms that are collected on our site are both individually valid and also have strong similarities despite their diversity of origin:-

Wisdom Quotes from the Great Poets

A Disdain for Materialism: Poor and content is rich, and rich enough.

Shakespeare
A Distrust of Intellect: The intellectual power, through words and things,
Went sounding on, a dim and perilous way!

Wordsworth
Poetical Insights are possible!: God guard me from those thoughts men think
In the mind alone;
He that sings a lasting song
Thinks in a marrow-bone;

Yeats
Charity: That best portion of a good man's life,
His little, nameless, unremembered acts
Of kindness and of love.

Wordsworth
Purity of Heart: A peace above all earthly dignities,
A still and quiet conscience.

Shakespeare
Humility: The best of men
That e'er wore earth about him, was a sufferer,
A soft, meek, patient, humble, tranquil spirit,
The first true gentleman that ever breathed.

Thomas Dekker
Meekness: Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice,
And could of men distinguish her election,
Sh'hath sealed thee for herself, for thou hast been
As one in suff'ring all that suffers nothing,
A man that Fortune's buffets and rewards
Hast ta'en with equal thanks; and blest are those
Whose blood and judgement are so well co-medled,
That they are not a pipe for Fortune's finger
To sound what stop she please: give me that man
That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him
In my heart's core, ay in my heart of heart,
As I do thee.

Shakespeare

Wisdom Quotes from Interfaith Sources

These spiritual insights quotations demonstrate the recognition of individual important Spiritual Truths by one of the world religions in the case of each "Truth":-

A Disdain for Materialism: Chuang Tzu put on cotton clothes with patches in them, and arranging his girdle and tying on his shoes, (i.e. to keep them from falling off), went to see the prince of Wei.
"How miserable you look, Sir!" Cried the prince. "It is poverty, not misery", replied Chuang Tzu. "A man who has TAO cannot be miserable. Ragged clothes and old boots make poverty, not misery".

Chuang Tzu - (Taoism)
A Distrust of Intellect: Sell your cleverness and buy bewilderment; Cleverness is mere opinion, bewilderment intuition.

Rumi - (Islam)
Spiritual Insights are possible!: This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth walk not as other Gentiles walk, in the vanity of their mind. Having the understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart:

St. Paul - (Christianity)
Charity: He that does everything for Me, whose supreme object I am, who worships Me, being free from attachment and without hatred to any creature, this man, Arjuna!, comes to Me.

Bhagavad Gita - (Hinduism)
Purity of Heart: The path of the just is as the shining light, that shineth more and more unto the perfect day. The way of the wicked is as darkness: they know not at what they stumble.

Solomon - (Judaism)
Humility: Would you become a pilgrim on the road of love? The first condition is that you make yourself humble as dust and ashes.

Ansari of Herat - (Islam)
Meekness: Let a man overcome anger by love, let him overcome evil by good; let him overcome the greedy by liberality, the liar by truth! Speak the truth, do not yield to anger; give, if thou art asked for little; by these three steps thou wilt go near the gods.

Dhammapada - (Buddhism)

Wisdom Quotes from Christian Sources

A selection of wisdom quotes that demonstrate the profound depth of the insights that are recognised by Christian authorities are set out below. They are sourced from the Bible and also from the works of Thomas a Kempis whose "Of the Imitation of Christ" ranks as the second most widely read Christian text after the Bible itself.

A Disdain for Materialism: Some have Me in their mouths, but little in their hearts.
There are others who, being enlightened in their understanding and purified in their affection, always breathe after things eternal, are unwilling to hear of earthly things, and grieve to be subject to the necessities of nature; and such as these perceive what the Spirit of Truth speaketh in them.
For it teacheth them to despise the things of the earth and to love heavenly things; to disregard the world, and all the day and night to aspire after heaven.

Thomas a Kempis
A Distrust of Intellect: Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.

St. Paul
Spiritual Insights are possible!: It is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God has prepared for them that love him. But God has revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God.
...the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.

St. Paul
Charity: Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.

St. John
Purity of Heart: Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. Do all things without murmurings and disputings: That ye may be blameless and harmless, the sons of God, without rebuke, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom ye shine as lights in the world;

St. Paul
Humility: Neither be ye called masters: for one is your Master, even Christ. But he that is greatest among you shall be your servant. And whomsoever shall exalt himself shall be abased; and he that shall humble himself shall be exalted.

Jesus
Meekness: Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to wrath: For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.

St. James

If you will be so open-minded as to give our presentation of the QUITE AWESOME Wisdoms that have been won by the Mystics and Poets a fair hearing we believe that we can firmly establish your own opinion of their collective insights as one of appreciation and respect.

The preceding reviews constitute examples of mystical faith and of spiritual-poetical truth but we cannot deny that there were two people named Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace who did much to "intellectually" discredit religious belief lessening the weight of importance that western culture has recently given to the wisdoms discerned by the mystics and the poets and opening up a wide-ranging science vs god or charles darwin vs religion and faith debate or controversy.
World Wide Humanity has a very long history of sincere involvement with religious practice! This history of involvement has, in ways, been called into question by Evolutionism. Not only the more longstanding physical Evolutionism that is associated with Charles Darwin but also by the more recent behavioural evolutionism as represented by the increasingly prominent science of Evolutionary Psychology.

To set against these Evolutionisms we have the deeply impact-FULL and inherently persuasive Enlightenments, Wisdoms, and Insights of the Poets and Mystics.
We at age-of-the-sage.org consider the way in which the awesome insights of the Poets, and the Mystics, have been overlooked in Humanity's search for understanding to be nothing short of a downright scandal.

Late in his life Charles Darwin was approached by a publisher who encouraged the preparation of an Autobiograpichal work detailing his life and outlook.

Darwin fell in with this project and indeed seems to have taken it seriously as a record of interest for his own family:-

A German editor having written to me to ask for an account of the development of my mind and character with some sketch of my autobiography, I have thought that the attempt would amuse me, and might possibly interest my children or their children. I know that it would have interested me greatly to have read even so short and dull a sketch of the mind of my grandfather written by himself, and what he thought and did and how he worked. I have attempted to write the following account of myself, as if I were a dead man in another world looking back at my own life. Nor I have I found that difficult, for life is nearly over with me. I have taken no pains about my style of writing.

Charles Darwin's Autobiography, published in 1876, actually contains a sub-section specifically entitled "Religious Beliefs" which contains the following quotations:-

At present the most usual argument for the existence of an intelligent God is drawn from deep inward conviction and feelings which are experienced by most persons. But it cannot be doubted that Hindoos, Mahomadans and others might argue in the same manner and with equal force in favour of the existence of one God, or of many Gods, or as with the Buddhists of no God. ...

Formerly I was led by feelings such as those just referred to, (although I do not think that the religious sentiment was ever strongly developed in me), to the firm conviction of the existence of God, and of the immortality of the soul... ...This argument would be a valid one, if all men of all races had the same inward conviction of the existence of one God; but we know this is very far from being the case. Therefore I cannot see that such inward convictions and feelings are of any weight as evidence of what really exists....

It happens that in our own times sympathetic translations of texts drawn from several World Religions are widely available. Many persons have come to see that there is a "Perennial Philosophy" of agreement that lies at the heart of several World Faiths. The range of agreement between the World Religions about mystical / spiritual truths, in our view, does much to overcome Darwin's objection as just mentioned in the brief excerpt from his autobiography! The World Faiths, immensely socially and historically influential over several millenia but somewhat questioned by rationalisms, particularly in our own times and "in the West", are actually in substantial agreement! There remain mysterious spiritual truths - the impact of which most people can feel mystically or poetically - this, we feel, must habve some bearing on the science vs god debate or controversy.

The term "Perennial Philosophy" is attributed to Leibniz and was used by Aldous Huxley (who was himself actually a grandson of "Darwin's Bulldog" Thomas Henry Huxley) as the title of his own celebrated work that quite deeply explores the Mysticism common to several world religions and faiths.

Human Nature, Human Behaviour and Human Existence in general are all very complex matters. That being said the Poets would have it that people have a certain "Drive to Reason" as well as a "Thirst for Faith."

Some quotations will illustrate this:-

A Drive to Reason

Civilisation is hooped together, brought
Under a rule, under the semblance of peace
By manifold illusion, but Man's life is thought,
And he, despite his terror, cannot cease,
Ravening through century after century
Ravening, raging and uprooting, that he may come
Into the desolation of reality.

W. B. Yeats

A Thirst for Faith

Live while you live, the epicure would say,
And seize the pleasures of the present day;
Live while you live the sacred preacher cries,
And give to God each moment as it flies.
Lord, in my views let both united be;
I live to pleasure when I live to thee.

Philip Dodderidge

Thou hast created us for Thyself, and our heart is not quiet until it rests in Thee.

St. Augustine

The main pages of the age-of-the-sage.org Web site are very much about the truly awesome insights of the Poets and Mystics.

The majority of these pages detail and explore the more Spiritual insights that have been won by those adept in Poetry or in Mysticism across the globe and across the ages. Some of our pages, however, continue into the realms of Metaphysics and show how Poets and Mystics have actually won KEY insights into Existence in general.

The following images are examples of the more Metaphysical insights that have been won into Human Existence:-

The above views of Human Nature / the Tripartite Soul suggest that people are essentially the same yet differences exist in terms of ethnocultural and confessional heritages.

We cannot deny that despite suggestions of a deep similarity in human nature across the Millenia and across the Globe there have been, for good and for ill, some notable "extreme?" personalities.

Several of our pages are full of awesomely profound quotations drawn from the Mysticism that is to be found at the very heart of the World Religions. We expect that those who read them with an open mind will be obliged to accept that people are indeed Spiritual and that that Spirituality allows people to become Enlightened as they make "Spiritual Progress" towards some mysterious Absolute Spirituality that has an independent existence.

We hope that, even if you are interested in human nature from a "purely scientific" standpoint, you will take the trouble to access our Metaphysical Insights pages and possibly also our Poetic Insights and Spiritual Insights pages.

If you do we hope that you will be impressed by the profundity of the insights into Human Nature, into Spirituality, and into Existence, that have been attained by the Poets and Mystics.

We cannot "Explain" these insights but nonetheless feel that people should be aware of them.

Introductory quotations

"Central" mysticism insights

"Other" spiritual wisdom

"Central" poetry insights

"Other" poetry wisdom

Spirituality & the wider world

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The Science vs God
Charles Darwin vs Religion Faith
Debate or Controversy

The Science vs GodCharles Darwin vs Religion FaithDebate or Controversy