Charles Robert Darwin

Charles Robert Darwin (1809 – 1882) was a naturalist and the son of the physician Robert Darwin. Charles was to become a doctor but was unhappy in the anatomy room, Edinburgh and took a bachelor's degree in Cambridge to become a priest. However, he was mostly involved in sports, mainly hunting, and also amateur studies in natural science. He participated in 1832-36 as a naturalist in a circumnavigation of the world on the cruiser Beagle. This journey is described in the "Journal of Researches" in 1845 (Sw. tr. 1872 and 1925: "A Naturalist's Journey Around the World"). He then spent a few years in London and in 1842 settled on a farm near the village of Downe in Kent, where he lived the rest of his life as a private scholar, constantly tormented by the ill health he contracted during the sea voyage. Only through the devoted care of his wife and an extremely regular lifestyle was he able to work as he did. Darwin's personality was distinguished by an amiable unpretentiousness and an almost weak sensitivity. He always loved natural life in all its forms. Among people he was reserved and withdrawn. He carried out his work with never-failing energy, as often as his health permitted. Without a trace of ambition or vanity, he eventually acquired an exceptionally high reputation among all mankind.

Doubted
As a scientist, Darwin was autodidact (self-educated). His studies were superficial, but best in geology. In biology, his studies were limited to outdoor observations and systematics. Therefore, it was understandable that the old systematics' doctrine of the constancy of species - depending on their creation from the beginning - would appear to him on his journey. Namely, on isolated islands, e.g. the Galapagos group, he found related, but not the same species of common genera. The absurdity of these species having been created each on its own island made him doubt the creation of species and the constancy of species. During long years of study, especially of different breeds of domestic animals, he developed the theory that made him famous.

Among cannibals
Darwin was between 22 and 25 years old when he made his first trip around the world. He then stayed for a time in Tierra del Fuego in 1833, where he saw how the savages and cannibals lived. He wrote to missionaries and warned them against traveling there. "You can't do anything there! I never could have imagined that people could live in such uncivilized conditions." After 30 years, however, he was back in Tierra del Fuego and what did he see? Missionaries had been there in the meantime and the Word of God had transformed the people so much in both their way of life and character that he was surprised to admit his mistake in warning the missionaries. Now the transformation was so obvious that he had to admit with shame that only the Gospel could accomplish such a thing. This made him think and he began to believe in God.

Read the Bible and prayed
He wrote a letter to the missionary society asking to become a member and sent $125 for the work among the heathen. During Darwin's last years, one of the missionaries - a friend of his - came to visit before his departure. He found Darwin reading the Bible and asked how far he had gotten. "I'm still in Hebrews," Darwin replied. "Haven't you gotten any further?" "No, there are such depths here, so it is impossible to pass by lightly." A couple of weeks earlier, when the missionary visited, he was also working on the Letter to the Hebrews. The missionary also asked how things were going with the theories of evolution. Then he sighed heavily and replied that he had long ago abandoned and retracted his hypotheses. "It was then, when I was young and stupid, that I threw out my theories. I never thought that they would take on the proportions they did." In one of his books it is told that after his conversion, Darwin began every working day with an hour of prayer. One morning a man came to visit, before Darwin had finished his devotions. The visitor was in a hurry, but Darwin's son replied: "My father has forbidden us to disturb him during the devotions, so if it cannot wait, it is better to come again another day."