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From Religion to Ethics: Andrew D. White and the Dilemma of a Christian Rationalist

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Glenn C. Altschuler
Glenn C. Altschuler
Affiliation:
Mr. Altschuler is assistant professor of history in Ithaca College, Ithaca, New York.
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Extract

In 1896 Andrew D. White published A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom, a work which had consumed his scholarly passion for twenty years. His original interest in the subject stemmed from his difficulties, while President of Cornell, with Protestant sectarian critics. During those years, he answered opponents somewhat guardedly in lectures and letters to religious publications, but at the same time he began research on what he hoped would he his magnum opus, a work to demonstrate the futility of attempts by religious advocates to prohibit scientific inquiry and to defend essential Christian truths. “I wish the clergy to read it,” he told historian George Lincoln Burr, “and if they like to attack it, and no university on my shoulders.”

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 47 , Issue 3 , September 1978 , pp. 308 - 324
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1978

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References

1. Andrew D. White to Burr, October 26, 1888, White Collection, Olin Library, Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. Reel 50.

2. See Brown, Jerry, The Rise of Biblical Criticism in America, 1800–1870 (Middletown. Connecticut, 1969).Google Scholar

3. Draper, John William, History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science (New York, 1874), p. vi.Google Scholar

4. Ibid., p. 33.

5. Ibid., p. 284.

6. Ibid., pp. 62, 217, 362; Fleming, Donald, John William Draper and the Religion of Science (Philadelphia, 1950), pp. 122–135.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

7. White insisted on this title rather than “Battlefields of Science,” the title of numerous lectures he had given, which he believed would lead potential readers to think that it “had something to do with Krupp guns, or armor plates, or Whitehead torpedoes.” ADW to Burr, June 25, 1896, White Collection, Reel 67.

8. Carter, Paul, The Spiritual Crisis of the Gilded Age (DeKalb, Illinois, 1971), p. 41.Google Scholar

9. Except for this brief reference, Carter does not discuss White. White, Edward, Science and Religion in American Thought (Stanford, 1952)Google Scholar is the only historian I have found who treats White's work in more than a paragraph, yet his discussion is rather brief and unsatisfactory.

10. Chapters of the book were serialized in the Popular Science Monthly in the 1880s and 1890s. Howells had offered to publish White's work without footnotes but the latter had refused. ADW to Youmans, October 30, 1875, White Collection, Reel 20.

11. White, who researched extensively in Europe, was the First to use source notes in a work on this subject. Youmans, E. L., “The Conflict of Ages,” The Popular Science Monthly 48 (February, 1896): 493–494.Google Scholar

12. ADW to Burr, April 5, 1889, White Collection, Reel 51.

13. A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom (New York and London, 1896) 1: 239.Google Scholar

14. Ibid., p. vi.

15. Ibid., p. 390.

16. Ibid., p. 203.

17. Ibid., pp. 53, 210, 212; White, , “Meteorology II,” The Popular Science Monthly 31 (07, 1887): 374.Google Scholar

18. White simply refused to call those on the “right side” theologians. White, , “Comparative Mythology II,” The Popular Science Monthly 36 (03, 1890), p. 600.Google Scholar

19. A History of the Warfare of Science 2:31.

20. Ibid., pp. 31–32.

21. For White's documentation of current Protestant intransigence see ADW to Bishop McTyeire, July 15, 1878, White Collection, Reel 23.

22. White, , “The Retreat of Theology in the Galileo Case,” The Popular Science Monthly 41 (06, 1892): 153.Google Scholar

23. See also ADW to Gilman, July 24, 1878, White Collection, Reel 23.

24. A History of the Warfare of Science, 2:292.

25. Ibid., 2:208.

26. Ibid., 1:23; Autobiography, 2:433.

27. ADW to Charles Fitch, November 15, 1905, White Collection, Reel 96; “The American Chapel at Berlin,” The Outlook 69 (12 28, 1901): 1076–1078.Google Scholar

28. ADW to Burr, August 26, 1885, White Collection, Reel 44.

29. Quoted in Herbst, Jurgen, The German Historical School in American Scholarship (Ithaca, 1965), p. 74.Google Scholar

30. White checked bookstalls to insure a healthy circulation for the journal. ADW to Burr, February 28, 1896, White Collection, Reel 65.

31. Burr to ADW, August 16, 1897, White Collection, Reel 72; ADW to D. Appleton and Co., July 10, 1896, White Collection, Reel 67; ADW to George W. Smalley, November 10, 1910, White Collection, Reel 108. Royalties for the Warfare of Science at White's death in 1918 were $10,007.66. Burr to E. L. Williams, January 30, 1919, Burr MSS.

32. Chicago Tribune, 07 6, 1897, p. 6Google Scholar

33. Holland to ADW, November 21, 1891, White Collection, Reel 56.

34. See, e.g., Philes to ADW, November 31, 1881, White Collection, Reel 30; Burr to ADW, April 1, 1899, White Collection, Reel 77; Burr to ADW, June 24, 1904, White Collection, Reel 92.

35. ADW to Evans, April 14, 1891, White Collection, Reel 55.

36. Burr to ADW, September 16, 1901, White Collection, Reel 84.

37. Battershall, Walton, “The Warfare of Science with Theology,” The North American Review, 165 (07, 1897): 87–98.Google Scholar

38. See, e.g., White, Edward, Science and Religion in American Thought, pp. 57–89.Google Scholar

39. See, e.g., the review in The Forum 22 (09, 1896): 67–78;Google Scholar by White's handpicked successor as President of Cornell. W. H. Shipman, pastor of a Methodist Episcopal church, reminded White of Tyndall's assessment of Newton's theory of light: “For a century it stood like a dam across the course of discovery.” Shipman to ADW, March 1, 1898, White Collection, Reel 73.

40. Jordan, David Starr, “The Warfare of Science,” The Dial 21 (09 16, 1896): 146–148.Google Scholar

41. Schurman, Jacob Gould, “Review,” Science 4 (12 11, 1896): 879–881.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

42. Britt to ADW, January 9, 1905, White Collection, Reel 93; Shackelford to ADW, June 23, 1909, White Collection, Reel 105; Miller to ADW, January 16, 1917, White Collection, Reel 123; William Phillips to ADW, November 6, 1895, White Collection, Reel 64.

43. Eaton to ADW, March 6, 1894, White Collection, Reel 61.

44. Eaton to ADW, April 16, 1894, White Collection, Reel 61; Eaton to ADW, July 21, 1894, White Collection, Reel 62; Eaton to ADW, January 21, 1896, White Collection, Reel 65; ADW to Eaton, January 30, 1896, White Collection. Reel 65.

45. Anonymous, , “Review,” The Outlook 53 (06 20, 1896): 1153.Google Scholar

46. Carnegie to ADW, May 6, 1896, White Collection, Reel 66.

47. Anonymous, , “Review,” The Nation 62 (05 28, 1896): 421–422.Google Scholar

48. Many forgot that White's aim had been reconcilation. See, e.g., Hopkins to ADW, March 27, 1897, White Collection, Reel 70.

49. Fred White to ADW, February 2, 1889, White Collection, Reel 51; Watts to ADW, March 29, 1897, White Collection, Reel 70; Evans to ADW, February 22, 1877, White Collection, Reel 22; Evans to ADW, January 4, 1901, White Collection, Reel 82. Evans recognized that White's political ambitions in the Republican Party had been thwarted several times because of his religious views.

50. Ingersoll to ADW, December 27, 1888, White Collection, Reel 50; ADW to Mrs. George Kennan, March 18, 1896, Kennan MSS, Library of Congress. For White's view of Ingersoll see Larson, Orvin, American Infidel: Robert G. Ingersoll (New York, 1962), p. 281.Google Scholar

51. Folkman to ADW, December 31, 1900, White Collection, Reel 82.

52. Evans to ADW, March 25, 1874, White Collection, Reel 15; Evans to ADW, February 22, 1877, White Collection, Reel 22.

53. Leverette, William Jr, “E. L. Youman's Crusade for Scientific Antonomy and Respectability,” American Quarterly 17 (1965): 12–32.Google Scholar

54. Carter, , Spiritual Crisis of the Gilded Age, pp. 16–17.Google Scholar