“Several writers have misapprehended or objected to the term ‘natural selection’ . Some have even imagined that natural selection induces variability, whereas it implies only the preservation of such variations as occur and are beneficial to the being under its conditions of life. No one objects to agriculturists speaking of the potent effects of man's selection; and in this case the individual differences given by nature, which man for some object selects, must of necessity first occur. Others have objected that the term selection implies conscious choice in the animals which become modified; and it has even been urged that as plants have no volition, natural selection is not applicable to them!

In the literal sense of the word, no doubt, natural selection is a misnomer; but who ever objected to chemists speaking of the elective affinities of the various elements ? — and yet an acid cannot strictly be said to elect the base with which it will in preference combines.

It has been said that I speak of natural selection as an active power or deity; but who objects to an author speaking of the attraction of gravity as ruling the movements of the planets? Every one knows what is meant and is implied by such metaphorical expressions; and they are almost necessary for brevity. So again it is difficult to avoid personifying the word ‘nature’; but I mean by nature, only the aggregate action and product of many natural laws, and by laws the sequence of events as ascertained by us. With a little familiarity such superficial objections will be forgotten.”

A photo (Ѻ) of a Tomato Hornworm caterpillar victimized by the rice-like eggs of the wasp larvae, overlaid with Charles Darwin's famous 1860 "wasp feeding quote", which worked to teeter him away from theism; and with which Richard Dawkins, in the 1970s and 1980s, admixtured with "selfish genes" + "Hamilton rule" + "blind forces", has used as his main atheism fuel, in the new atheism era, to promote a purposeless universe ideology as his modus operandi.

Religion
The following are representative statements concerning Darwin's religious views:

“Science has nothing to do with Christ, except insofar as the habit of scientific research makes a man cautious in admitting evidence. For myself, I do not believe that there ever has been any revelation. As for a future life, every man must judge for himself between conflicting vague probabilities.”

— Charles Darwin (1879), “Letter to German student” [14]

See main: Warm pond model

“[The original spark of life may have begun in] a warm little pond, with all sorts of ammonia and phosphoric salts, lights, heat, electricity, etc. present, so that a protein compound was chemically formed ready to undergo still more complex changes.”

The deeply rooted 158-year genius of the Darwin family: from Erasmus, Charles' grandfather, who posted that humans all originated from one living filament; to Charles Darwin, who introduced a working mechanism of evolution; to his grandson C.G. Darwin, who proposed the logic that in order to study and predict the future course of evolution, the subject of "human thermodynamics", the investigation of systems of human molecules, needs to be developed and pursued.

“Clausius and Darwin cannot both be right.”

— Roger Caillois, Coherences Aventureuses (1973), [9]

“I believe that I have somewhere said (but I cannot find the passage) that the principle of continuity renders it probable that the principle of life will hereafter be shown to be part or consequence of some general law.”

“A completely mad book.”

— Anons (1860), two German colleagues of Ernst Haeckel on reading Darwin’s On the Origin of Species [12]

“Darwin is the ‘new Newton’ who has explained the origin of organisms strictly via mechanical causes.”

— Ernst Haeckel (1868), History of Creation [13]

“Avoid stating how far, I believe, in materialism, say only that emotions, instincts, degrees of talent, which are hereditary re so because brain of child resembles parent stock.”

— Charles Darwin (1827), reflection on his friend atheist radical materialist Walter Browne (1805-1885) (Ѻ) having his materialist perspective paper on life and mind ‘expunged’ from the minutes of the Plinian Society meeting [15]

“Origin of man now proved. Metaphysics must flourish. He who understands the baboon would do more towards metaphysics than Locke.”

— Charles Darwin (1838), personal notes (Ѻ)

“The monkeys understand the affinities of man better than the boasted philosopher himself.”

— Charles Darwin (1838), personal notes (Ѻ)

“Love of the ‘deity effect’ of organization, oh you materialist! Why is thought being a secretion of brain, more wonderful than gravity a property of matter? It is our arrogance, our admiration of ourselves.”

— Charles Darwin (c.1850), Transmutation Notebook [15]

“We can allow satellites, planets, suns, universe, nay whole systems of universes, to be governed by laws, BUT the smallest insect, we wish to be created at once by special act.”

— Charles Darwin (c.1860) (Ѻ)

“I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term of natural selection.”

— Charles Darwin (c.1860) (Ѻ)

“Man is descended from a hairy, tailed quadruped, probably arboreal in its habits.”

— Charles Darwin (c.1860) (Ѻ)

“A moral being is one who is capable of reflecting on his past actions and their motives - of approving of some and disapproving of others.”

— Charles Darwin (c.1860) (Ѻ)

“It is mere rubbish, thinking at present of the origin of life; one might as well think of the origin of matter.”

— Charles Darwin (1863) (Ѻ); cited by Lawrence Krauss (2012) in A Universe from Nothing (pg. #)

“You have made a convert of an opponent in one sense [of your Hereditary Genius], for I have always maintained that, excepting fools, men did not differ much in intellect, only in zeal and hard work.”

— Charles Darwin (c.1869), “Letter to Francis Galton” [16]

“My theology is a simple muddle. I cannot look at the universe as the result of ‘blind chance’, yet I can see NO evidence of a beneficent design, or indeed or design of any kind.”

— Charles Darwin (1870), “Letter to Joseph Hooker” (Ѻ), Jul 12

“Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge.”

— Charles Darwin (1871), Descent of Man [1]

“Man is descended from a hairy, tailed quadruped, probably arboreal in its habits, and an inhabitant of the Old World. This creature, if its whole structure had been examined by a naturalist, would have been classed amongst the Quadrumana, as surely as the still more ancient progenitor of the Old and New World monkeys. The Quadrumana and all the higher mammals are probably derived from an ancient marsupial animal, and this through a long line of diversified forms, from some amphibian-like creature, and this again from some fish-like animal.”

— Charles Darwin (1871), The Descent of Man, Part 3 (§21:609) [17]

“I have steadily endeavored to keep my mind free (see: free thinker), so as to give up any hypothesis, however much beloved (and I cannot resist forming one on every subject), as soon as facts are shown to be opposed to it.”

— Charles Darwin (1877), on his own intelligence and ability (Ѻ)(Ѻ)

“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 (1879), “Letter to Wilson” (Ѻ), Mar 5

“My judgment often fluctuates. In my most extreme fluctuations, I have never been an ‘atheist’ in the sense of denying the existence of a god. I think that generally – and more and more as I grow older, but not always – that ‘agnostic’ would be the most correct description of my state of mind.”

— Charles Darwin (1879), “Letter to John Fordyce” (Ѻ), Jul 7

“It seems to me (rightly or wrongly) that direct arguments against Christianity and theism hardly have any effect on the public; and that freedom of thought will be best promoted by that gradual enlightening of human understanding which follows the progress of science. I have therefore always avoided writing about religion and have confined myself to science.”

— Charles Darwin (1880) (Ѻ)