God is unnecessary: ...how can we suppose that the august Being who brought all these countless worlds into form by the simple establishment of a natural principle flowing from his mind, was to interfere personally and specially on every occasion when a new shell-fish or reptile was to be ushered into existence on one of these worlds? Surely this idea is too ridiculous to be for a moment entertained. (p.154) He furthermore suggests that this interpretation may be based upon corrupt theology: Thus, the scriptural objection quickly vanishes, and the prevalent ideas about the organic creation appear only as a mistaken inference from the text, formed at a time when man's ignorance prevented him from drawing therefrom a just conclusion. (p.156) And praises God for his foresight in generating such wondrous variety from so elegant a method, while chastening those who would oversimplify His accomplishment: To a reasonable mind the Divine attributes must appear, not diminished or reduced in some way, by supposing a creation by law, but infinitely exalted. It is the narrowest of all views of the Deity, and characteristic of a humble class of intellects, to suppose him acting constantly in particular ways for particular occasions. It, for one thing, greatly detracts from his foresight, the most undeniable of all the attributes of Omnipotence. It lowers him towards the level of our own humble intellects. Much more worthy of him it surely is, to suppose that all things have been commissioned by him from the first, though neither is he absent from a particle of the current of natural affairs in one sense, seeing that the whole system is continually supported by his providence. (pp.156–157) Following its publication, there was increasing support for ideas of the coexistence of God and Nature, with the deity setting Natural Laws rather than continually intervening with miracles. It is perhaps for this reason that Origin of Species was accepted so readily upon its eventual publication. On the other hand, the knowledge of the scandal and experience of the reaction of his scientist friends confirmed Darwin's reluctance to publish his own ideas until he had well researched answers to all possible objections (though, in the end, Darwin had to publish earlier than he had wanted to anyway). Vestiges and Lamarck The book argued for an evolutionary view of life in the same spirit as the late Frenchman Jean-Baptiste Lamarck. Lamarck had long