History

Newton’s Views on Science and Faith

In this series

“This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets, could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being … This Being governs all things, not as the soul of the world, but as Lord over all; and on account of his dominion he is wont to be called Lord God.”

“When I wrote my treatise about our system, I had an eye upon such principles as might work with considering men for the belief of a Deity, and nothing can rejoice me more than to find it useful for that purpose.”

On interpreting Scripture: “It is the perfection of all God’s works that they are done with the greatest simplicity … And therefore, as they that would understand the frame of the world must endeavor to reduce their knowledge [science] to all possible simplicity, so it must be in seeking to understand these [prophetic] visions.”

“The true God is a living, intelligent and powerful Being … He governs all things, and knows all things that are or can be done.”

“I don’t know what I may seem to the world, but, as to myself, I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the sea shore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.”

Charles E. Hummel is author of The Galileo Connection and Genesis: God’s Creative Call (both InterVarsity).

Copyright © 1991 by the author or Christianity Today/Christian History magazine.Click here for reprint information on Christian History.

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