The similar phrase 'Worldly Christianity' is one used by Bonhoeffer. It's J Gresham Machen that I want to line up most closely with. See his Christianity and culture here. Having done commentaries on Proverbs (Heavenly Wisdom) and Song of Songs (Heavenly Love), a matching title for Ecclesiastes would be Heavenly Worldliness. For my stance on worldliness, see 3 posts here.

Great quote - Thomas Carlyle on Charles Darwin


Subsequent to my trip to Carlyle's house I came across this. Fascinating.

Thomas Carlyle made the the following biting remarks to a friend who visited him a short time before his death:
"The so-called literary and scientific classes in England now proudly give themselves to protoplasm, origin of species and the like, to prove that God did not build the universe. I have known three generations of the Darwins - grandfather, father, and son, atheists all. The brother of the present famous naturalist, a quiet man, who lives not far from here, told me that among his grand-father's effects he found a seal engraven with this legend: Omnia ex conchis  (everything from a cockle shell)! I saw the naturalist not many months ago; told him that I had read his Origin of Species and other books; that he had by no means satisfied me that men were descended from monkeys, but had gone far towards persuading me that he and his so-called scientific brethren had brought the present generation of Englishmen very near to monkeys. A good sort of man is this Darwin, and well-meaning, but with very little intellect. Ah! It is a sad and terrible thing to see nigh a whole generation of men and women professing to be cultivated, looking around in a purblind fashion, and finding no God in this universe! I suppose it is a reaction from the reign of cant and hollow pretence, professing to believe what in fact they do not believe. And this is what we have got. All things from frog-spawn; the gospel of dirt the order of the day. The older I grow - and now I stand upon the brink of eternity - the more comes back to me the sentence in the Catechism which I learned when a child, and the fuller and deeper its meaning becomes: ' What is the great end of man? To glorify God and enjoy Him for ever.' No gospel of dirt, teaching that men have descended from frogs through monkeys can ever set that aside."

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