Throughout the nineteenth century, particularly after the publication of Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species in 1859, the presumed contest between science and religion was characterized in terms of warfare. This "military metaphor," as it has been called, fanned White of hostility on both sides, creating the impression that scientists and theologians were split into two warring camps with the general public choosing one side or the other. The truth was considerably more complex. At best the military metaphor characterized the viewpoints of pro- and anti-Darwinian extremists, but it failed to describe the views of the vast majority in the middle. At the center of the war between science and religion were two influential books purporting to provide its history: John William Draper's History of the Conflict between Religion and Science (1874), which went through fifty printings by 1930, and A History...