Jim Buchanan has said that a frequent expression around the University of
Chicago in the 1940s was "There is no God, and Frank Knight is his prophet."

Tonight, reading Darwin's Sacred Cause, by Adrian Desmond and James Moore, I
found that Charles Darwin once remarked of Harriet Martineau in the 1850s
that "There is no God, and Harriet is his prophet" (p. 300).

In the notes, the authors suggest that Darwin was repeating a quip (about
Martineau?) made by Douglas Jerrold, who published as "Q" in Punch.

So my question is whether the expression was well enough known to have some
currency on both sides of the Atlantic. I'd assume the repetition is not
simply coincidental, but wonder how the expression lingered long enough to
be applied to Knight.

Ross Emmett