Suarez inquires in what sense the word "day," as employed in the first
chapter of Genesis, is to be taken. He discusses the views of Philo
and of Augustin on this question, and rejects them. He suggests that
the approval of their allegorizing interpretations by St. Thomas
Aquinas, merely arose out of St. Thomas's modesty, and his desire not
to seem openly to controvert St. Augustin--"voluisse Divus Thomas pro
sua modestia subterfugere vim argumenti potius quam aperte Augustinum
inconstantiae arguere."
Finally, Suarez decides that the writer of Genesis meant that the
term "day" should be taken in its natural sense; and he winds up
the discussion with the very just and natural remark that "it is
not probable that God, in inspiring Moses to write a history of the
Creation which was to be believed by ordinary people, would have made
him use language, the true meaning of which it is hard to discover,
and still harder to believe."[1]
[Footnote 1: "Tractatus de opere sex Dierum, seu de Universi
Creatione, quatenus sex diebus perfecta esse, in libro Genesis cap. i.
refertur, et praesertim de productioue hominis in statu innocentiae."
Ed. Birckmann, 1622.]
And in chapter xii. 3, Suarez further observes:--
"Ratio enim retinendi veram significationem diei naturalis est
illa communis, quod verba Scripturae non sunt ad metaphoras
transferenda, nisi vel necessitas cogit, vel ex ipsa scriptura
constet, et maximè in historica narratione et ad instructionem
fidei pertinente: sed haec ratio non minus cogit ad
intelligendum propriè dierum numerum, quam diei qualitatem,
QUIA NON MINUS UNO MODO QUAM ALIO DESTRUITUR SINCERITAS,
IMO ET VERITAS HISTORIAE. Secundo hoc valde confirmant alia
Scripturae loca, in quibus hi sex dies tanquam veri, et inter
se distincti commemorantur, ut Exod. 20 dicitur, _Sex diebus
operabis et facies omnia opera tua, septimo autem die Sabbatum
Domini Dei tui est_. Et infra: _Sex enim diebus fecit Dominus
caelum et terram et mare et omnia quae in eis sunt_, et idem
repetitur in cap. 31. In quibus locis sermonis proprietas
colligi potest tum ex aequiparatione, nam cum dicitur: _sex
diebus operabis_, propriissimè intelligitur: tum quia non est
verisimile, potuisse populum intelligere verba illa in alio
sensu, et è contrario incredibile est, Deum in suis praeceptis
tradendis illis verbis ad populum fuisse loquutum, quibus
deciperetur, falsum sensum concipiendo, si Deus non per sex
veros dies opera sua fecisset."
These passages leave no doubt that this great doctor of the Catholic
Church, of unchallenged authority and unspotted orthodoxy, not only
declares it to be Catholic doctrine that the work of creation took
place in the space of six natural days; but that he warmly repudiates,
as inconsistent with our knowledge of the Divine attributes, the
supposition that the language which Catholic faith requires the
believer to hold that God inspired, was used in any other sense than
that which He knew it would convey to the minds of those to whom it
was addressed.
And I think that in this repudiation Father Suarez will have the
sympathy of every man of common uprightness, to whom it is certainly
"incredible" that the Almighty should have acted in a manner which He
would esteem dishonest and base in a man.
But the belief that the universe was created in six natural days is
hopelessly inconsistent with the doctrine of evolution, in so far as
it applies to the stars and planetary bodies; and it can be made to
agree with a belief in the evolution of living beings only by the
supposition that the plants and animals, which are said to have been
created on the third, fifth, and six days, were merely the primordial
forms, or rudiments, out of which existing plants and animals have
been evolved; so that, on these days, plants and animals were not
created actually, but only potentially.
The latter view is that held by Mr. Mivart, who follows St. Augustin,
and implies that he has the sanction of Suarez. But, in point of fact,
the latter great light of orthodoxy takes no small pains to give the
most explicit and direct contradiction to all such imaginations, as
the following passages prove. In the first place, as regards plants,
Suarez discusses the problem:--
"_Quomodo herba virens et caetera vegetabilia hoc [tertio] die
fuerint producta._[1]
[Footnote 1: "Propter haec ergo sententia illa Augustini et
propter nimiam obscuritatem et subtilitatem ejus difficilis
creditu est: quia verisimile non est Deum inspirasse Moysi,
ut historiam de creatione mundi ad fidem totius populi adeo
necessariam per nomina dierum explicaret, quorum significatio
vix inveniri et difficillime ab aliquo credi posset." _(Loc.
cit._ Lib. I. cap. xi. 42.)]
"Praecipua enim difficultas hîc est, quam attingit Div. Thomas
I, par. qu. 69, art. 2, an haec productio plantarum hoc die
facta intelligenda sit de productione ipsarum in proprio esse
actuali et formali (ut sic rem explicerem) vel de productione
tantum in semine et in potentia. Nam Divus Augustinus libro
quinto Genes, ad liter, cap. 4 et 5 et libro 8, cap. 3,
posteriorem partem tradit, dicens, terram in hoc die accepisse
virtutem germinandi omnia vegetabilia quasi concepto omnium
illorum semine, non tamen statim vegetabilia omnia produxisse.
Quod primo suadet verbis illis capitis secundi. _In die quo
fecit Deus coelum et terram et omne virgultum agri priusquam,
germinaret_. Quomodo enim potuerunt virgulta fieri antequam
terra germinaret nisi quia causaliter prius et quasi in
radice, seu in semine facta sunt, et postea in actu producta?
Secundo confirmari potest, quia verbum illud _germinet terra_
optimè exponitur potestativè ut sic dicam, id est, accipiat
terra vim germinandi. Sicut in eodem capite dicitur _crescite
et multiplicamini_. Tertio potest confirmari, quia actualis
productio vegetabilium non tarn ad opus creationis, quam ad
opus propagationis pertinet, quod postea factum est. Et hanc
sententiam sequitur Eucherius lib. 1, in Gen. cap. 11, et illi
faveat Glossa, interli. Hugo. et Lyran. dum verbum _germinet_
dicto modo exponunt. NIHILOMINUS CONTRARIA SENTENTIA TENENDA
EST: SCILICET, PRODUXISSE DEUM HOC DIE HERBAM, ARBORES, ET
ALIA VEGETABILIA ACTU IN PROPRIA SPECIE ET NATURA. Haec est
communis sententia Patrum.--Basil, homil. 5; Exaemer. Ambros.
lib. 3; Exaemer. cap. 8,11, et 16; Chrysost, homil. 5 in Gen.
Damascene, lib. 2 de Fid. cap. 10; Theodor. Cyrilli. Bedae,
Glossae ordinariae et aliorum in Gen. Et idem sentit Divus
Thomas, _supra_, solvens argumenta Augustini, quamvis propter
reverentiam ejus quasi problematicè semper procedat. Denique
idem sentiunt omnes qui in his operibus veram successionem et
temporalem distinctionem agnoscant."
Secondly, with respect to animals, Suarez is no less decided:--
_De animalium ratione carentium productione quinto et sexto
die facta._[1]
"32. Primo ergo nobis certum sit haec animantia non in virtute
tantum aut in semine, sed actu, et in seipsis, facta fuisse
his diebus in quibus facta narrantur. Quanquam Augustinus
lib. 3, Gen. ad liter, cap. 5 in sua persistens sententia
contrarium sentire videatur."
[Footnote 1: _Loc. cit._ Lib. II. cap. vii. et viii. 1, 32, 35.]
But Suarez proceeds to refute Augustin's opinions at great length, and
his final judgment may be gathered from the following passage:--
"35. Tertio dicendum est, haec animalia omnia his diebus
producta esse, IN PERFECTO STATU, IN SINGULIS INDIVIDUIS, SEU
SPECIEBUS SUIS, JUXTA UNIUSCUJUSQUE NATURAM.... ITAQUE FUERUNT
OMNIA CREATA INTEGRA ET OMNIBUS SUIS MEMBRIS PERFECTA."
As regards the creation of animals and plants, therefore, it is clear
that Suarez, so far from "distinctly asserting derivative creation,"
denies it as distinctly and positively as he can; that he is at much
pains to refute St. Augustin's opinions; that he does not hesitate to
regard the faint acquiescence of St. Thomas Aquinas in the views of
his brother saint as a kindly subterfuge on the part of Divus Thomas;
and that he affirms his own view to be that which is supported by the
authority of the Fathers of the Church. So that, when Mr. Mivart tells
us that Catholic theology is in harmony with all that modern science
can possibly require; that "to the general theory of evolution, and
to the special Darwinian form of it, no exception ... need be taken on
the ground of orthodoxy;" and that "law and regularity, not arbitrary
intervention, was the Patristic ideal of creation," we have to choose
between his dictum, as a theologian, and that of a great light of
his Church, whom he himself declares to be "widely venerated as an
authority, and whose orthodoxy has never been questioned."
But Mr. Mivart does not hesitate to push his attempt to harmonize
science with Catholic orthodoxy to its utmost limit; and, while
assuming that the soul of man "arises from immediate and direct
creation," he supposes that his body was "formed at first (as now
in each separate individual) by derivative, or secondary creation,
through natural laws" (p. 331).
This means, I presume, that an animal, having the corporeal form and
bodily powers of man, may have been developed out of some lower form
of life by a process of evolution; and that, after this anthropoid
animal had existed for a longer or shorter time, God made a soul by
direct creation, and put it into the manlike body, which, heretofore,
had been devoid of that _anima rationalis_, which is supposed to be
man's distinctive character.
This hypothesis is incapable of either proof or disproof, and
therefore may be true; but if Suarez is any authority, it is not
Catholic doctrine. "Nulla est in homine forma educta de potentia
materiae,"[1] is a dictum which is absolutely inconsistent with the
doctrine of the natural evolution of any vital manifestation of the
human body.
[Footnote 1: Disput. xv. § x. No. 27.]
Moreover, if man existed as an animal before he was provided with a
rational soul, he must, in accordance with the elementary requirements
of the philosophy in which Mr. Mivart delights, have possessed a
distinct sensitive and vegetative soul, or souls. Hence, when the
"breath of life" was breathed into the manlike animal's nostrils,
he must have already been a living and feeling creature. But Suarez
particularly discusses this point, and not only rejects Mr. Mivart's
view, but adopts language of very theological strength regarding it.
"Possent praeterea his adjungi argumenta theologica, ut est
illud quod sumitur ex illis verbis Genes. 2. _Formavit Deus
hominem ex limo terrae et inspiravit in faciem ejus spiraculum
vitae et factus est homo in animam viventem_: ille enim
spiritus, quam Deus spiravit, anima rationalis fuit, et PER
EADEM FACTUS EST HOMO VIVENS, ET CONSEQUENTER, ETIAM SENTIENS.
"Aliud est ex VIII. Synodo Generali quae est
Constantinopolitana IV. can. 11, qui sic habet. _Apparet
quosdam in tantum impietatis venisse ut homines duas animas
habere dogmatizent: talis igitur impietatis inventores et
similes sapientes, cum Vetus et Novum Testamentum_ _omnesque
Ecclesiae patres unam animam rationalem hominem habere
asseverent, Sancta et universalis Synodus anathematizat_."[1]
[Footnote 1: Disput. xv. "De causa formali substantiali," § x. No.
24.]
Moreover, if the animal nature of man was the result of evolution, so
must that of woman have been. But the Catholic doctrine, according to
Suarez, is that woman was, in the strictest and most literal sense of
the words, made out of the rib of man.
"Nihilominus sententia Catholica est, verba illa Scripturae
esse ad literam intelligenda. AC PROINDE VERE, AC REALITER,
TULISSE DEUM COSTAM ADAE, ET, EX ILLA, CORPUS EVAE
FORMASSE."[1]
[Footnote 1: "Tractatus de Opere," Lib. III. "De hominis creatione,"
cap. ii. No. 3.]
Nor is there any escape in the supposition that some woman existed
before Eve, after the fashion of the Lilith of the rabbis;
since Suarez qualifies that notion, along with some other Judaic
imaginations, as simply "damnabilis."[1]
[Footnote 1: Ibid. Lib. III. cap. iv. Nos. 8 and 9.]
After the perusal of the "Tractatus de Opere" it is, in fact,
impossible to admit that Suarez held any opinion respecting the origin
of species, except such as is consistent with the strictest and most
literal interpretation of the words of Genesis. For Suarez, it is
Catholic doctrine, that the world was made in six natural days. On the
first of these days the _materia prima_ was made out of nothing, to
receive afterwards those "substantial forms" which moulded it into
the universe of things; on the third day, the ancestors of all living
plants suddenly came into being, full-grown, perfect, and possessed of
all the properties which now distinguish them; while, on the fifth
and sixth days, the ancestors of all existing animals were similarly
caused to exist in their complete and perfect state, by the infusion
of their appropriate material substantial forms into the matter
which had already been created. Finally on the sixth day, the _anima
rationalis_--that rational and immortal substantial form which is
peculiar to man--was created out of nothing, and "breathed into" a
mass of matter which, till then, was mere dust of the earth, and so
man arose. But the species man was represented by a solitary male
individual, until the Creator took out one of his ribs and fashioned
it into a female.
This is the view of the "Genesis of Species," held by Suarez to be the
only one consistent with Catholic faith: it is because he holds this
view to be Catholic that he does not hesitate to declare St. Augustin
unsound, and St. Thomas Aquinas guilty of weakness, when the one
swerved from this view and the other tolerated the deviation. And,
until responsible Catholic authority--say, for example, the Archbishop
of Westminster--formally declares that Suarez was wrong, and that
Catholic priests are free to teach their flocks that the world was
_not_ made in six natural days, and that plants and animals were _not_
created in their perfect and complete state, but have been evolved by
natural processes through long ages from certain germs in which they
were potentially contained, I, for one, shall feel bound to believe
that the doctrines of Suarez are the only ones which are sanctioned
by Infallible Authority, as represented by the Holy Father and the
Catholic Church.
I need hardly add that they are as absolutely denied and repudiated by
Scientific Authority, as represented by Reason and Fact. The question
whether the earth and the immediate progenitors of its present living
population were made in six natural days or not, is no longer one upon
which two opinions can be held.
The fact that it did not so come into being stands upon as sound a
basis as any fact of history whatever. It is not true that existing
plants and animals came into being within three days of the creation
of the earth out of nothing, for it is certain that innumerable
generations of other plants and animals lived upon the earth before
its present population. And when, Sunday after Sunday, men who profess
to be our instructors in righteousness read out the statement, "In
six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them
is," in innumerable churches, they are either propagating what they
may easily know, and, therefore, are bound to know, to be falsities;
or, if they use the words in some non-natural sense, they fall below
the moral standard of the much-abused Jesuit.
Thus far the contradiction between Catholic verity and Scientific
verity is complete and absolute, quite independently of the truth or
falsehood of the doctrine of evolution. But, for those who hold the
doctrine of evolution, all the Catholic verities about the creation of
living beings must be no less false. For them, the assertion that
the progenitors of all existing plants were made on the third day, of
animals on the fifth and sixth days, in the forms they now present, is
simply false. Nor can they admit that man was made suddenly out of the
dust of the earth; while it would be an insult to ask an evolutionist
whether he credits the preposterous fable respecting the fabrication
of woman to which Suarez pins his faith. If Suarez has rightly stated
Catholic doctrine, then is evolution utter heresy. And such I believe
it to be. In addition to the truth of the doctrine of evolution,
indeed, one of its greatest merits in my eyes, is the fact that it
occupies a position of complete and irreconcilable antagonism to that
vigorous and consistent enemy of the highest intellectual, moral, and
social life of mankind--the Catholic Church. No doubt, Mr. Mivart,
like other putters of new wine into old bottles, is actuated by
motives which are worthy of respect, and even of sympathy; but his
attempt has met with the fate which the Scripture prophesies for all
such.
Catholic theology, like all theologies which are based upon the
assumption of the truth of the account of the origin of things given
in the Book of Genesis, being utterly irreconcilable with the doctrine
of evolution, the student of science, who is satisfied that the
evidence upon which the doctrine of evolution rests, is incomparably
stronger and better than that upon which the supposed authority of
the Book of Genesis rests, will not trouble himself further with these
theologies, but will confine his attention to such arguments against
the view he holds as are based upon purely scientific data--and
by scientific data I do not merely mean the truths of physical,
mathematical, or logical science, but those of moral and metaphysical
science. For, by science, I understand all knowledge which rests upon
evidence and reasoning of a like character to that which claims our
assent to ordinary scientific propositions. And if any one is able to
make good the assertion that his theology rests upon valid evidence
and sound reasoning, then it appears to me that such theology will
take its place as a part of science.
The present antagonism between theology and science does not arise
from any assumption by the men of science that all theology must
necessarily be excluded from science; but simply because they are
unable to allow that reason and morality have two weights and two
measures; and that the belief in a proposition, because authority
tells you it is true, or because you wish to believe it, which is a
high crime and misdemeanour when the subject matter of reasoning is
of one kind, becomes under the _alias_ of "faith" the greatest of all
virtues, when the subject matter of reasoning is of another kind.
The Bishop of Brechin said well the other day:--"Liberality in
religion--I do not mean tender and generous allowances for the
mistakes of others--is only unfaithfulness to truth."[1] And, with
the same qualification, I venture to paraphrase the Bishop's dictum:
"Ecclesiasticism in science is only unfaithfulness to truth."
[Footnote 1: Charge at the Diocesan Synod of Brechin. _Scotsman_,
Sept. 14, 1871.]
Elijah's great question, "Will you serve God or Baal? Choose ye," is
uttered audibly enough in the ears of every one of us as we come to
manhood. Let every man who tries to answer it seriously, ask himself
whether he can be satisfied with the Baal of authority, and with all
the good things his worshippers are promised in this world and the
next. If he can, let him, if he be so inclined, amuse himself with
such scientific implements as authority tells him are safe and will
not cut his fingers; but let him not imagine he is, or can be, both a
true son of the Church and a loyal soldier of science.
And, on the other hand, if the blind acceptance of authority appears
to him in its true colours, as mere private judgment _in excelsis_,
and if he have the courage to stand alone, face to face with the abyss
of the Eternal and Unknowable, let him be content, once for all, not
only to renounce the good things promised by "Infallibility," but even
to bear the bad things which it prophesies; content to follow reason
and fact in singleness and honesty of purpose, wherever they may lead,
in the sure faith that a hell of honest men will, to him, be more
endurable than a paradise full of angelic shams.
Mr. Mivart asserts that "without a belief in a personal God, there is
no religion worthy of the name." This is a matter of opinion. But
it may be asserted, with less reason to fear contradiction, that the
worship of a personal God, who, on Mr. Mivart's hypothesis, must
have used language studiously calculated to deceive His creatures and
worshippers, is "no religion worthy of the name." "Incredibile est,
Deum illis verbis ad populum fuisse locutum quibus deciperetur," is a
verdict in which, for once, Jesuit casuistry concurs with the healthy
moral sense of all mankind.
Having happily got quit of the theological aspect of evolution, the
supporter of that great truth who turns to the scientific objections
which are brought against it by recent criticism, finds, to his
relief, that the work before him is greatly lightened by the
spontaneous retreat of the enemy from nine-tenths of the territory
which he occupied ten years ago. Even the Quarterly Reviewer not only
abstains from venturing to deny that evolution has taken place, but he
openly admits that Mr. Darwin has forced on men's minds "a recognition
of the probability, if not more, of evolution, and of the certainty of
the action of natural selection" (p. 49).
I do not quite see, myself, how, if the action of natural selection is
_certain_, the occurrence of evolution is only _probable_; inasmuch as
the development of a new species by natural selection is, so far as
it goes, evolution. However, it is not worth while to quarrel with
the precise terms of a sentence which shows that the high watermark of
intelligence among those most respectable of Britons, the readers of
the _Quarterly Review_, has now reached such a level that the next
tide may lift them easily and pleasantly on the once-dreaded shore of
evolution. Nor, having got there, do they seem likely to stop, until
they have reached the inmost heart of that great region, and accepted
the ape ancestry of, at any rate, the body of man. For the Reviewer
admits that Mr. Darwin can be said to have established:
"That if the various kinds of lower animals have been evolved
one from the other by a process of natural generation or
evolution, then it becomes highly probable, _à priori_, that
man's body has been similarly evolved; but this, in such a
case, becomes equally probable from the admitted fact that he
is an animal at all" (p. 65).
From the principles laid down in the last sentence, it would follow
that if man were constructed upon a plan as different from that of any
other animal as that of a sea-urchin is from that of a whale, it
would be "equally probable" that he had been developed from some other
animal as it is now, when we know that for every bone, muscle, tooth,
and even pattern of tooth, in man, there is a corresponding bone,
muscle, tooth, and pattern of tooth, in an ape. And this shows one
of two things--either that the Quarterly Reviewer's notions of
probability are peculiar to himself; or, that he has such an
overpowering faith in the truth of evolution, that no extent of
structural break between one animal and another is sufficient to
destroy his conviction that evolution has taken place.
But this by the way. The importance of the admission that there is
nothing in man's physical structure to interfere with his having been
evolved from an ape, is not lessened because it is grudgingly made and
inconsistently qualified. And instead of jubilating over the extent of
the enemy's retreat, it will be more worth while to lay siege to his
last stronghold--the position that there is a distinction in kind
between the mental faculties of man and those of brutes; and that, in
consequence of this distinction in kind, no gradual progress from
the mental faculties of the one to those of the other can have taken
place.