CHAPTER XVI.

THE DETAILS OF THE CREATION NARRATIVE

_APPENDIX._

PROFESSOR DELITZSCH ON THE GARDEN OF EDEN

CHAPTER I.

_INTRODUCTORY_

Among the recollections that are lifelong, I have one as vivid as ever

after more than twenty-five years have elapsed; it is of an evening

lecture--the first of a series--given at South Kensington to working

men. The lecturer was Professor Huxley; his subject, the Common Lobster.

All the apparatus used was a good-sized specimen of the creature itself,

a penknife, and a black-board and chalk. With such materials the

professor gave us not only an exposition, matchless in its lucidity, of

the structure of the crustacea, but such an insight into the purposes

and methods of biological study as few could in those days have

anticipated. For there were as yet no Science Primers, no International

Series; and the "new biology" came upon us like the revelation of

another world. I think that lecture gave me, what I might otherwise

never have got (and what some people never get), a profound conviction

of the reality and meaning of facts in nature. That impression I have

brought to the attempt which this little book embodies. The facts of

nature are God's revelation, of the same weight, though not the same in

kind, as His written Word.

At the same time, the further conviction is strong in my mind, not

merely of the obvious truth that the Facts and the Writing (if both

genuine) cannot really differ, but further, that there must be, after

all, a true way of explaining the Writing, if only it is looked for

carefully--a way that will surmount not only the difficulty of the

subject, but also the impatience with which some will regard the

attempt. Like so many other questions connected with religion, the

question of reconciliation produces its double effect. People will

ridicule attempts to solve it, but all the same they will return again

and again to the task of its actual solution.

That the latter part of the proposition is true, has recently received

illustration in the fact that a review like the _Nineteenth Century_,

which has so little space to spare, has found room in four successive

numbers[1] for articles by Gladstone, Huxley, and H. Drummond, on the

subject of "Creation and its Records." May I make one remark on this

interesting science tournament? I can understand the scientific

conclusions Professor Huxley has given us. I can also understand Mr.

Gladstone, because he values the Writing as the professor values the

Facts. But one thing I can _not_ understand. Why is Professor Huxley so

angry or so contemptuous with people who value the Bible, whole and as

it stands, and want to see its accuracy vindicated? Why are they

fanatics, Sisyphus-labourers, and what not? That they are a very large

group numerically, and hardly contemptible intellectually, is, I think,

obvious; that a further large group (who would not identify themselves

wholly with the out-and-out Bible defenders) feel a certain amount of

sympathy, is proved by the interest taken in the controversy. Yet all

"reconcilers" are ridiculed or denounced--at any rate are contemptuously

dismissed. Can it be that the professor has for the moment overlooked

one very simple fact?

[Footnote 1: November, December, 1885; and January, February, 1886.]

The great bulk of those interested in the question place their whole

hope for their higher moral and spiritual life in this world and the

next on one central Person--the LORD JESUS CHRIST. If He is wrong, then

no one can be right--there is no such thing as right: that is what they

feel. It will be conceded that it is hardly "fanatical" to feel this.

But if so, surely it is not fanatical, but agreeable to the soberest

reason, further to hold that this (to them sacred) PERSON did (and His

apostles with Him) treat the Book of Genesis as a whole (and not merely

parts of it) as a genuine revelation--or, to use the popular expression,

as the _Word of_ GOD. That being so, can it be matter for surprise or

contemptuous pity, that they should be anxious to vindicate the Book,

to be satisfied that the MASTER was not wrong? That is the ultimate and

very real issue involved in the question of Genesis.

As long as people feel _that_, they must seek the reconciliation of the

two opposing ideas. If the attempt is made in a foolish or bitter

spirit, or without a candid appreciation of the facts, then the attempt

will no doubt excite just displeasure. But need it always be so made?

As to the first part of my proposition that attempts to reconcile

religion and science are received with a certain dislike, it is due

partly to the unwisdom with which they are sometimes made. Prof. H.

Drummond speaks of the dislike as general.[1]

If this is so, I, as a "reconciler," can only ask for indulgence, hoping

that grace may be extended to me on the ground of having something to

say on the subject that has not yet been considered.

Nor, as regards the impatience of the public, can I admit that there is

only fault on one side. In the first place, it will not be denied that

some writers, delighted with the vast, and apparently boundless, vision

that the discovery (in its modern form) of Evolution opened out to them,

did incautiously proceed, while surveying their new kingdom, to assert

for it bounds that stretch beyond its legitimate scope.

[Footnote 1: In the Introduction to his well-known book, "Natural Law in

the Spiritual World."]

Religionists, on the other hand, imagining, however wrongly, that the

erroneous extension was part of the true scientific doctrine, attacked

the whole without discrimination.

While such a misapprehension existed, it was inevitable that writers

anxious alike for the dignity of science and the maintenance of

religion, should step in to point out the error, and effect a

reconciliation of claims which really were never in conflict.

It is hardly the fault of "religionists" that it was at first supposed

that one _could_ not hold the doctrine of evolution without denying a

"special" creation and a designing Providence. It was on this very

natural supposition that the first leading attack--attributed to the

Bishop of Oxford--proceeded. And the writer fell into the equally

natural mistake of taking advantage of the uncompleted and unproved

state of the theory at the time, to attack the theory itself, instead of

keeping to the safer ground, namely, that whatever might ultimately be

the conclusion of evolutionists, it was quite certain that no theory of

evolution that at all coincided with the known facts, offered any ground

for argument against the existence of an Intelligent Lawgiver and First

Cause of all; nor did it tend in the slightest to show that no such

thing as creative design and providence existed in the course of nature.

What the discovery of evolution really did, was to necessitate a

revision of the hitherto popularly accepted and generally assumed and

unquestioned notion of what _creation_ was. And it has long appeared to

me, that while now the most thoroughgoing advocates of evolution

generally admit that their justly cherished doctrine has nothing to say

to the existence of a Creator, or to the possibility of design--which

may be accepted or denied on other grounds--the writers on the side of

Christianity have not sufficiently recognized the change which their

views ought to undergo.

As long as this is the case, there will continue to be a certain

"conflict," not indeed between science and religion, but of the kind

which has been vividly depicted by the late Dr. Draper.

It can scarcely have escaped the notice of the most ordinary reader

that, in the course of that interesting work, the author has very little

to say about religion--at any rate about religion in any proper sense of

the term. The conflict was between a Church which had a zeal for God

without knowledge, and the progress of scientific thought; it was also a

conflict between discovered facts, and facts which existed, not in the

Bible, but in a particular interpretation, however generally received,

of it.

The present work is therefore addressed primarily to Christian believers

who still remain perplexed as to what they ought to believe; and its aim

is to prevent, if may be, an unreasonable alarm at, and a useless

opposition to, the conclusions of modern science; while, at the same

time, it tells them in simple language how far those conclusions really

go, and how very groundless is the fear that they will ever subvert a

true faith that, antecedent to the most wonderful chain of causation and

methodical working which science can establish, there is still a Divine

Designer--One who upholds all things "by the word of His power."

The doctrine of evolution is still the _ignotum_ to a great many, and it

is therefore, according to the time-honoured proverb, taken _pro

magnifico_, as something terribly adverse to the faith. Nor can it be

fairly denied, as I before remarked, that some of the students of the

theory have become so enamoured of it, so carried away by the

intoxication of the gigantic speculation it opens out to the

imagination, that they have succumbed to the temptation to carry

speculation beyond what the proof warrants, and thus lend some aid to

the deplorable confusion, which would blend in one, what is legitimate

inference and what is unproved hypothesis or mere supposition.

It only remains to say that the basis of this little book is a short

course of lectures in which I endeavoured to disarm the prejudices of an

educated but not scientifically critical audience, by simply stating how

far the theory of cosmical evolution had been really proved--proved,

that is, to the extent of that reasonable certainty which satisfies the

ordinary "prudent man" in affairs of weight and importance. I have tried

to show that evolution, apart from fanciful and speculative extensions

of it, allows, if it does not directly establish, that the operation of

nature is not a chance or uncontrolled procedure, but one that suggests

a distinct set of lines, and an orderly obedience to pre-conceived law,

intelligently and beneficently (in the end) designed.

There are obviously two main points which the Christian reader requires

to have made clear. The first is that, the modern theory of evolution

being admitted, the constitution of matter in the universe and the

principles of development in organic life, which that theory

establishes, not only do not exclude, but positively demand, the

conception of a Divine artificer and director. The second point, which

is perhaps of still greater weight with the believer, is that where

revelation (which is his ultimate standard of appeal) has touched upon

the subject of creation, its statements are not merely a literary fancy,

an imaginary cosmogony, false in its facts though enshrining Divine

truth, but are as a whole perfectly true.

Whatever novelty there may be, is to be found in the treatment of the

second subject. The first portion of the work is only a brief and

popular statement of facts, quite unnecessary to the scientific reader

but probably very necessary to the large body of Churchmen, who have not

studied science, but are quite able to appreciate scientific fact and

its bearings when placed before them in an untechnical form, and

divested of needless details and subordinate questions.

But it is around the supposed declarations of Scripture on the subject

of creation that the real "conflict" has centred. Let us look the matter

quite fairly in the face. We accept the conclusion that (let us say) the

horse was developed and gradually perfected or advanced to his present

form and characteristics, by a number of stages, and that it took a very

long time to effect this result. Now, if there is anywhere a statement

in Holy Writ that (_a_) a horse was _per saltum_ called into existence

in a distinctive and complete form, by a special creative _fiat_, and

that (_b_) this happened not gradually, but in a limited and specified

moment of time, then I will at once admit that the record (assuming that

its meaning is not to be mistaken) is not provably right, if it is not

clearly wrong; and accept the consequences, momentous as they would be.

If, in the same way, the Record asserts that man, or at least man the

direct progenitor of the Semitic race,[1] was a distinct and special

creation, his bodily frame having some not completely explained

developmental connection with the animal creation, but his higher nature

being imparted as a special and unique creative endowment out of the

line of physical development altogether, then I shall accept the Record,

because the proved facts of science have nothing to say against it,

whatever Drs. Buchner, Vogt, Häckel, and others may assert to the

contrary.

[Footnote 1: With whose history, as leading up to the advent of the

Saviour in the line of David, the Bible is mainly concerned.]

In the first of my two instances, the popular idea has long been that

the sacred record _does_ say something about a direct and separate

creative act; and this idea has been the origin and ground of all the

supposed conflict between science and "religion." As long as this idea

continues, it can hardly be said that a book addressed to the clearing

up of the subject is unnecessary or to be rejected _per se_.

As to the method in which this subject will be dealt with, I shall

maintain that the Scripture does _not_ say anything about the horse, or

the whale, or the ox, or any other animal, being separately or directly

created. And the view thus taken of the Record I have not met with

before. This it is necessary to state, not because the fact would lend

any value to the interpretation--rather the contrary; but because it

justifies me in submitting what, if new, may be intrinsically important,

to the judgment of the Church; and it also protects me from the offence

of plagiarism, however unwitting. If others have thought out the same

rendering of the Genesis history, so much the better for my case; but

what is here set down occurred to me quite independently.

A study of the real meaning of the Record, in the light of what may be

fairly regarded as proved facts, cannot be without its use to the

Christian. If it be true that a certain amount of information on the

subject of creation is contained in revelation, it must have been so

contained for a specific purpose--a purpose to be attained at some stage

or other of the history of mankind. It is possible also that the study

will bring to light a probable, or at any rate a possible, explanation

of some of those apparent (if they are not real) "dead-locks" which

occur in pursuing the course of life history on the earth.

Such considerations will naturally have more weight with the Christian

believer than with those who reject the faith. But at least the

advantage of them remains with the believer, till the contrary is shown.

The extreme evolutionist may cling to the belief that at some future

time he will be able to account for the entrance of LIFE into the

world's history, that he will be able to explain the connection of MIND

with MATTER; or he may hope that the sterility of certain hybrid forms

will one day be explained away, and so on. But till these things _are_

got over, the believer cannot be reproached as holding an unreasonable

belief when his creed maintains that Life is a gift and prerogative of a

great Author of Life; that Mind is the result of a spiritual environment

which is a true, though physically intangible, part of nature; and that

the absence of any proof that variation and development cross

certain--perhaps not very clearly ascertained, but indubitably

existing--lines, points to the designed fixing of certain types, and the

restriction of developmental creation to running in certain lines of

causation up to those types, and not otherwise.

It can never be unreasonable to believe anything that is in exact

accordance with facts as ascertained at any given moment of

time--unless, indeed, the fact is indicated by other considerations as

being one likely to disappear from the category of fact altogether.[1]

Enough has thus, I hope, appeared, to make the appearance of this little

work, at least excusable; what more may be necessary to establish its

claim to be read must depend on what it contains.

I have only to add that I can make no pretension to be a teacher of

science. I trust that there is no material error of statement; if there

is, I shall be the first to retract and correct it. I am quite confident

that no correction that may be needed in detail will seriously affect

the general argument.

[Footnote 1: At present it is an ascertained fact that certain chemical

substances are elements incapable of further resolution. But there are

not wanting indications which would make it a matter of no surprise at

all, if we were to learn to-morrow that the so-called element had been

resolved. Such a fact is an example of what is stated in the text; and a

belief based on the absolute and unchangeable stability of such a fact

would not be unassailable. But none of the above stated instances of

"dead-lock" in evolution are within "measurable distance" of being

resolved.]

CHAPTER II.

_THE ELEMENT OF FAITH IN CREATION._

In the extract placed on the title-page, the author of the Epistle

clearly places our conclusion that God "established the order of

creation"--the lines, plans, developmental-sequences, aims, and objects,

that the course of creation has hitherto pursued and is still

ceaselessly pursuing,[1] in the category of _faith_.

Of course, from one point of view--very probably that of the writer of

the Epistle--this conclusion is argued by the consideration that the

human mind forms no distinct conception of the formation of solid--or

any other form of--matter _in vacuo_, where nothing previously existed.

And what the mind does not find within its own power, but what yet _is

true_ in the larger spiritual kingdom beyond itself, is apprehended by

the spiritual faculty of _faith_.

[Footnote 1: [Greek: Kataertisthai tous aionas]. This implies more than

the mere originating or supplying of a number of material, organic, or

inorganic (or even spiritual) forms and existences. Whatever may be the

precise translation of [Greek: aion], it implies a chain of events, the

cause and effect, the type and the plan, and its evolution all

included.]

But from another point of view, the immediate action of faith is not so

evident. If, it might be said, the law of evolution, or the law of

creation, or whatever is the true law, is, in all its bearings, a matter

to be observed and discovered by human science, then it is not easy to

see how there is any exercise of faith. We should be more properly said

to _know_, by intellectual processes of observation, inference, and

conclusion, that there was a Law Giver, an Artificer, and a First Cause,

so unlimited in power and capacity by the conditions of the case, that

we must call Him "Divine."

And many will probably feel that their just reasoning on the subject

leads them to knowledge--knowledge, i.e., as approximately certain as

anything in this world can be.

But the text, by the use of the term [Greek: aion], implies (as I

suggested) more than mere production of objects; it implies a designed

guidance and preconceived planning. If it were merely asserted that

there is a first cause of material existence, and even that such a cause

had enough known (or to be inferred) about it, to warrant our writing

"First Cause" with capitals, then the proposition would pass on all

hands without serious question. But directly we are brought face to

face, not merely with the isolated idea of creation of tangible forms

out of nothing (as the phrase is), but rather with the whole history

and development of the world and its inhabitants, we see so many

conflicting elements, such a power of natural forces and human passions

warring against the progress of good, and seeming to end only too often

in disaster, that it becomes a matter of _faith_ to perceive a Divine

providence underlying and overruling all to its own ends.

The fact is, that directly we make mention of the "aeons"--the world's

age histories--we are met with that Protean problem that always seems to

lurk at the bottom of every religious question: Why was _evil_

permitted? Mr. J.S. Mill, many readers will recollect, concluded that if

there was a God, that God was not perfectly good, or else was not

omnipotent. Now of course our limited faculties do not enable us to

apprehend a really absolute and unlimited omnipotence. We _can_ only

conceive of God as limited by the terms of His own Nature and Being. We

say it is "impossible for God to lie," or for the Almighty to do wrong

in any shape; in other words, we are, in this as in other matters where

the finite and the Infinite are brought into contact, led up to two

necessary conclusions which cannot be reconciled. We can reason out

logically and to a full conclusion, that given a God, that God must be

perfect, unlimited and unconditioned. We can also reason out, _provided

we take purely human and finite premises_, another line of thought which

forbids us to suppose that a Perfect God would have allowed evil,

suffering, or pain; and this leads us exactly or nearly to Mr. Mill's

conclusion.

Whenever we are thus brought up to a dead-lock, as it were, there is the

need of _faith_, which is the faculty whereby the finite is linked on to

the Infinite. For this faith has two great features: one is represented

by the capacity for assimilating fact which is spiritual or

transcendental, and therefore not within the reach of finite intellect;

the other is represented by the capacity for reliance on, and trust in,

the God whose infinite perfections we cannot as finite creatures grasp

or follow.

In the difficult scheme of the world's governance, in the storms,

earthquakes, pestilences, sufferings of all kinds--signs of failure,

sickness, and decay, and death, signs of the victory of evil and the

failure of good--we can only _believe_ in God, and that all will issue

in righteous ends. And our belief proceeds, as just stated, on two

lines: one being our spiritual capacity for knowing that GOD IS, and

that we, His creatures, are the objects of His love; the other being the

fact that we only see a very little end of the thread, or perhaps only a

little of one thread out of a vast mass of complicated threads, in the

great web of design and governance, and that therefore there is wide

ground for confidence that the end will be success. We rely confidently

on God. If it is asked, Why is it a part of faith to have a childlike

confidence in an unseen God?--we reply, that the main origin of such

confidence is to be found in the wonderful condescension of God

exhibited in the Incarnation, the Cross, and the Resurrection.

This is not the place to enter on a detailed examination of the

essential importance of these great central facts of Christian belief in

establishing faith in the unseen, and distinguishing its grasp from the

blind clutches of credulity; but a single consideration will suffice at

least to awaken a feeling of a wide _vista_ of possibility when we put

it thus: Do we wonder at the spectacle of a righteous man, passing his

life in suffering and poverty, seemingly stricken by the Divine

hand?--But is not the case altered when we reflect _that the Hand that

thus smites is a hand itself pierced_ with the Cross-nails of a terrible

human suffering, undergone solely on man's account?

It can be proved easily, by exhaustive examples, to be the case, that

wherever the finite is brought into contact with the Infinite, that

there must be a dead-lock, a leading up successively to two conclusions,

one of which is almost, if not quite, contrary to the other. A very

striking instance of this is the question of Predestination and

Free-will. From the finite side, I am conscious that I am a free agent:

I can will to rise up and to lie down. It is true that my will may be

influenced, strongly or feebly, by various means--by the effect of

habit, by the inherited tendency of my constitution, by some present

motive of temptation, and so forth: but the _will_ is there--the

motive-influence or inclining-power is not the will, but that which

affects or works on will. A _motive_ pulls me this way, another pulls me

that; but in the end, my _will_ follows one or the other. I can, then,

do as I please. On the other hand, Infinite Knowledge must know, and

have known from all eternity, what I shall do now, and at every moment

of my future being: and for Omnipotence to know from all eternity what

will be, is, in our human sense, practically undistinguishable from the

thought that the Power has predestined the same; and man cannot of

course alter that. Here, then, by separate lines of thought, we are

brought to two opposite and irreconcilable conclusions. It is so always.

We cannot ourselves imagine how a fixed set of laws and rules can be

followed, and yet the best interests of each and every one of God's

creatures be served as truly as if God directly wielded the machinery of

nature only for the special benefit of the individual. The thing is

unthinkable to us: yet directly we reason on the necessarily _unlimited_

capability of a Divine Providence, we are led to the conclusion that it

must be possible. Here then is the province of _Faith_.[1]

[Footnote 1: The Scripture clearly recognizes the two opposing lines. In

one place we read, "Thou hast given them a law which _shall not be

broken_;" in another, "All things work together for good to them that

love God."]

It is by Faith, then--combined with only a limited degree of knowledge,

founded on observation and reasoning--that we understand that "the aeons

were constituted by the Word of God, so that the things which are seen

were not made of things which do appear" (the phenomenal has its origin

in the non-phenomenal).

While allowing, then, the element of Faith in our recognition of a

Creator and Moral Governor of the world, our care is in this, as in all

exercises of faith, that our faith be reasonable. We are not called on

to believe so as to be "put to confusion," intellectually, as Tait and

Balfour have it.

CHAPTER III.

_THE DOCTRINE OF CREATION STATED_.

It will strike some readers with a sense of hopelessness, this demand

for a reason in our faith. A special and very extensive knowledge is

required, it seems, to test the very positive assertion that some have

chosen to make regarding the "explosion" of the Christian faith in the

matter of Creation.

We are told in effect that every thing goes by itself--that given some

first cause, about which we know, and can know, nothing, directly

primordial matter appears on the scene, and the laws of sequence and

action which observed experience has formulated and is progressively

formulating are given, then nothing else is required; no governance, no

control, and no special design. So that in principle a Creator and

Providence are baseless fancies; and this is further borne out by the

fact, that when the Christian faith ventures on details as to the mode

of Creation it is certainly and demonstrably wrong. If these

propositions are to be controverted, it must be in the light of a

knowledge which a large body of candid and earnest believers do not

possess.

Fortunately, however, the labours of many competent to judge have placed

within the reach of the unscientific but careful student, the means of

knowing what the conclusions of Science really are, as far as they

affect the questions we have to consider. At least, any inquirer can,

with a little care and patient study, put himself in a position to know

where the difficulty or difficulties lie, and what means there are of

getting over them. His want of technical knowledge will not be in his

way, so far as his just appreciation of the position is concerned.

Without pretending to take up ground which has already been occupied by

capable writers whose books can easily be consulted, I may usefully

recapitulate in a simple form, and grouped in a suitable order, some of

the points best worth noting.

The theory of cosmical evolution is not, in its general idea, a new

thing. The sort of evolution, however, that was obscurely shadowed forth

by the early sages of India (much as it is the fashion now to allude to

it) really stands in no practical relation to the modern and natural

theory which is associated with the name of CHARLES DARWIN, and which

has been further taken up by Mr. HERBERT SPENCER and others as the

foundation for a complete scheme of cosmic philosophy. The theory is

now, in its main features, admitted by every one. But there are a few

who would push it beyond its real ascertained limits, and would

substitute fancies for facts; they are not content to leave the

_lacunae_, which undoubtedly do exist, but fill them up by

hypothesis,[1] passing by easy steps of forgetfulness from the "it was

possibly," "it was likely to have been," to the "it must have been," and

"it was"!

To all such extensions we must of course object; there are gaps in the

scheme which can be filled in with really great probability, and in such

cases there will be no harm done in admitting the probability, while

still acknowledging it as such. An overcautious lawyer-like captiousness

of spirit in such matters will help no cause and serve no good purpose.

Nor is it at all difficult in practice to draw the line and say what is

fairly admissible conjecture and what is not. There are other gaps,

however, that at present, no real analogy, no fair inferential process,

can bridge over; and to all speculations on such subjects, if advanced

as more than bare and undisguised guesses, objection must be taken.

If this one line had been fairly and firmly adhered to from the first,

it can hardly be doubted that much of the acrimony of controversy would

have been avoided. It is just as essential at the present moment to

insist on the point as ever. But to proceed. Stated in the extreme

form, the theory is, that given matter as a beginning, that matter is

thenceforth capable, by the aid of fixed and self-working laws, to

produce and result in, all the phenomena of life--whether plant, animal,

or human--which we see around us. Matter developes from simple to

complex forms, growing by its own properties, in directions determined

by the circumstances and surroundings of its existence.

[Footnote 1: It is enough to instance the theories of Dr. Buchner and,

in earlier days, of Oken. The Häckel and Virchow incident in this

connection, and the noble protest of the latter against positive

teaching of unproved speculation, are in the recollection of all.]

If I may put this a little less in the abstract, but more at length, I

should describe it thus[1]:--

Astronomers, while watching the course of the stars, have frequently

observed in the heavens what they call _nebulae_. With the best

telescopes these look like patches of gold-dust or luminous haze in the

sky. Some nebulae, it is supposed, really consist of whole systems of

stars and suns, but at so enormous a distance that with our best glasses

we cannot make more out of them than groups of apparent "star-dust" But

other nebulae do not appear to be at this extreme distance, and therefore

cannot consist of large bodies. And when their light is examined with

the aid of a spectroscope, it gives indications that such nebulae are

only masses of vapour, incandescent, or giving out light on account of

their being in a burning or highly heated condition.

[Footnote 1: The biological evolutionist will, I am aware, object to

this, saying that the origin of the cosmos and nebular theories are

matters of speculation with which he is not concerned--they are no part

of evolution proper. But I submit that the general philosophical

evolution does include the whole. At any rate, the materialist view of

nature does take in the whole, in such a way as the text indicates.]

Now, it is supposed that, in the beginning of the world, there was, in

space, such a nebula or mass of incandescent vapour, which, as it was

destined to cool down and form a world, philosophers have called "cosmic

gas."

This cosmic gas, in the course of time, began to lose its heat, and

consequently to liquefy and solidify, according to the different nature

of its components; and thus a globe with a solid crust was formed, the

surface of which was partly dry and partly occupied by water, and

diversified by the abundant production of the various earths, gases,

metals, and other substances with which we are familiar. These

substances, in time, and by the slow action of their own laws and

properties, combined or separated and produced further forms. But to

come at once to the important part of the theory, we must at once direct

our attention to four substances; these would certainly, it is said (and

that no doubt is quite true) be present; they are oxygen, hydrogen,

nitrogen, and carbon. The first three would be, when the earth assumed

anything like its present conditions of temperature and air-pressure,

invisible gases, as they are at present; the fourth is a substance which

forms the basis of charcoal, and which we see in a nearly pure form

crystallized in the diamond.

Now, if these substances are brought together under certain appropriate

conditions, the oxygen and hydrogen can combine to form _water_; the

carbon and the oxygen will form _carbonic acid_; while nitrogen will

join with hydrogen to form that pungent smelling substance with which we

are familiar as _ammonia_. Again, let us suppose that three compound

substances--water, carbonic acid, and ammonia--are present together with

appropriate conditions; it is said that they will combine to form a

gummy transparent matter, which is called _protoplasm_. This protoplasm

may be found in small shapeless lumps, or it may be found enclosed in

cells, and in various beautifully shaped coverings, and it is also found

in the blood, and in all growing parts or organs of all animals and

plants of every kind whatsoever.

Protoplasm, then, is the physical basis of life. Simple, uniform,

shapeless protoplasm, combined out of the substances just named, first

came into existence; and as, however simple or shapeless, it always

exhibits the property of life, it can henceforth grow and develop from

simpler to ever increasingly complex forms, without any help but that of

surrounding circumstances--the secondary causes which we see in

operation around us.

If some readers should say they have never seen _protoplasm_, I may

remind them where every one has, at some time or another, met with it.

If you cut a stick of new wood from a hedge, and peel off the young

bark, you know that the bark comes off easily and entire, leaving a

clean white wand of wood in your hand; but the wand feels sticky all

over. This sticky stuff is nothing more than transparent growing

protoplasm, which lies close under the inner bark.

At first, the materialist holds, protoplasm appeared in very simple

forms, just such as can still be found within the sea, and in ponds. But

the lower organized forms of life are extremely unstable, and a

different _environment_ will always tend to evoke continuous small

changes, so that there may be advance in forms of all kinds. For if by

chance[1] some creature exhibits a variation which is favourable to it

in the circumstances in which it is placed, that creature will be fitter

than the others which have not that variation. And so the former will

survive, and as they multiply, their descendants will inherit the

peculiarity. Thus, in the course of countless generations, change will

succeed change, till creatures of quite a complex structure and

specialized form have arisen. As the circumstances of life are always

infinitely various, the developments take place in many different

directions; some fit the creature for life in deep seas, some for flying

in the air, some for living in holes and crevices, some for catching

prey by swift pursuit, others for catching it by artful contrivance, and

so forth. Many changes will also arise from protective necessity: if an

insect happens to be like a dead leaf, it will escape the notice of

birds which would snap up a conspicuously coloured one; and so the

dull-coloured will survive and perpetuate his kind, while the others are

destroyed. On the other hand, beauty in colour and form may have its

use. This is chiefly exhibited in the preference which the females of a

species show for the adorned and showy males.

[Footnote 1: Not really of course "by chance," but simply owing to such

circumstances as cannot be accounted for by any direct antecedents.]

Supposing an organism developed so far as to be a bird, but only with

dull or ugly feathers. By accident one male bird, say, gets a few

bright-coloured feathers on his head. Here his appearance will attract

birds of the other sex; and then by the law of heredity, his offspring

are sure to repeat the coloured feathers, till at last a regularly

bright-crested species-arises. In this way _natural variability_, acted

on by the necessities of _environment_ (which cause the _survival of the

fittest_ specimens) and the principle of _heredity_, viz., that the

offspring repeat the features of the parents, aided by the principle of

_sexual selection_, have been the origin and cause of all the species we

see in the world.

Thus we have an unbroken series--certain substances condensing out of

cosmic vapour, some of them combining to form the variety of rocks,

soils, metals, &c., and others giving rise to protoplasm which grows'

and develops into a thousand shapes and hues, of insect, fish, reptile,

bird, and beast.

And then it is, that charmed with the completeness and symmetry of such

a theory, and overlooking the difficulties that crop up here and

here--demanding some Power from without to bridge them over--certain

extreme theorists have rushed to the conclusion that in all this there

is no need of any external Creator or Providence--nothing but what we

call secondary causes, ordinary causes which we see at work around us

all day and every day.

How inconceivable, they add, is the truth of the Book of Genesis, which

asserts the successive creation of fully-formed animals by sudden acts

of command; and all accomplished in a few days at the beginning of the

world's human history!

This I believe to be a fair outline, though of course a very rough and

general one, of the Theory of Evolution as regards the forms of matter

and living organisms. Now it will at once strike the candid reader, that

even granted the whole of the scheme as stated, there is _nothing_ in it

that has any answer to the objection,--But may I not believe that a wise

Creator conceived and established the whole plan--first creating MATTER

and FORCE, then superadding LIFE at a certain stage, and then drawing

out the type and design according to which everything was to grow and

develop? Is not such a production and such a design the true essence of

Creation? Can all these things happen _without_ such aid? Let us then

look more closely at some of the steps in the evolution just described.

And let us stop at the very beginning--the first term of the series.

We may agree (in the absence of anything leading to a contrary

conclusion) that matter may first have appeared as a cosmic gas, or

incandescent vapour in space. It is probable, if not certain, that our

earth is a mass that has only cooled down on the surface, the centre

being still hot and to some extent, at any rate, molten; and in the sun

we have the case of an enormous globe surrounded with a _photosphere_,

as it is called--a blaze of incandescent substances, which our

spectroscopes tell us are substances such as we have on earth now in

cooled or condensed condition--iron, oxygen, hydrogen, and other such

forms of matter.

First of all, how did any _substance_, however vapoury and tenuous, come

to exist, when previously there was nothing?

If we admit, that there was a time when even cosmic gas did not exist,

then there must have been _an Agent_, whose _fiat_ caused the change.

And as that Agent does not obviously belong to the material order, it

must belong to the spiritual or non-material; for the two orders

together exhaust the possibilities of existence. If, however, it is

urged that "primal matter"--cosmic vapour--containing the "potentiality"

of all existence, is eternal and alway existed of itself, then we are

brought face to face with innumerable difficulties. In the first place,

the existence of matter is not the only difficulty to be got over; not

the only dead-lock along the line. We pass it over and go on for a

time, and then we come to another--the introduction of LIFE. I will not

pause to consider that here; we shall see presently that it is

impossible to regard life as merely a quality or property of matter.

When we have passed that, we have a third stoppage, the introduction of

_Reason_ or _Intelligence_; and then a fourth, the introduction of the

_Spiritual faculties_, which cannot be placed on the same footing as

mere reason. So that to get over the first point, and dispense with a

Cause or a Creator of matter, is of no avail: it is incredible that

there should be no Creator of matter, but that there should be a Creator

of life--an Imparter of reason, an Endower of soul.

But let us revert to the first stage and look at the nature of MATTER.

CHAPTER IV.

_CREATIVE DESIGN IN INORGANIC MATTER._

I take as self-evident the enormous difficulty of self-caused,

self-existent matter. And when we see that matter _acting_, not

irregularly or by caprice, but _by law_ (as every class of philosopher

will admit), then it is still further difficult to realize that matter

not only existed as a dead, simple, inactive thing, but existed with a

folded-up history inside it, a long sequence of development--not the

same for all particles, but various for each group: so that one set

proceeded to form the _object_, and another the _environment_ of the

object; or rather that a multitude of sets formed a vast variety of

objects, and another multitude of sets formed a vast variety of

environments. When we see matter acting by law, then if there is no

Creator, we have the to us unthinkable proposition of law without a

lawgiver!

On the other hand, if we shut out some of the difficulties, keep our eye

on one part of the case only--and that is what the human mind is very

apt to do--we can easily come round to think that, after all,

_elementary_ matter--cosmic gas--is a very _simple_ thing; and looks

really as if no great Power, or Intellect, were required to account for

its origin. After all, some will say, if we grant your great, wise,

beneficent, designing Creator, the finite human mind has as little idea

of a self-existing God, as it has of self-existing matter and

self-existing law. _You_ postulate one great mystery, _we_ postulate two

smaller ones; and the two together really present less "unthinkableness"

to the mind than your one. That is so far plausible, but it is no more.

To believe in a GOD is to believe in One Existence, who necessarily (by

the terms of our conception) has the power both of creating matter,

designing the forms it shall take, and originating the tendencies,

forces, activities--or whatever else we please to call them--which drive

matter in the right direction to get the desired result. To believe not

only that matter caused itself, but that the different forces and

tendencies, and the aims and ends of development, were self-caused, is

surely a much more difficult task. It is the existence of such a

_variety_, it is the existence of a uniform tendency to produce certain

though multitudinous results, that makes the insuperable difficulty of

supposing _matter always developing_ (towards certain ends) to be

self-caused.

The advocates of "eternal matter" really overcome the difficulty, by

shutting their eyes to everything beyond a part of the problem--the

existence of simple matter apart from any laws, properties, or

affinities.

But the simplest drop of water, in itself, and apart from its mechanical

relations to other matter, is really a very complex and a very wonderful

thing; not at all likely to be "self-caused." Water is made up, we know,

of oxygen and hydrogen--two elementary colourless, formless gases. Now

we can easily divide the one drop into two, and, without any great

difficulty, the two into four, and (perhaps with the aid of a magnifying

glass) the four into eight, and so on, _as long as_ the minute particle

_still retains the nature of water_. In short, we speak of the smallest

subdivision of which matter is capable without losing its own nature, as

the _molecule_. All matter may be regarded as consisting of a vast mass

of these small molecules.

Now, we know that all known matter is capable of existing either in a

solid, liquid, or gaseous form, its nature not being changed. Water is

very easily so dealt with. Some substances, it is true, require very

great pressure or very great cold, or both, to alter their form; but

even carbonic acid, oxygen, and hydrogen, which under ordinary

conditions are gases, can with proper appliances be made both liquid and

solid. Pure alcohol, has, I believe, never been made solid, but that is

only because it is so difficult to get a sufficient degree of cold:

there is no doubt that it could be done.

It might be supposed that the molecules of which dead matter (whether

solid, liquid, or vapourous) is composed, were equally motionless and

structureless. But it is not so: every molecule in its own kind is

endowed with marvellous properties. In the first place, every molecule

has a double capability of motion. In the solid form the molecules are

so packed together that, of course, the motion is excessively

restricted; in the liquid it is a little easier; in the gaseous state

the molecules are in a comparatively "open order." In most substances

that are solid under ordinary conditions, by applying heat continuously

we first liquefy and ultimately vapourize them. In those substances

which under ordinary conditions are _gas_ (like carbonic acid, for

instance), it is by applying cold, with perhaps great pressure as well,

that we induce them to become liquid and solid; in fact, the process is

just reversed. As we can most easily follow the process of heating, I

will describe that. First, the solid (in most cases) gets larger and

larger as it progresses to liquefaction, and when it gets to vapour, it

suddenly expands enormously. Take a rod of soft iron, and reduce it to

freezing temperature: let us suppose that in that condition it measures

just a thousand inches long. Then raise the temperature to 212 degrees

(boiling point), and it will be found to measure 1,012 inches. Why is

that? Obviously, because the molecules have got a little further apart.

If you heat it till the iron gets liquid, the liquid would also occupy

still more space than the original solid rod; and if we had temperature

high enough to make the melted iron go off into vapour, it would occupy

an enormously increased space. I cannot say what it would be for iron

vapour; but if a given volume of water is converted into vapour, it will

occupy about 1,700 times the space it did when liquid, though the weight

would not be altered.

It may here be worth while to mention that it is not invariably true

that a substance gets contracted, and the molecules more and more

pressed together, as it assumes a solid form. There is at least one

exception. If we take 1,700 pints of steam, the water, as I said, on

becoming cool enough to lose the vapourous form, will shrink into a

measure holding a single pint; if we cooled lower still, it will get

smaller and smaller in bulk (though of course not at all at the same

rate) till it arrives at a point when it is just going to freeze; then

suddenly (7 degrees above the freezing point) it again begins to expand.

Ice occupies more space than cold water; its molecules get arranged in a

particular manner by their crystallization.

On the admission of an _intelligent_ Creator providing, by beneficent

design, the laws of matter, it is easy to give a reason for this useful

property. It prevents the inhabitants of northern climates being

deprived of a supply of water. As it is, the solid water or ice

expands, and, becoming lighter, forms at the top of the water, and the

heavier warmer water remains below. But if ice always got denser and

sank, the warmer liquid would be perpetually displaced and so come up to

the surface, where it would freeze and sink in its turn. In a short

time, then, all our water supplies would (whenever the temperature went

down to freezing, which it constantly does in winter) be turned into

solid ice. This would be a source of the gravest inconvenience to the

population of a cold climate. If we deny a designing mind, the

alternative is that this property of water is a mere chance.

But to return to molecules. Molecules are endowed with an inherent

faculty of motion; only under the conditions of what we call the solid,

they are so compressed, that there is no room for any motion appreciable

to the senses. Even if the solid is converted into vapour, the molecules

are still much restrained in their movements by the pressure of the air.

But of late years, great improvements (partly chemical, partly

mechanical) have been made in producing perfect _vacua_; that is to say,

in getting glass or other vessels to be so far empty of air, that the

almost inconceivably small residue in the receptacle has no perceptible

effect on the action of a small quantity of any substance already

reduced to the form of gas or vapour introduced into it. Dr. W. Crookes

has made many beautiful experiments on the behaviour of the molecules of

attenuated matter in _vacua_. The small quantity of vapour introduced

contains only a relatively small number of molecules, which thus freed

from all sensible restraint within the limits of the glass vessel used,

are free to move as they will; they are observed to rush about, to

strike against the sides of the vessel, and under proper conditions to

shine and become _radiant_, and to exhibit extraordinary phenomena when

subjected to currents of electricity. So peculiar is the molecular

action thus set up, that scientific men have been tempted to speak of a

fourth condition of matter (besides the three ordinary ones, solid,

liquid, and gaseous), which they call the ultra-gaseous or radiant state

of matter.

This marvel of molecular structure seems already to have removed us

sufficiently far from the idea of a simple inert mass, which might be

primordial and self-caused. But we have not yet done. Even imagining the

extreme subdivision[1] of the particles in one of Dr. Crookes' vacuum

globes, the particles are still water. But we know that water is a

compound substance. The molecule has nine parts, of which eight are

hydrogen and one oxygen--because that is the experimentally known

proportion in which oxygen and hydrogen combine to form water. As we can

(in the present state of our knowledge) divide no farther, we call these

ultimate fragments of simple or elementary substance _atoms_.

[Footnote 1: As to the possibility of _indefinite_ subdivision of

matter, see Sir W. Thomsons's lecture, _Nature_, June, 1883, _et seq._]

Every substance, however finely divided into molecules, if it is not a

simple substance, must therefore have, inside the _molecular_ structure,

a further _atomic_ structure. And in the case of unresolvable or

"elementary" substance, the molecule and the atom are not necessarily

the same. For though there is reason to believe that, the molecule of

these does consist, in some cases, of only one atom--in which case the

atom and the molecule are identical; in other cases, the molecule is

known to consist of more than one atom of the same element; and the

atoms are capable of being differently arranged, and when so arranged

have different _properties_ or behaviour, though their nature is not

changed. This property is spoken of by chemists as _allotropism_. No

chemist on earth can detect the slightest difference in _constitution_

between a molecule of _ozone_ and one _oxygen_; but the two have widely

different properties, or behave very differently. There is thus a great

mystery about atoms and their possible differences under different

arrangement, which is as yet unsolved. Those who wish to get an insight

into the matter (which cannot be pursued farther here) will do well to

read Josiah Cooke's "The New Chemistry," in the International Scientific

Series. The mind is really lost in trying to realize the idea of a

fragment of matter too small for the most powerful microscope, but

existing in fact (because of faultless reasoning from absolutely

conclusive experiments), and yet so constituted that it is

_practically_ a different thing when placed in one position or order,

from what it is when placed in another.

Turning from this mystery, as yet so obscure, to what is more easily

grasped, we shall hardly be surprised to learn, further, that every kind

of, atom obeys its own laws, and that while atoms of one kind always

have a _tendency to combine_ with atoms of other kinds, it is absolutely

impossible to get them to combine together except on certain conditions.

The difference between combination and mixture is well known. Shake sand

and sugar in a bag for ever so long, but they will only _mix_, not

_combine_ or form any new substance even with the aid of electric

currents; but place oxygen and hydrogen gas under proper conditions, and

the gases will disappear, and water (in weight exactly equal to the

weight of the volume of gases) will appear in their place.

It is only certain kinds of atoms that will combine at all with other

kinds; and when they do so combine, they will only unite in absolutely

fixed proportions, so that chemists have been able to assign to every

kind of element its own combining proportion. The substances that will

combine will do so in these proportions, or in proportions of any _even

multiple_ of the number, and in no other. Thus fourteen parts of

nitrogen will combine with sixteen of oxygen; and we have several

substances in nature, called nitrous oxide, nitric oxide, nitric

di-oxide, &c., which illustrate this, in which fourteen parts of

nitrogen combine with sixteen oxygen or fourteen nitrogen with a

multiple of sixteen oxygen, or a multiple of fourteen nitrogen combine

with sixteen oxygen, and so on.

See now where we have got to. When we had spoken of a tiny fragment of

primal matter--a drop of water, for instance--it seemed as if there was

no more to be said; but no, we found ourselves able to give a whole

history of the molecules of which the substance consists; and when we

had considered the molecule, we found a further beautiful and intricate

order of _atoms_ inside the molecule, as it were.

And there is no reason to suppose that science has yet revealed all that

is possible to be known about atoms and molecules; so that if further

wonders should be evoked, the argument will grow and grow in cumulative

force.

Let me sum up the conclusion to be drawn from these facts in a quotation

from a discourse of Sir John F.W. Herschel.

"When we see," says that eminent philosopher, "a great number of things

precisely alike, we do not believe this similarity to have originated

except from _a common principle independent of them_; and that we

recognize this likeness, chiefly by the _identity of their deportment

under similar circumstances_ strengthens rather than weakens the

conclusion.

"A line of spinning jennies, or a regiment of soldiers dressed exactly

alike and going through precisely the same evolutions, gives us no idea

of independent existence: we must see them act out of concert before we

can believe them to have independent wills and properties not impressed

on them from without.

"And this conclusion, which would be strong even if there were only two

individuals precisely alike in _all_ respects and _for ever_, acquires

irresistible force when their number is multiplied beyond the power of

imagination to conceive.

"If we mistake not, then, the discoveries alluded to effectually destroy

the ideas of an _eternal_ self-existent matter by giving to each of its

atoms the essential characters at once of a _manufactured_ article and

of a _subordinate agent_."

In other words, continuing the metaphor of the trained army, we see

millions upon millions of molecules all arranged in regiments, distinct

and separate, and the regiments again made up of companies or

individuals, each obeying his own orders in subordination to, and in

harmony with, the whole: are we not justified in concluding that this

army has not been only called into being by some cause external to

itself; but further, that its constitution has been impressed upon it,

and its equipments and organization directed, by an Infinite

Intelligence?

There is, then, no such thing to be found in Nature as a simple,

structureless "primal matter" which exhibits nothing tending to make

self-causation or aboriginal existence difficult to conceive. To look at

matter in that light is not only to take into consideration a _part_ of

the case; it is really to take what does not exist, a part that exists

only in the imagination. The simplest form of matter we can deal with,

exhibits within itself all the wondrous plan, law, and sequence of the

molecular and atomic structure we have sketched out; and when we

consider that, having taken matter so far, we have even then only

introduced it to the verge of the universe, ushered it on to the

threshold of a great "aeon," when and where it is to be acted on by

"gravitation" and other forces, to act in relation to other matter, and

to be endowed perhaps with LIFE, we shall feel that the

self-existence--the uncaused existence of matter, and of the principles

on which matter proceeds or acts, is in reality not a less mystery than

the self-existence of a Designing and Intelligent Cause, but one so

great as to be itself "unthinkable."

CHAPTER V.

_THE CREATION OF LIVING MATTER_.

We now come to _Living_ Matter; directing attention, first, to that

elementary form of life as exhibited in simple protoplasm and in the

lower forms of organism, and then to the perfect forms of bird and

beast. In each case, we shall find the same evidence of Design and

Intelligence, the same proof of "contrivance" and purpose, which we

cannot attribute to the mere action of secondary causes.

The simplest form in which LIFE is manifested is in a viscid gelatinous

substance without colour or form, called _Protoplasm_. Wherever there is

life there is protoplasm. Protoplasm, as before remarked, lies just

under the bark in trees, and is the material from which the growth of

the wood and bark cells and fibres proceeds. Protoplasm, is also present

in the muscles and in the blood, and wherever growth is going on.

But protoplasm also exists by itself; or, more properly speaking, there

exist living creatures, both plant and animal, which are so simple in

structure, so low in organization, that they consist of nothing but a

speck of protoplasm. Such a creature is the microscopic _amoeba_.

Sometimes these little specks of protoplasm are surrounded with

beautifully formed "silicious shells--a skeleton of radiating _spiculae_

or crystal-clear concentric spheres of exquisite symmetry and

beauty.[1]" The simplest _amoeba_ however, has no definite form; but the

little mass moves about, expands and contracts, throws out projections

on one side and draws them in on the other. It exhibits irritability

when touched. It may be seen surrounding a tiny particle of food,

extracting nutriment from it and growing in size. Ultimately the little

body separates or splits up into two, each part thenceforth taking a

separate existence.

[Footnote 1: Professor Allman.]

Now it is claimed that such a little organism contains the potentiality

of all life; that it grows and multiplies, and develops into higher and

higher organisms, into all (in short) that we see in the plant and

animal world around us. This, it is argued, is all done by natural

causes, not by any direction or guidance or intervention of a Divine

agency.

Here we must stop to ask how this protoplasm, or simplest form of

organic life, came to exist? How did it get its _life_--its property of

taking nourishment, of growing and of giving birth to other creatures

like itself?

The denier of creation replies, that just in the same way as, by the

laws of affinity, other inanimate substances came together to produce

the earth--salts and other compounds we see in the world around us--so

did certain elements combine to form protoplasm. This combination when

perfected has the property of being alive, just as water has the

property of assuming a solid form or has any other of the qualities

which we speak of as its properties.

Now it is perfectly true that, treated as a substance, you can take the

gummy protoplasm, put it into a glass and subject it to analysis like

any other substance. But simple as the substance appears, composition is

really very complicated. Professor Allman tells us that so difficult and

wonderful is its chemistry, that in fact really very little is known

about it. The best evidence we have, I believe, makes it tolerably

certain that protoplasm consists of a combination of ammonia, carbonic

acid, and water, and that every molecule of it is made up of 76 atoms,

of which 36 are carbon, 26 hydrogen, 4 nitrogen, and 10 oxygen.[1]

But no chemist has ever been able either to account theoretically for

such a composition, still less to produce it artificially. It is urged,

however, that it may be only due to our clumsy apparatus and still very

imperfect knowledge of chemistry, that we were unable artificially to

make up protoplasm.

[Footnote 1: Nicholson ("Zoology," p. 4) gives for Albumen, which is

nearly identical with protoplasm--Carbon, 144; Hydrogen, 110; Nitrogen,

18; Oxygen, 42; Sulphur, 2. These figures nearly equal those in the

text, being those figures multiplied each by 4 (approximately) and

without the trace of sulphur.]

And of course there is no answer to a supposition of this sort.

Nevertheless there is no sort of reason to believe that protoplasm will

ever be made; nor, if we could succeed in uniting the elements into a

form resembling protoplasmic jelly, is there the least reason to suppose

that such a composition would exhibit the irritability, or the powers of

nutrition and reproduction, which are essentially the characteristics of

_living_ protoplasm. It is not too much to say that, after the close of

the controversy about spontaneous generation, it is now a universally

admitted principle of science that life can only proceed from life--the

old _omne vivum ex ovo_ in a modern form.[1]

But here the same sort of argument that was brought forward regarding

the possibility of matter and its laws being self-caused, comes in as

regards life.

[Footnote 1: _See_ "Critiques and Addresses," T.H. Huxley, F.R.S.,

p. 239. So much is this the case, that it is really superfluous, however

interesting, to recall the experiments of Dr. Tyndall and others, which

finally demonstrated that wherever primal animal forms, bacteria and

other, "microbes," were produced in infusions of hay, turnip, &c.,

apparently boiled and sterilized and then hermetically sealed, there

were really germs in the air enclosed in the vessel, or germs that in

one form or another were not destroyed by the boiling or heating. Dr.

Bastian's argument for spontaneous generation is thus completely

overthrown. _(See_ Drummond, "Natural Law," pp. 62-63.)]

The argument in the most direct form was made use of by Professor

Huxley, but it is difficult to believe that so powerful a thinker could

seriously hold to a view which will not bear examination, however neatly

and brilliantly it may go off when first launched into the air. The

argument is that life can only be regarded as a further property of

certain forms of matter. Oxygen and hydrogen, when they combine, result

in a new substance, quite unlike either of them in character, and

possessing _new_ and different properties. The way in which the

combination is effected is a mystery, yet we do not account for the new

and peculiar properties of water (so different from those of the

original gases) as arising from a principle of "aquosity," which we have

to invoke from another world. The answer is that the argument is from

analogy, and that there is not really the remotest analogy between the

two cases. It is true that, as far as we know, electricity is necessary

to force a combination of the requisite equivalents of oxygen and

hydrogen into water. But though we do not know why this is, or what

electricity is, we can repeat the process as often as we will. But mark

the difference; the water once existing is obviously only a new form of

matter, in the same category with the gases it came from: it neither

increases in bulk, nor takes in fresh elements to grow, and give birth

to new drops of water. But protoplasm has something quite different--for

there may be dead protoplasm and living protoplasm, both identical to

the eye and to every chemical test. In either condition, protoplasm, as

such, has _properties_ of the same nature (though not of the same kind)

as those of water, oxygen gas, or any other matter; it is colorless,

heavy, sticky, elastic, and so forth; but besides all that (without the

aid of electricity or any physical force we can apply) one has the power

of producing more protoplasm--gathering for itself, by virtue of its

inherent power, the materials for growth and reproduction.

If directly water was called into existence it could take in

nourishment, and divide and go on producing more water--and if some

water could do this, while other water (which no available test could

distinguish from it in any other respect) could not, then we _should_ be

perfectly justified in giving a special name to this power, and calling

it "aquosity" or "vitality" or anything else, it being out of all

analogy to anything else which we call a "property" of matter.

In the introduction of LIFE into the _aeon_ of organic developmental

history, we have a clear and distinct period, as we had when _matter_

came into view, or when _the change_ was ushered in which set the cosmic

gas cooling and liquefying, and turning to solid in various form.

The fact is that every organic form, whether plant or animal, derived

from the protoplasmic compounds of carbon-dixoide, ammonia and water,

is, as Mr. Drummond puts it,[1] "made of materials which have once been

inorganic. An organizing principle, not belonging to their kingdom, lays

hold of them and elaborates them."

[Footnote 1: "Natural Law," p. 233.]

Thus by the introduction of LIFE we have a vastly enlarged horizon.

Before, in the organic world, we had only the "principle" of solidifying

or crystallizing, liquefying, and turning to gas or vapour, ever

stopping when the state was attained. Or if a combination was in

progress, still the result was only a rearrangement of the same bulk of

materials (however new the form) in solid, liquid, or gas, but no

increase, no nutrition, no reproduction. In the organic world we have

something so different, that whether we talk of "property" or

"principle," the things are entirely distinct.

The essential difference, stated as regards the mere facts of

irritability or motion, nutrition and reproduction, is so grandly

sufficient in itself, that one almost regrets to have to add on the

other facts which further emphasize the distinction between _life_ and

any _property_ of matter. But these further facts are highly important

as regards another part of the argument. For while what has just been

said almost demonstrates the necessity of a Giver of Life from a kingdom

outside the organic, the further facts point irresistibly to the

conclusion that we must predicate more about the Giver of Life that we

can of an abstract and unknown Cause.

The original protoplasm, when dead, is undistinguishable by the eye, by

chemical test, or by the microscope, from the same protoplasm when

living; and living protoplasm, again, may be either animal or vegetable.

Both are in every respect (externally) absolutely identical. Yet the one

will only develop into a _plant_, the other only into an _animal._ Nor

does it diminish the significance of the fact to say that the

differentiation is _now_ fixed by heredity. If we suppose protoplasm to

be only a fortuitous combination of elements, what secondary or common

natural cause will account for its acquisition of the fixed difference?

It is true that some forms of plants exhibit some functions that closely

approach the functions of what we call animal life; but, as we shall see

presently, there is no evidence whatever that there is any bridge

between the two--we have no proof that a plant ever develops into an

animal. Here is one of the gaps which the theory of Evolution, true as

it is to a certain extent, cannot bridge over; and we must not overlook

the fact. We shall revert to it hereafter.

Can it be believed, then, that protoplasm, as the origin of life, is

self-caused, and self-developed? And this is not all. I must briefly

remind my readers that the way in which animal protoplasm deals with the

elements of nutrition is quite opposite to that which plant protoplasm

follows. I might, indeed, have mentioned this at an earlier stage, when

I mentioned Professor Huxley's comparison of the chemical action in the

formation of water with what he assumed to be the case in the formation

of protoplasm. When water is formed, the two gases disappear, and an

_exactly equal weight_ of water appears in their place; but if living

protoplasm is enabled to imbibe liquid or other nutriment containing

ammonia, water, and carbonic acid, there is no disappearance of the

three elements and an equivalent weight of living protoplasm appearing

in its place. Protoplasm consumes the oxygen and sets free the carbonic

acid. Both kinds of protoplasm do this, until exposed to the light; and

then a difference is observed; for under the influence of light, animal

protoplasm alone continues to act in this way, and vegetable protoplasm

begins at once to develop little green bodies or corpuscles in its

cells, and afterwards acts in a totally opposite way, taking the carbon

into its substance and giving off the oxygen.[1]

[Footnote 1: Certain _fungi_ seem to afford an exception to this. The

above is, I believe, true as a theoretical action of plants and animals

in protoplasmic form. But practically, in all higher developments of

either kind, other distinctions come into play; e.g., that plants can

make use of inorganic matter, gases, and water, and elaborate them into

organic matter. Animals cannot do this, they require more or less solid

food--always requiring "complex organic bodies which they ultimately

reduce to much simpler inorganic bodies. They are thus mediately or

immediately dependent on plants for their subsistence" (Nicholson,

"Zoology," 6th ed. p. 17). It is perhaps with reference to this that in

the Book of Genesis the Creator is represented as giving _plant_ life to

the service of man and animals--while nothing is said of the preying of

_Carnivora_ and _Insectivora_ on animal life.]

Not only then has each kind of protoplasm its own mysterious character

impressed on it, and is compelled to act in a certain way; but still

further, each particle of animal and vegetable protoplasm, when directed

into its _general_ course of development as _plant or animal_, will

again only obey a certain course of development in its own line.

But we must proceed a step further; for those who would believe in the

sufficiency of unaided Evolution, bid us bear in mind how very

elementary the dawn of instinct or the beginning of reason is in the

lowest forms which are classed as animal, and how very small is the

gap[1] between some highly organized plants and some animal forms, and

argue therefore that they may justly regard the distinction as of minor

importance, and hope that the "missing link" will be yet discovered and

proved. At any rate, they minimize the difference, and urge that it is

of no account if at least they can establish the sufficiency of a proved

development extending unbroken from the lowest to the highest animal

form. And having fixed attention on this side, no doubt there is a long

stretch of smooth water over which the passage is unchecked.

[Footnote 1: At the risk of repetition I will remind the reader that

nature contains _nothing like_ a progressive scale from plant to animal.

It is _never_ that the highest plant can be connected with the lowest

animal as in one series of links. The animal kingdom and the plant

kingdom are absolutely apart. Both start from similar elementary

proteinaceous structures; and both preserve their development

upwards--each exhibiting _some_ of the features of the other. It is at

the bottom of each scale that resemblance is to be found, _not_ between

the top of one and the lowest members of the other.]

The Evolution theory is that all the different species of animals,

birds, and other forms of life have been caused by the accumulation and

perpetuation of numerous small changes which began in one or at most a

few elementary forms, and went on till all the thousands of species we

now know of were developed.[1] It _is_ a fact that all organic forms

have a certain tendency to vary. I need only allude to the many

varieties of pigeons, horses, cattle, and dogs which are produced by

varying the food, the circumstances of life and so forth, and by

selective breeding.

The contention then is: given certain original simple forms of life,

probably marine or aquatic--for it is in the water that the most likely

occur--these will gradually change and vary, some in one direction, some

in another; that the changes go on increasing, each creature giving

birth to offspring which exhibits the stored-up results of change, till

the varied and finished forms--some reptile, some bird, some

animal--which we now see around us, have been produced. And at last man

himself was developed in the same way. All this, observe, is by the

action of just such ordinary and natural causes as we now see operating

around us--changes in food and in climate, changes in one part requiring

a corresponding change in others, and so on.

[Footnote 1: The reader may find this admirably put in Wallace,

"Contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection," p. 302.]

Nature contains no sharply drawn lines. Plants are different from

animals; but there are animals so low down in the scale of life that it

is difficult to distinguish them from plants. Pigeons are distinct from

pheasants, but the line at which the one species ends and the other

begins is difficult to draw. This fact seems to invite some theory of

one form changing into other. Accordingly the evolutionist explains the

working of the process which he asserts to be sufficient to produce all

the various forms of life in our globe.

After stating this more in detail than we have previously done, we shall

be in a better position to judge if the process (which in the main we

have no desire to deny or even to question) can dispense with _guidance_

and the fixing of certain lines and limits within which, and of certain

types towards which, the development proceeds. That is our point.

It is hardly necessary to illustrate the enormous destruction of life

which goes on in the world. Even among the human race, the percentage of

infants that die in the first months of their life is very large. But in

the lower forms of life it is truly enormous. Only consider the myriads

of insects that perish from hunger or accident, and from the preying of

one species on another. If it were not so, the world would be overrun by

plagues of mice, of birds, of insects of all kinds, and indeed by

creatures of every grade. The term "struggle for existence" is, then,

not an inapt one. All forms of living creatures have to contend with

enemies which seek to prey upon or to destroy them, with the difficulty

of obtaining food, and with what I may call the chances of

nature--cold, storms, floods, disease, and so forth.

Now, it is obvious that if some creatures of a given kind possess some

accidental peculiarity or modification in their formation which gives

them (in one way or another) an advantage over their fellows, these

improved specimens are likely to survive, and, surviving, to have

offspring.

It is this perpetuation of advantageous changes, originally induced by

the circumstances of environment, that is indicated by the term "natural

selection." Nature chooses out the form best suited to the circumstances

which surround it, and this form lives while the others die out. And

this form goes on improving by slow successive changes, which make it

more and more fit for the continually changing circumstances of its

life.

Subordinate also to this natural selection is the principle that bright

colour and other special qualities may be developed in the males of a

race, because individuals with such advantages are more attractive, and

therefore more easily find mates, than dull-coloured or otherwise less

attractive individuals.

Of each of these principles I may give a simple example. Supposing a

species of bird with a soft slender beak to be placed on an island,

where the only food they could obtain was fruit enclosed in a hard or

tough shell or covering. Supposing some birds accidentally possessed of

a beak that was shorter and stouter than the others', these would be

able to break open the shell and get at the fruit, while the others

would starve. Some of the descendants of the birds with the stout beaks

would inherit the same peculiarity, and in the course of several

generations there would thus arise a species with short and strong,

perhaps curved, beaks just fitted to live on fruits of the kind

described. In a similar way the webbed feet of birds that swim were

developed by their aquatic habits. And so with the long slender toes of

the waders, which are so well fitted for walking over floating aquatic

plants.

Of the other principle, sexual selection, a familiar example is the

bright and showy colouring of the male birds of many species: the

females of their species, as they need protection while helplessly

sitting on their eggs, are dull-coloured like the bark of trees or the

sand, among which their nests lie hid.

Some of the Himalayan pheasants exhibit this peculiarity to a marked

degree. Originally, it is said, the male bird, which was more brightly

coloured than the rest, got mated more easily by the preference shown to

him for his bright colour.

The question is, can we suppose all this to go on, by self-caused laws

and concurrence of circumstances, without a pre-existing design for the

forms to reach or an external guidance in the processes?

CHAPTER VI.

_THE MARKS OF CREATIVE INTELLIGENCE IN THE EVOLUTION OF ORGANIC FORMS_.

The heading of this chapter does not mark a new departure, for we have

been tracing existing forms of matter from the first, and have already

seen the necessity of believing in Creative Intelligence and Guidance.

We have seen that inorganic matter, with what we call its molecular or

atomic structure, cannot be reasonably regarded as self-caused; and we

have concluded with Sir J.F.W. Herschell that the sight of such a

well-arranged army, performing its evolutions in a regular and uniform

manner, irresistibly suggests a great Commander and Designer. We have

further found that the advent of LIFE demands a Power _ab extra_. We

have called attention to the gap, between plant and animal, which is

ignored or made light of, chiefly on account of the close approach of

the two kingdoms. But there is one broad distinction, namely, that of

elementary reason and no reason, or of consciousness and

unconsciousness, which is, in itself, a sufficient difficulty to pull

us up shortly. We have not yet fully considered this matter, because it

will come more appropriately at a later stage, and in the _à fortiori_

form. But we have justly noted it here. We cannot account for the most

elementary reason by any physical change; there is no analogy between

the two. The connection of mind and matter is unexplainable; and no

theory of development of physical form can say why, at any given stage,

physical development begins to be accompanied by brain-power and

_consciousness_. Admit candidly that the addition of intelligence at a

certain stage, however mysteriously interwoven with structural

accompaniments, is a gift _ab extra_, and we have at least a reasonable

and so far satisfactory explanation.

But when we have got an animal form, however simple and elementary, with

at least a recognizable "potentiality" of intelligence, we enter, as I

said, a long stretch of apparently smooth water, over which, for an

important part of our passage, we seem able to glide without any

difficulty from the necessary intervention of the so-called

supernatural. I have, then, to show that even here there is really no

possibility of dispensing with a Creator who has a purpose, a designed

scheme, and a series of type-forms to be complied with.

In order to fully exhaust the question how far natural selection is

capable of accounting for everything, it would be necessary to take a

very wide view of natural history and botany, which it is quite

impossible for us to attempt. But this is not necessary for our purpose.

We are perfectly justified in selecting certain topics which must arise

in the discussion. If, in studying these points, we find that _there_ at

least the intervention of a Controlling Power becomes necessary, and the

absence of it leaves things without any reasonable explanation, then we

shall have good and logical ground for holding to our faith in the

universal presence of such a Power. No chain is stronger than its

weakest link. If secondary causes cannot succeed at any one part of the

chain, it is obvious that they fail as a universal explanation.

This part of the work has already been done far better than I could do

it. In the first eight chapters of Mivart's "Genesis of Species" [1] the

argument has been ably and clearly put, and whatever answer is possible

has been given by Darwin and others; so that the world may judge. All

that can here be usefully attempted, is, by way of reminder, to

reproduce some main topics on which no real answer has been given. These

are selected, partly because they are less abstruse and difficult to

follow than some which might be dealt with, partly because they are

calculated to awaken our interest, and partly because the conclusion in

favour of a continual Providence; working through organized law and

system, appears to follow most clearly from them.

[Footnote 1: Second Edition, 1871.]

The points I would call attention to are the following:--

(I) That as natural selection will only maintain changes that have been

_beneficial_ to the creature, it is contrary to such a law, if acting

entirely by itself, that that there should be developments (not being

mere accidental deformities, &c.) disadvantageous to the creature. And

yet the world is full of such.

(2) That there are forms which cannot be accounted for on the

evolutionist supposition, that they were gradually obtained by a series

of small changes slowly progressing towards a perfect structure. They

would be of no use at all unless produced _at once and complete_.

(3) That natural selection, as apart from a Divine Designer, altogether

fails to account for _beauty_, as distinguished from mere brilliancy or

conspicuousness, in nature. Whereas, if we suppose the existence of a

beneficent Creator, who has moral objects in view, and cares for the

delight and the improvement of His creatures,[1] and looking to the

known effects on the mind of beauty in art and in nature, the existence

is at once and beyond all cavil explained.

[Footnote 1: "He hath made everything _beautiful_ in his time" (Eccles.

iii. II).]

(4) That we have positive evidence against _uncontrolled_ evolution

(uncontrolled by set plan and design i.e.) and a strong presumption in

favour of the existence of created _types_; so that evolution proceeds

towards these types by aid of natural laws and forces working together

(in a way that our limited faculties necessarily fail to grasp

adequately);[1] and so that, the type once reached, a certain degree of

variation, but never _transgression_ of _the type_, is possible.

Further, that on this supposition we are able to account for some of the

unexplained facts in evolutionary history, such as _reversion_ and the

_sterility of hybrids_; and to see why there are gaps which cannot be

bridged over, and which by extreme theorists are only feebly accounted

for on the supposition that as discovery progresses they _will_ be

bridged over some day.

[Footnote 1: "Also He hath set the world in their heart, so that _no man

can find out the work that God maketh_ from the beginning to the end"

(Eccles. iii II).]

(5) Lastly, that there is no possibility of giving _time_ enough on any

possible theory of the world's existence, for the evolution of all

species, unless _some_ reasonable theory of creative arrangement and

design be admitted.

The great objection--the descent of man and the introduction of reason,

consciousness, and so forth, into the world, will then form two separate

chapters, concluding the first division of my subject.

There is one point which the reader may be surprised to see omitted. It

is, that if these slow changes were always going on, why is not the

present world full of, and the fossil-bearing rocks also abounding in,

_intermediate forms_, creatures which _are on their way_ to being

something else? But there are reasons to be given on this ground which

make the subject a less definite one for treatment. It is said, for

example, that in the fossil rocks we have only such scanty and

fragmentary records, that it is not possible to draw a complete

inference, and that there is always the possibility of fresh discoveries

being made. Such discoveries have, it is asserted, already been made in

the miocene and again in later rocks; different species of an early form

of _horse_ which are (and this we may admit) the ancestral or

intermediate forms of our own horse, have been found. I therefore would

not press the difficulty, great as it is, because of the escape which

the hope of future discovery always affords. I will take this

opportunity to repeat that in this chapter I say nothing about the

difficulty which arises from the introduction of elementary reason or

instinct, and of consciousness, into the scale of organic being; that

will more appropriately fall in with the consideration of the

development of man, where naturally the difficulty occurs with its

greatest force.

(1) I come at once to the great difficulty that, if all existing forms

are due to the occurrence of changes that helped the creature in the

struggle for existence, how is it possible now to account for forms

which are not advantageous? yet such forms are numerous. Of this

objection, the existence of imperfect or neuter bees and ants is an

instance. The modification in form which these creatures exhibit is of

no advantage to them. It _is_ a great advantage, no doubt, to the other

bees; but then this introduces a view of some power _making_ one thing

for the benefit of another, not a change in the form itself adapted of

course to its _own_ advantage--since natural laws, forces, and

conditions of environment could not conceivably _design_ the advantage

of another form, and cause one to change for the benefit of that other.

Why is it, again, that crabs and crayfish can only grow by casting off

their shells, during which process they often die, as well as remain

exposed defenceless to the attacks of enemies? Why should stags shed

their horns also, leaving them defenceless for a time? Other animals do

not do so, and there is nothing in the nature of the horn which requires

it.

This brief allusion is here sufficient. Mr. Mivart's work gives it at

large.

(2) Passing next to the question of the advantage of _incomplete

stages_--portions of a mechanism only useful when complete, the most

striking examples may be found in the Vegetable kingdom. The

fertilization of flowering plants is effected by the pollen, a yellow

dust formed in the anthers, which is carried from flower to flower. In

the pines and oaks, this is done by the wind. But in other cases insects

visit a flower to get the honey, and in so doing get covered with

pollen, which they carry away and leave in the next flower visited. Now

one of our commonest and most useful plants, the red clover, is so

constructed that it can only be fertilized by humble bees. If this bee

became extinct, the plant would die out; how can such a development be

advantageous to it?

But the contrivances by which this process of fertilization is secured

are so marvellous, that I confess I am completely staggered by the idea

that these contrivances have been caused by the self-growth and

adaptation of the plant without guidance. There is a plant called

_Salvia glutinosa_[1]--easily recognized by its sticky calyx and pale

yellow flowers. The anthers that bear the pollen are hidden far back in

the hood of the flower, so that the pollen can neither fall nor can the

wind carry it away; but the two anthers are supported on a sort of

spring, and directly a bee goes to the flower and pushes in his head to

get the honey, the spring is depressed and both anthers start forward,

of course depositing their pollen on the hairy back of the bee, which

carries it to the stigma of the next flower. This process can be tested

without waiting for a bee, by pushing a bit of stick into the flower,

when the curious action described will be observed. It is very easy to

say that this admirable mechanical contrivance is of great use to the

plant _in its complete_ form; but try and imagine what use an

intermediate form would have been! If development at once proceeded to

the complete form, surely this marks _design_; if not, no partial step

towards it would have been of any use, and therefore would not have been

inherited and perpetuated so as to prepare for further completion. But

many other plants have a structure so marvellous that this objection is

continually applicable. Let me only recall one other case, that of the

orchid, called _Coryanthes macrantha_. In this flower there are two

little horns, which secrete a pure water, or rather water mixed with

honey. The lower part of the flower consists of a long lip, the end of

which is bent into the form of a bucket hanging below the horns. This

bucket catches the nectar as it drops, and is furnished with a spout

over which the liquid trickles when it is too full. But the mouth of the

bucket is guarded by a curiously ridged cover with two openings, one on

each side. The most ingenious man, says Mr. Darwin, would never by

himself make out what this elaborate arrangement was intended for. It

was at last discovered. Large humble bees were seen visiting the flower;

by way of getting at the honey, they set to work to gnaw off the ridges

of the lid above alluded to; in doing this they pushed one another into

the bucket, and had to crawl out by the spout. As they passed out by

this narrow aperture, they had to rub against the anthers and so carried

off the pollen. When a bee so charged gets into another bucket, or into

the same bucket a second time, and has to crawl out, he brushes against

the stigma, and leaves the pollen on it. I might well have adduced this

plant as another instance of the first objection, since it may well be

asked, How could such a development, resulting in a structure which

presents the greatest difficulty in the way of fertilization, be

beneficial to the plant? But here the point is that, even if any one

could assert the utility of such an elaborate and complicated

development, and suppose it self-caused by accident or effect of

environment, it certainly goes against the idea that all forms are due

to an _accumulation of small changes_. For these curious contrivances in

the case of _Salvia, Coryanthes_, and other plants, would in any case

have been no use to the plant till the whole machinery _was complete_.

Now, on the theory of slow changes gradually accumulating till the

complete result was attained, there must have been generation after

generation of plants, in which the machinery was as yet imperfect and

only partly built up. But in such incomplete stages, fertilization would

have been impossible, and therefore the plant must have died out. Just

the same with the curious fly-trap in _Dionoea_. Whatever may be its

benefit to the plant, till the whole apparatus as it now is, was

_complete_, it would have been of no use. In the animal kingdom also,

instances might be given: the giraffe has a long neck which is an

advantage in getting food that other animals cannot reach; but what

would have been the use of a neck which was becoming--and had not yet

become--long? here intermediate stages would not have been useful, and

therefore could not have been preserved.[2] In flat fishes it is curious

that, though they are born with eyes on different sides of the head, the

lower eye gradually grows round to the upper-side. As remarked by Mr.

Mivart, natural selection could not have produced this change, since the

_first steps towards it_ could have been of no possible use, and could

not therefore have occurred, at least not without direction and guidance

from without. Mr. Darwin's explanation of the case does not touch this

difficulty.

[Footnote 1: This species was instanced because the lectures which form

the basis of the book were originally delivered at Simla, in the N.W.

Himalaya, where, at certain seasons, the plant is a common wayside weed.

Mr. Darwin notices a similar and, if possible, more curious structure in

a species of _Catasetum_.]

[Footnote 2: See this fully explained by Mivart, "Genesis of Species,"

pp. 29, 30 (2nd edition).]

(3) The third point, the occurrence of so much _beauty_ in organic life,

is perhaps one of the most conclusive arguments for design in nature.

Here, if possible, more clearly than elsewhere, I see a total failure of

"natural causes." We are told that the beauty of birds (for instance) is

easily accounted for by the fact, that the ornamented and beautiful

males are preferred by the other sex; and that this is an advantage, so

the beauty has been perpetuated; and the same with butterflies and

beetles.

We are told also that bright-coloured fruits attract birds, who eat the

soft parts of the fruit and swallow the hard stone or seed which is thus

prepared for germination, and carried about and dispersed over the

earth's surface. Again, showy coloured flowers attract insects, which

carry away pollen and fertilize other flowers.

All this is perfectly true; but it entirely fails to go far enough to

meet the difficulty.

Now passing over such difficulties as the fact that bright colours in

flowers _do not_ attract insects in many cases, but much more

inconspicuous flowers if they have a scent (mignonette, for example)

_do_; passing over such a fact as that afforded by the violet, which (as

some may not be aware) has two kinds of flower, one scented and of a

beautiful colour, the other green and inconspicuous, and it is the

_latter, not the former_ which is usually fertile;--passing over all

detailed difficulties of this kind, I allude only to the one great one,

that in all these cases, besides mere bright colour, conspicuousness or

showiness, there is a great and wonderful beauty of pattern, design, or

colour arrangement, in nature. Now there is not a particle of evidence

to show that any animal has, to the smallest extent, a _sense of

beauty_. On the contrary it is most improbable. The sense of artistic

beauty is not only peculiar to man, but only exists in him when

civilized and cultivated. Uneducated people among ourselves have no

sense of landscape and other beauty. How then can it exist in animals?

If there was nothing to explain but a uniform bright and showy colour,

natural selection might be sufficient to account for it. How is it,

then, that this is not the case? We have not only colour, but colour

diversified in the most elaborate and charming manner. Look at the

exquisite patterns on a butterfly's wing! look at the various delicate

arrangements of colour and pattern in flowers; or look again at the

arrangement of colour on a humming-bird--sometimes the tail, sometimes

the breast is ornamented, sometimes a splendid crest covers the head,

sometimes a jewelled gorget or ruff surrounds the throat; and these are

not uniformly coloured, but exhibit metallic and other changes of lustre

not to be imitated by the highest art. But to fully realize this, I had

best refer to a more familiar instance. Let any one examine--as an

object very easily procurable in these days--a peacock's feather. No

doubt the whole tail when expanded is very brilliant; but look closely

at the structure of a single feather; is all this arrangement needed

only to make the tail bright or conspicuous? Observe how wonderfully the

outer parts are varied; part has a metallic lustre of copper, part has

this also shot with green: then there is a delicate ring of violet with

a double yellowish border, all quite distinct from the inmost gorgeous

"eye" of green, blue, and black, and all arranged on the same feather!

Take, again, the so-called diamond beetle of Brazil; here the wing case

is black studded all over with little pits or specks, which as a whole

only give it a powdery pale-green colour; but place it in the sunlight

and look at it with a magnifying glass--each little speck is seen to be

furnished with a set of minute metallic scales showing green and red

flashes like so many diamonds. How does such a delicate ornament answer

the demands of mere conspicuousness?

But there is a stronger case than this. I before alluded to the

exquisite symmetry of the silicious and crystalline coverings of some of

the simplest forms of marine animalcules; and also I may here add the

beautiful colouring of _shells_ sometimes on the _inside_.[1] In what

possible way would this beauty serve for any purely _useful_ purpose?

[Footnote 1: See Mivart, p. 61.]

Lastly, how are we to account for the beauty of autumnal tints in woods,

or coloured _leaves_ in plants such as the _Caladium_? The beauty is of

no conceivable use to the plant.

"In Canada the colours of the autumn forest are notorious. Even on

cloudy days the hue of the foliage is of so intense a yellow that the

light thrown from the trees creates the impression of bright sunshine,

each leaf presents a point of sparkling gold. But the colours of the

leafy landscape change and intermingle from day to day, until pink,

lilac, vermilion, purple, deep indigo and brown, present a combination

of beauty that must be seen to be realized; for no artist has yet been

able to represent, nor can the imagination picture to itself, the

gorgeous spectacle.[1]"

Have we not here an exhibition which cannot be accounted for on any

principle of natural utility?

[Footnote 1: "Quarterly Review," 1861, p. 20.]

(4) The fourth point, as previously stated, will be best treated by

stating beforehand what is the conclusion come to, and then justifying

it. My suggestion is that if we suppose a continuous evolution without a

series of designs prescribed before life began to develop, and without

any external guidance, then we are lost in difficulties. We cannot

account for why variation should set in in the very different ways it

does, nor why such a vast variety of divergent results should be

produced. We cannot account for the tendency to reversion to a previous

type, when artificial or accidental variation is not continually

maintained,[1] nor for the sterility of hybrids; nor, above all, for

evolution performing such freaks (if I may so say) as the origination of

our small finches and the tropical humming-birds from earlier

vertebrates through the Mesozoic reptiles, the pterodactyles,

_Odontornithes_ and subsequent forms. Supposing that the Almighty

Designer created a complete _cosmos_ of (1) the starry heavens and the

planetary system, (2) then a scheme whereby earth and water were to be

duly distributed over our planet; (3) established the relations by

which the external heavenly bodies were to regulate our seasons, tides,

and times (as we know they do). (4) Suppose, further, that the Designer

did not make "out of nothing" the series of finally developed animals as

we now have them, but "made the animals make themselves"--that is to

say, created the type, the ideal form, and adapted the laws and forces

which constitute environment, so that development of form should go on

regularly towards the appointed end, but in separate and appropriate

channels, each terminating when its object had been attained. Suppose

these conditions (which, as we shall afterwards see, are what

Revelation, fairly interpreted, declares) to exist; all the known

_facts_, and also the fairly certain _inferences_ of Evolution, are then

accounted for.

[Footnote 1: Pigeon fanciers know that when they have once obtained, by

crossbreeding and selection, a particular form or feather, the utmost

care is needed to preserve it. If the parents are not selected the

progeny wilt gradually revert towards the original wild pigeon type.]

We have neither by revelation nor physical discovery an exact _scheme_

of all the types, nor which of the elementary forms were destined to

remain unchanged throughout. But some scheme of created types we surely

have. Whether what we call _species_[1] are all types or not, we cannot

say; probably not. All we can be sure of is that there are definite

lines somewhere. We see the sterility of some hybrids, for instance,

which would seem to indicate that while some forms can conjugate and

their offspring remain fertile, others (approaching, as it were, the

verge of separation) give rise to hybrids which are or not absolutely

sterile,[2] according as they approach, or are more remote from, the

designed barrier-line. And at that point the separation is insuperable.

Certain forms of _Carnivora_ and _Ungulata_ seem to be for ever

apart--not only the two great orders, but even subdivisions within them.

Reptiles and birds, on the other hand, unlike as they at first sight

seem, have no type line drawn to separate them; that, at least, is one

of the more recent conclusions of biological science.

[Footnote 1: It should be borne in mind that what we call a _species_ as

distinct from a mere variety, is a more or less arbitrary or provisional

thing dependent on the state of science for the time. Species are

constantly being lumped together by some and separated by others. It

follows most probably, that while some species are really types--i.e.,

one can never pass into the other and lose its essentials, unless it is

destined to disappear (like the pterodactyle), not being wanted in the

whole scheme--other species are really only varieties, and maybe lost or

modified without limit.]

[Footnote 2: We may well regard the mule as a peculiar form just such as

the evolutionist would rejoice to see: here is a modified species, which

has qualities different from those of either of the parent stock, and

well fitted "to struggle for existence." Yet this modified race would,

if left to itself, die out.]

In other cases where variation has occurred, and especially when it is

artificially--i.e., by the aid of selective breeding--caused or

favoured, there is the constant tendency to _revert_, which is at once

intelligible if there is a type scheme to be maintained.

If there were a series of created types, there may naturally have been

what I may call sub-types; which would be certain well-marked stages on

the way to the final form. Such sub-type forms would naturally occur at

different ages, and being marked would show their place in the scale,

and their connection with the ultimate perfect form. Such a possibility

would exactly account for the series of _Eohippus, Hipparion_, and

horse, which we have already instanced; and still more so for the rise

and disappearance of the great Mesozoic Saurians when their object was

fulfilled. Deny guidance and type, and everything becomes confused. Why

should variation take certain directions? how comes it that natural

forces and conditions of life so occur and co-operate as to produce the

variety of changes needed?

And there is also one other general objection which I desire to state.

Why should _development_ have gone in different directions _towards the

same object_? I grant that different circumstances would produce

different changes, but not for the same purpose. For example take

eye-sight. The world shows several types of eye. The _insect_ eye quite

unlike any other; the crustacean eye also distinct; and birds, fishes,

and animals having an eye which is generally similar and is somewhat

imitated by the eye of the _cuttle fish_ (which is not a _fish_, but a

_cephalopod_).

Again, granted that _poison_ is a useful defence to creatures: how is it

given so differently?--to a serpent in the tooth; to a bee or a scorpion

in the tail; to a spider in a specially adapted _antenna_, and to the

centipede in a pair of modified legs on the _thorax_.

One would have supposed that natural causes tending to produce poison

weapons would have all gone on the same lines. And, curiously, in some

few cases, we have a sameness of line. About twelve species--all

fish--have an electric apparatus, familiar to most of us in the flat

sea-fish called _Torpedo_ and in the fresh-water eel called _Gymnotus_.

The only answer the anti-creationist can give to this dissimilarity of

development is that there are many vacant places in the polity of

nature, and that development takes place in that direction which fits

the creature to occupy a vacant place, and is, therefore, diverse.

It seems to me that this--the only answer that can he given--is

necessarily a modified form or mode _of creation._ How can _natural

causes_ know anything about a polity of nature and a vacant place, here

and there, so that the creature must develop in one way or another to

fill it?

Another set of cases is the production of similar functional results by

most diverse means, as in the case of flying animals, birds,

pterodactyles, and bats; here there is a widely different modification

of the fore-arm and other bones, all for the same purpose. The reader

will do well to refer to Mr. Mivart's book on this subject.

Again, the question of types seems to be pointed to in the curious fact

of what I may call the double development of birds from reptiles. Mr.

Mivart says, "If one set of birds sprang from one set of reptiles and

another set from another set of reptiles, the two sets could never by

'natural selection' only have grown into such perfect similarity." Yet

we can trace the _Struthious_ birds (those that, like ostriches, do not

fly) through the Dinosaurs and _Dinornis_, and the flying Carinate birds

though pterodactyles, _Archaeopteryx_, and _Icthyornis_, &c.

It might well be added to this part of the subject, that granted that

developmental changes were often small, that progress was attained

little by little, this does not appear to have been always the case.

The discoveries of the fossil species of horse,[1] _Eohippus,

Hipparion_, and so forth, clearly establish a developmental series, and

the ancient forms are claimed as the ancestor of the modern horse; but

these (Professor Owen tells us) differed more from one another than the

ass and the zebra (for instance) differ from the horse. Still, of course

it may be that there are still undiscovered intermediate forms; and in

any case there need be no desire to detract from the value of the

series, as really pointing towards a gradual perfection of the horse

from a ruder ancestor up to the latest type. But having reached the

type, and though that type exhibits such (considerable) variations as

occur between the Shetland pony, the Arab, and the dray-horse, we have

still no difficulty in recognizing the essential identity; nor is there

any evidence or any probability that the horse will ever change into

anything essentially different. All the fossil bats, again, were true

bats: and so with the rhinoceroses and the elephants. Granting the

fullest use that may be made of the imperfection of the geological

record, it is difficult to account for this, and still more for the

absence of intermediate forms (particularly suitable for preservation)

of the _Cetaceae_. The Zeuglodons from Eocene down to Pliocene, the

Dolphins in the Pliocene, and the _Ziphoids Catodontidae_, and

_Balaenidae_ in the Pliocene, are all fully developed forms, with no

intermediate species.

[Footnote 1: The series is thus (Nicholson, p. 702):--1.

_Eohippus_--Lower Eocene of America; fore-feet have four toes and a

rudimentary thumb or pollex. 2. _Orohippus_ (about the size of a

fox)--Eocene. 3. _Anchitherium_--Eocene and Lower Miocene; three toes,

but 2 and 4 are diminutive. 4. _Hipparion_--Upper Miocene and Pliocene;

still three toes, but 3 more like the modern horse and 2 and 4 still

further diminished. 5. _Pliohippus_--later Pliocene, very like Equus. 6.

_Equus_--Post-Pliocene.]

Mr. Mivart remarks, "There are abundant instances to prove that

considerable modifications may suddenly develop themselves, either due

to external conditions or to obscure internal causes in the organisms

which exhibit them.[1]" If it is not so, granted to the full the

imperfection of the Geologic record, but remembering the cases where we

_do_ find intermediate forms; we ask why should they not be preserved in

other cases? If they ever existed we should surely see _more_ changing

forms; not only such as are more or less uncertainly divided species,

but whole orders running one into another. No evidence exists to show

that any bird has gradually passed into an animal, nor a carnivorous

beast become ruminant, or _vice versâ._

[Footnote 1: P. 112] [Transcriber's note: Chapter VIII]

The analogy of changes that are known will not bear extension enough to

prove, even probably, any such change.

Surely if our conclusion in favour of a Divine Design to be attained,

and a Providential Intelligence directing the laws of development, is no

more than a belief, it is a probable and reasonable belief: it certainly

meets facts and allows place for difficulties in a way far more

satisfactory than the opposite belief which rejects _all_ but

"secondary" and purely "natural" causes.

So clear does this seem to me, that I cannot help surmising that we

should never have heard of any objection to Divine creation and

providential direction, if it had not been for a prevalent fixed idea,

that by "creation" _must_ be meant a final, one-act production _(per

saltum)_ of a completely developed form, where previously there had been

nothing. Such a "creation" would of course militate against _any_

evolution, however cautiously stated or clearly established. And no

doubt such an idea of "creation" was and still is prevalent, and would

naturally and almost inevitably arise, while nothing to the contrary in

the _modus operandi_ of Creative Power was known. What is more strange

is that the current objection should not now be, "Your _idea of

creation_ is all wrong," rather than the one which has been strongly

put forward (and against which I am contending), "There is no place for

a Creator."

(5) This is the only other _general_ point that remains to be taken up

in connection with the theory that all living forms are due to the

gradual accumulation of small favourable changes without creative

intervention. The objection is that we cannot obtain the inconceivably

long time required for the process of uncontrolled and unaided

evolution.

I am not here concerned to argue generally for the shortness or longness

of the periods of geological time; let us, for the purposes of argument,

admit a very wide margin of centuries and ages; but _some_ limit there

must be. The sun's light and heat, for one thing, are necessary, and

though the bulk of combustible material in the sun is enormous, there

must be some end to it. Sir William Thomson has calculated (and his

calculations have never been answered) that on purely physical grounds,

the existence of life on the earth must be limited to some such period

as 100 millions of years; and this is far too short for uncontrolled

evolution.

We know from fossils, that species have remained entirely unaltered

since the glacial epochs began, and how many generations are included

even in that! If no change is visible in all that time, how many more

ages must have elapsed before a primitive _Amoeba_ could have developed

into a bird or a Mammal?

In Florida Mr. Agassiz has shown that coral insects exist unchanged,

and must have been so for 30,000 years.

When we remember also the enormous destruction of life that takes place,

supposing that in a given form a few creatures underwent accidental

changes which were beneficial and likely to aid them--still what chances

were there that the creatures which began to exhibit the right sort of

change should have died before they left offspring! the chances against

them are enormous: and the chances have to be repeated at every

successive change before the finally perfected or advanced creature took

its place in the polity of nature. Moreover, there is the chance of

small changes being lost by intercrossing: our own cattle-breeders have

most carefully to select the parents, or else the favourable variety

soon disappears.

How then, seeing the power of stability which at least some forms are

found to exhibit--seeing too the enormous chances against the survival

of the particular specimens that begin to vary, and the further chances

of the loss of variety by intercrossing; how can we get the millions of

millions of years necessary to produce the present extreme divergence of

species? The fact is that the force of this objection is likely to be

undervalued, from the mere difficulty of bringing home to the mind the

immeasurable time really demanded by uncontrolled evolution.

Nor is the question of time left absolutely to be matter of belief or

speculation. For here and there in the geological records of the rocks,

we _have_ certain intermediate forms--or forms which we may fairly argue

to be such. But looking at the very considerable differences between the

earlier and the later of these forms--differences greater than those

which now separate well-defined species, it seems questionable whether

any of the divisions of Tertiary time, taking all the circumstances into

consideration, could be lengthened out sufficiently to accomplish the

change.

At any rate, if any particular example be disallowed, the general

objection must be admitted to be weighty.