THE EVOLUTION OF SPECIES.
This is Evolution's great field of labor. It was this which mainly
occupied Darwin's labors and is the basis of the whole sweeping
theory. This suggested man's animal origin and all that follows as
to man's history and religion and civilization. So that this is the
basal part of Evolution. Yet against this fundamental argument, two
great charges are made and admitted: First, not a single case of
evolution of species is known, and, second, no law or force by which
such changes could take place has been discovered. We will consider
these two fatal defects.
NOT A SINGLE INSTANCE OF EVOLUTION IS KNOWN.
In support of this assertion we might quote the admissions of nearly
every evolutionary writer. Prof. Winchell writes upon this point as
follows:
"The great stubborn fact which every form of the theory encounters
at the very outset is, that notwithstanding variations, we are
ignorant of a single instance of the derivation of one good species
from another. The world has been ransacked for an example, and
occasionally it has seemed for a time as if an instance had been
found of the origination of a genuine species by so-called natural
agencies, but we only give utterance to the admissions of all the
recent advocates of derivation theories, when we announce that the
long-sought _experimentum crucis_ has not been discovered." (_The
Doctrine of Evolution_, p. 54.)
Prof. Conn, in one of the most recent works upon Evolution, says:
"It is true enough that naturalists have been unable to find a
single unquestioned instance of a new species.... It will be
admitted at the outset on all sides, that no unquestioned instance
has been observed of one species being derived from another.... It
is therefore impossible at present to place the question beyond
dispute." (_Evolution of To-day_, p. 23.)
Here then is a fatal defect. The world has been ransacked for
evidence, the museums are full of specimens, the secrets of nature
have been explored in every land, the minutest creatures discovered
and analyzed. We have the remains of animals and plants of many
kinds thousands of years old, such as the mummied remains from
Egypt, and yet not a single instance of the change Evolution asserts
has ever been known! Yet this change of species is the fundamental
argument of Evolution. On this rests its theory of the origin of man
and all that flows from that assertion, and this basal assertion is
absolutely without an actual instance of fact.
The changes in certain species such as roses, primroses, tomatoes,
pigeons and dogs, are not new species, but only varieties, having
none of the traits of species, easily intermingling, propagating,
and readily reverting to their original forms, changes which true
species are not susceptible of. Darwin admitted that the continued
fertility of these varieties was one of his greatest difficulties.
One of the definitions of species is that they will not interbreed
and propagate. So that hybrids are sterile. "After its kind," is the
primal law of nature, and as Dr. Jesse B. Thomas says, "The stubborn
mule still blocks the way of Evolution."
NO CAUSE OF EVOLUTION IS KNOWN.
Evolution is not a force. There is no power or cause which is known
as Evolution. The word simply describes the order in which things
have been supposed to come. We must draw a clear line of distinction
between Cause and Order of Appearance. There is a certain order
in the succession of living things as they came, but what caused
that order is the very question at issue. The Duke of Argyle warns
against confusing these when he says, "Evolution puts forward a
visible order of phenomena as a complete and all-sufficient account
of its own origin and cause." (_Theories of Darwin._)
The absence of an agreed cause is admitted by evolutionists. Huxley
says, "The great need of Evolution is a theory of derivation."
(_Man's Place in Nature._) Darwin admits, "Our ignorance of the laws
of derivation is profound." (_Descent of Man._) "The laws governing
inheritance are for the most part unknown." (_Origin of Species._)
Prof. Conn in _Evolution of To-day_, says, "No two scientists are
agreed as to what is the cause of the supposed changes of species."
(p. 337.) Prof. Clodd traces it to the protoplasm which forms the
germ and ends his exhaustive treatise by saying the cause is still
unknown. (_Method of Evolution._)
Darwin's theory was Natural Selection. It is this which is
technically called "Darwinism," although some writers apply that
name to the general subject of Evolution. Natural selection is the
theory that inasmuch as minute variations occur in the struggle
of living things for existence, the variations which would prove
favorable to the welfare of the animal would be transmitted to
its progeny and be increased and so, in many generations, the
accumulating effects, aided by climate, food, sexual selection, and
other causes, would amount to a new species. Prof. Conn says of this
theory, "Natural selection is almost universally acknowledged as
insufficient to meet the facts of nature, since many facts of life
cannot be explained by it." (p. 243.)
Mr. Huxley said long before: "After much consideration, and with
assuredly no bias against Mr. Darwin's views, it is our clear
conviction that as the evidence now stands it is not absolutely
proved that a group of animals, having all the characteristics
exhibited by species in nature, has ever been originated by
selection, whether natural or artificial." (_Lay Sermons_, 295.)
The theories as to what produced the supposed changes are as many
as the writers on Evolution. Prof. Conn says, "All agreement
disappears. Each thinker has his own views." And adds, "Thus far
we have seen no indication of the manner in which this evolution
has been manifested." (p. 20.) Prof. J. Arthur Thomson, lecturer on
zoology in the School of Medicine, Edinburgh, said: "Unless we can
give some theory of the origin of variations we have no material for
further consideration. Unfortunately we are very ignorant about
the whole matter." The various writers ascribe the changes to food,
climate, sexual selection, extraordinary births, isolation and many
other supposed causes. All these have been in turn combatted by
other evolutionist writers, and the war goes on and has produced
libraries of volumes. It is around this that the conflict rages and
the war is a merry one.
HOW EVOLUTION ORIGINATED SPECIES.
It is when Evolution gives the particulars of these changes that it
becomes especially interesting. We will, by way of lighting up the
examination, consider a few of the stories it tells us as to how
things came.
Spencer tells us how the backbone came to be, for the primitive
animals had none. Prof. Conn quotes his account as follows: "He
thinks the segmentation, the division of the spinal column into
vertebrae, arose as the result of strains. Originally the vertebrate
was unsegmented, but in bending its body from side to side in
locomotion through the water, its spinal column became divided by
the action of simple mechanical force." (_Evolution of To-day_, p.
65.) Thus what we usually consider a serious calamity, the breaking
of one's backbone, became one of the greatest blessings, for
what would we be without flexible backs, with which to follow the
meanderings of Evolution?
Evolution also tells us how legs originated. The earliest animals
were without legs. Some animal in this legless state found on its
body some slight excrescences or warts, which aided materially
its progress as it wiggled along, and thus it acquired the habit
of using these convenient warts. This habit it transmitted to its
posterity and they increased the habit until the excrescences,
lengthened and strengthened by use, became legs of a rudimentary
kind, which by further use developed a system of bones and muscles
and nerves and joints such as we have ourselves.
Spencer's account of the origin of quadrupeds is that the earliest
animals propagated by dividing into two parts, and in some of
these the division was not perfectly made, and so the animal had
duplicated ends, each of which had legs, forming finally the present
quadruple arrangement.
Eyes originated from some animal having pigment spots or freckles
on the sides of its head, which, turned to the sun, agreeably
affected the animal so that it acquired the habit of turning that
side of its head to the sun, and its posterity inherited the same
habit and passed it on to still other generations. The pigment spot
acquired sensitiveness by use and in time a nerve developed which
was the beginning of the eye. From this incipient eye came the
present wonderful combination of lenses, nerves and muscles, all so
accurately adjusted that, of the sixteen possible adjustments of
each part, only once in a hundred thousand times would they come
together, as they now are, by chance.
Land animals began thus, according to Evolution: In a time of
drought some water animals, stranded by the receding waters, were
obliged thenceforth to adopt land manners and methods of living.
Although, strangely, the whale by the same cause was forced to the
water, for it was once a land animal, but in a season of drought was
obliged to seek the water's edge for the scant remaining herbage,
and, finding the water agreeable, remained there and its posterity
also, and finally, the teeth and legs no longer needed, became
decadent and abortive as we see them now. Darwin inferred the
history of the whale's marine career from seeing a bear swimming
in a pool and catching insects with its wide-open mouth as it so
skimmed the water's surface.
The same drought produced another and wonderful change, for it is
to this that the giraffe owes his long legs and neck. The herbage
on the lower branches withering up, he was obliged to stretch his
neck and legs to reach the higher branches. This increased, as all
such changes increased, in his posterity, and finally after many
generations produced the present immense reaching powers of the
giraffe. So that the same drought deprived the whale of his legs and
conferred them upon the giraffe.
The mere recital of these speculations will be enough for all who
have not surrendered their judgment to the keeping of others. It
seems scarcely necessary to assure readers unacquainted with the
theory, that this is not exaggeration or caricature. We have simply
abbreviated, and rendered into untechnical language, the accounts of
evolutionary writers given in all seriousness and with high-sounding
scientific terms. Any such work will give many specimens of similar
accounts. Reply seems unnecessary, yet must be made.
1. All this is pure speculation. Not a single such change is known,
or has been observed.
2. All is based on Natural Selection, which evolutionists have
themselves discarded; yet for want of any other theory they are
constantly obliged to fall back upon it.
3. Such acquired traits are not transmitted, as Prof. Thomson of
Edinborough, tells us. Only characteristics inherited, or congenital
in the fertilized egg cell, are so transmitted. (_Outlines of
Zoology_, p. 66.) The "sports" such as the white robins and crows
occasionally seen, disappear as individuals and do not propagate as
distinct types.
Let us pause here to contemplate the spectacle of a theory, which
its own advocates admit is unproven, and which has been opposed by
some of the greatest minds, a theory which has not a single direct
fact of evidence, and has no way of accounting for the changes which
it declares have taken place; such a theory accepted as the basis
of every science, the foundation of a universal philosophy, taught
in educational institutions to youth as if demonstrated, demanding
immediate and universal submission, undertaking to revise Scripture,
to revolutionize theology, and to prescribe what we must do to be
saved and to save others! Surely it is safe to hesitate before such
demands.
We will not discount the great service done humanity in the patient
research in the realms of nature by laborious students. All this
should be given weight. We also admit the value of a theory as a
means to the ascertaining of truth. But we cannot consent that
the vast interests affected by Evolution shall be decided by "the
balancings of probabilities," or the mooted value of a theory.
This is no place for theories, which must be held tentatively, if
at all. This is a matter which affects the belief and lives and
hopes of millions, their welfare here and hereafter. Religion is
too sacred to be made a shuttlecock tossed about in the arena of
intellectual amusement.
Sir J. William Dawson said of some writers and their theories: "To
launch a clever and startling fallacy, which will float a week and
stir up a hard fight, seems as great a triumph as the discovery
of an important fact or law; and the honest student is distracted
with the multitude of doctrines and hustled aside by the crowd of
ambitious groundlings." (_Story of the Earth and Man_, 313.)
Evolution has much to say for itself, but, as we see, it is all
of the nature of circumstantial evidence. This seems to the
non-scientific mind as strange for anything called science,
which we have been accustomed to think means something known or
proven. We have been accustomed to see cases thrown out of court
when presenting no evidence and to fare badly in general on mere
circumstantial evidence. However, as Evolution is so persistent
for a hearing, we must examine what it has to advance for our
consideration. Its arguments are drawn from Geology, Classification,
Distribution of Plants and Animals, Morphology and Embryology.
THE ARGUMENT FROM GEOLOGY.
The argument from this science is that the fossils appear in the
strata of the earth in advancing order, the simplest first, and more
complex afterwards. The assumption is that the higher came from the
lower, by a chain of infinitesimal changes, through a long series of
ages. Now the facts are not as claimed. We will show this later. But
admitting that they are, the argument is wanting.
1. All this is pure assumption. No such changes are known in
existing species to have ever taken place, and the assumption that
these changes took place in geologic ages is wholly unwarranted. If
it cannot be predicated of the animals we see and know, how can it
be asserted of a period millenniums ago?
2. Mere succession is not evolution. The coming in orderly
succession is evidence of some plan but not necessarily of
evolution. An intelligent Creator would work in the same way,
especially if he had intelligent beings to instruct thereby, at the
time or afterwards.
3. Evolution in comparing the successive comings of the rocky strata
and the fossil creatures, compares two kinds of things that cannot
be made analogous. Rocks are not produced by evolution, the higher
growing out of the lower, as is claimed of species. That certain
species appeared with the lower rocks and strata, and higher orders
with later rocks and strata only proves of one, as of the other,
an advancing order of production but tells nothing of the cause of
either.
4. We are supported in these doubts as to the value of Evolution's
argument from Geology by the fact, that many of the most eminent
geologists deny any proof of evolution in their chosen science.
Sir Roderick Murchison said, "I know as much of nature in her
geologic ages as any living man, and I fearlessly say that our
geologic record does not afford one syllable of evidence in support
of Darwin's theory." The great Swiss geologist, Joachim Barrande
states, "One cannot conceive why in all rocks whatever and in all
countries upon the two continents, all relics of the intervening
types should have vanished.... The discordances are so numerous and
pronounced, that the composition of the real fauna seems to have
been calculated by design for contradicting everything which the
theories (of Evolution) teach us respecting the first appearance and
primitive evolution of the forms of life upon the earth." (Quoted by
Winchell, in _Doctrine of Evolution_, p. 142.)
Prof. Conn, an evolutionist, admits the presence of many facts
disclosed by geology which oppose the theory of Evolution. He says,
"In the earliest records geology discloses, we find not a few
generalized types but well differentiated forms, nearly all the
sub-kingdoms as they now exist, five-sixths of our orders, nearly
an equal proportion of sub-orders, a great many families and some
of our present species. All this is a surprise and an unexplained
problem." Such a result, he says, is not what Evolution would lead
us to expect. All the important classes of animals made their
appearance without warning. (_Evolution of To-day_, pp. 6, 100, 103,
118.)
Haeckel writes, "We cannot shut our eyes to the fact that various
groups have from the time of their first appearance, burst out into
an exuberant growth of modification of form, size and members, with
all possible, and one might almost say, impossible shapes, and they
have done this within a comparatively short time, after which they
have died out not less rapidly." (_Last Link_, p. 144.)
The testimony of geology, as adduced by geologists and even by
evolutionists, is that it does not sustain the claims of Evolution.
Species existed in present form from the earliest times. Geologic
species came in suddenly and went out suddenly. Some of the
simplest remain unchanged through all earth's transformations to the
present time. (Dr. Robert Patterson, _Errors of Evolution_, p. 221.)
The great fossil cemeteries show that the living creatures fell in
serried ranks, overtaken by cataclysms, in every act of life. Le
Conte tries to explain this by saying that there were "paroxysmal"
eras, but what the paroxysms were, or whence they came, he does not
say. The whole testimony is against Evolution and reverts to proof
of the Bible story of Creation. Professor Adam Sedgwick says: "At
succeeding epochs, new tribes of beings were called into existence,
not merely as the progeny of those that had appeared before them,
but as new and living proofs of creative interference."
THE ARGUMENT FROM CLASSIFICATION OF SPECIES.
This is one of the strong points of Evolution. It is claimed that
plants and animals can be so classified in an ascending order that
it is evident the higher came out of the lower. We object as follows:
1. There is no classification agreed upon by scientists. This comes
largely from want of agreement as to what a species is. Scientists
differ widely and radically. Spencer presents a review of all these
schemes of classification and ends by saying, "It is absurd to
attempt a definite scheme of relationship." His own plan of the
scheme he says is the figure of a "laurel bush squashed flat by a
descending plane." (_Principles of Biology_, p. 389.) This agrees
with his statement as to the absurdity of such schemes. Some arrange
the whole in a continuous straight line from the lowest up.
Darwin thought the whole came from half a dozen germinal forms.
Where these came from he did not say. Dr. J. Clark Ridpath said,
"The eagle was always an eagle, the man always man. Every species
of living organism has I believe come up by a like process from
its own primordial germ." (_Arena_, June, 1879.) Haeckel insists
that the theory demands but a single primeval germ as the ancestor
of all living things. He presented a tree, showing twenty or more
stages between primeval protoplasm and man, but this has been now
rejected by evolutionists. Prof. D. Kerfoot Schults represents
the classification as follows: "If all the animals that have ever
existed on the earth be represented by a tree, those now existing
on the earth will be represented by the topmost twigs and leaves,
and the extinct forms will be represented by the main trunk and
branches." (_First Book on Organic Evolution_, p. xiv.)
But the source of all, the primeval protoplasm, is wanting. The
missing primeval germ or germs leaves the tree without a root,
and Prof. Conn tells that even the sub-kingdoms are not united by
fossils. Spencer admits that not a single species has been traced to
its source or its family tree completed, and even the ancestors of
our living species are wanting.
Prof. Dana admitted as follows, "If ever the links (upon which
the doctrine of Evolution depends) had an actual existence,
their disappearance without a trace left behind is altogether
inexplicable." Here then is a tree without root or trunk or
branches, and having only the tips of outer twigs and leaves, in
other words, a phantom tree, a fit representation of the theory for
which it stands.
The present orders of plants and animals give a strong argument
against Evolution. It has been seen that Succession is not
Evolution. The mere coming of animals in orderly succession
shows only plan, but the means of executing that plan is not
shown thereby. But further, while in the geologic ages there was
Succession, here in our age is Simultaneousness of species, two
very different and contradictory phenomena. Why has Succession
ceased? Why have not the higher orders pushed the lower out, as in
the geologic ages, if Evolution was the cause? Yet here they all
exist quietly together as if they knew nothing of Evolution or its
requirements.
Nor have any such changes occurred in thousands of years, as the
mummied remains of cats and crocodiles and ibises in Egypt show.
Surely 4,000 years would show some evolution if there had been such
a thing; but it is not seen in all the 4,000 years, or even in the
more distant period since primeval man existed, for we have the
remains of animals found with man in his early history. Out of 98
species, 57 are the same as we have to-day unchanged, and still
others, as the lingula, the same as in ages past. Thus Evolution's
trusted argument from Classification utterly fails of demonstration.
DISTRIBUTION OF PLANTS AND ANIMALS.
The distribution of plants and animals is another favorite argument
of this theory. Certain animals are said to be found only in certain
regions, the bison only in North America, the kangaroo only in
Australia, the armadillo only in Mexico. Evolution triumphantly
asks, Were they created only in these places? We now simply remark
that difficulties as to Creation do not prove Evolution. Evolution
says the ancestors of these came from other parts ages ago and by
long isolation and environment became what they are.
Facts again are against the theory. Huxley himself says that in the
neighborhood of Oxford are animal remains like those of Australia;
that Britain was once connected with the continent, and so these
animals passed over. The same is true he says of the isolated fauna
of New Zealand and South America. (Address in _Daily Post_, March
27, 1871.)
This argument might be used against Evolution as well as the
previous arguments. Two islands in the Pacific, only fifteen miles
apart, have the animals of Asia in one and of Australia in the
other. One of the Bermudas has lizards like those of Africa and
another like those of America. In fact it is evident that animals
and plants have scattered widely.
THE MORPHOLOGICAL ARGUMENT.
The comparative study of plants and animals presents another
argument for Evolution. It is found, for example, that there is a
similarity of plan in the fin of the fish, the wing of the bird,
the flipper of the whale, the leg of the animal and the arm of
the man. So also in a measure with all other corresponding parts.
This Evolution says, shows that all these animals are genetically
connected and all came from the same ancestors.
Huxley himself replies to this argument in these words, "No amount
of purely morphological evidence can suffice to prove that things
came into existence in one way rather than another." (_Study of
Zoology_, p. 86.) Another great scientist, Prof. Quatrefages,
professor of anthropology in the Museum of Natural Sciences, Paris,
writes on this as follows: "Without leaving domain of facts, and
only judging from what we know, we can say, that morphology itself
justifies the conclusion that one species has never produced another
by derivation." Prof. Conn admits, after going through the whole
subject with the latest facts, that unless some further explanation
can be found, homology does not prove descent. (_Evolution of
To-day_, p. 76.)
This resemblance of parts is just what we should expect in things
originating from one intelligent operator, whether Creator or
manufacturer. It is found in every factory. The wheel is the same
in the wheelbarrow, the cart, carriage and locomotive. In fact,
uniformity of plan proves unity in the cause, and not the diversity
of chance causes claimed by Evolution. If Evolution were true, there
would be as much diversity among organs as there is among the forms
of organs. If the operation of chance conditions has resulted in
radical changes in the forms of organs, why then is there not this
similar diversity among the organs themselves? Evolution has no
reply. Creation has such reply; God is one and his plan one. Why
should not the forms of all these things be alike, seeing they are
to live in the same climates, eat the same food and propagate in the
same manner?
The rudimentary, abortive and discarded parts found in some animals
form one of the strongest arguments Evolution advances. The favorite
instance it presents is found in the horse. The horse walks on one
toe and has splints further up the leg, which they tell us are the
remains of the other toes, and the callosities on the leg are the
remains of thumbs. The remains have been found of an animal as large
as a dog which resembles the horse and has two toes, and another
older animal, as large as a fox, which has four toes. Putting these
side by side, Evolution calls them all horses, and says the one-toed
animal came from the two-toed, and he from the four-toed, and that
this proves the evolution of the horse from the Eohippus (Old Horse)
as it is called.
1. Bearing in mind that this conclusion is pure assumption, and only
inference at best, let us remark that it violates the primal law of
evolution laid down by Spencer, that of evolution from the simple to
the complex. It should have shown first the one-toed horse, then his
development into a two-toed animal, and so on up to a horse having
five toes. This would be evolution. As it is, we see the opposite of
evolution, degradation, which often occurs in nature, and we see few
if any instances of any subsequent restoration to primal conditions.
2. Besides all this, that most necessary thing to a good horse,
a pedigree, is wanting. The connecting links are all missing in
his ancestral tree. For the ancestors of that first of horses are
unknown. But he is not alone in this, for even his owner has the
same sad want of proven descent, as we will see later. Just how the
horse lost his appendages, and why he dropped toe after toe in this
extraordinary manner the story leaves untold.
3. But another great objection exists. It takes time to breed
horses. It required all of the Tertiary period to produce the
one-toed animal from the four-toed ancestor and much longer time
was required to develop him from a totally different animal, where
more than a mere question of toes comes in. For we have to face
the difficulty, and the time necessary, to develop a good horse,
say from an alligator, and the still greater task of producing him
from an animal without toes at all, or even legs, or anything to
hang legs on, and simply a bag of jelly-like substance, which the
evolutionist assures us was the ancestor of all horses and their
riders. If it appears to the reader that life is too short for such
business we can say the geologist agrees with him, for he tells us
the age of the old earth itself was not one tenth long enough to
produce Evolution's horses, and still less their riders.
Another instance of Evolution's proofs is the swim-bladder of
fishes. This Evolution sometimes states is an incipient lung, and
that the fish learned in a drought to breathe air. Sometimes, as
the need of the theory demands, the swim-bladder is claimed as the
relic of a discarded lung. These however are two different and
opposing claims. Either as a prophecy or a relic the swim-bladder
is fatal to the claims of Evolution. If it is an incipient lung,
then here is intention, which Evolution rejects. If a relic, here is
retrogression, the opposite of evolution. The abortive organ is one
of the difficulties of the theory which Darwin admitted, and Prof.
Conn tells us, is not yet answered. Prof. Huxley said, "Either these
rudiments are of no use to the animal, in which case they ought to
have disappeared, or they are of some use to the animal, in which
case they are arguments for teleology." (_Darwinism_, p. 151.)
THE ARGUMENT FROM EMBRYOLOGY.
Evolution derives its greatest argument from the study of the
embryo. It makes three claims. First, that the germ of everything,
plant and animal, is the same, neither chemical analysis nor the
microscope showing any difference. If therefore, such vast variety
could come from origins so alike, why could not all we see come from
a similar origin, the primitive animal, which was also such a simple
cell? Second, in the growth of the embryo it recapitulates the
ancestral history of that particular organism. Third, all this when
compared with the geologic record, and the present orders of living
things as classified, presents the full succession of the forms of
life, the one supplying what the other lacks.
These claims must be examined separately.
1. The claim that the germs of all living things are alike is not
true. The resemblance is only superficial. Protoplasm, of which the
germ is composed, differs and is not homogeneous material. That
which builds the muscles is one kind, and that which builds brain
and nerves is entirely different. Prof. Clodd tells us it is not a
chemical compound but a mechanism. Nor could the germs be alike. For
the plant breathes carbon, the animal oxygen. The one oxidizes, the
other deoxidizes. There are still greater and deeper differences.
Tyndall says, "Under the most homogeneous material, there lie
structural energies of such complexity, that we must question
whether we have the mental elements with which to grapple with
them.... The most trained and disciplined imagination retires
in bewilderment from the problem. In that realm, inaccessible
to everything but mind, the wonders of Creation are wrought
out.... Here is determined the germ and afterwards the complete
organization." (_Fragments of Science_, p. 153.) So that these cells
or germs, which appear so alike, contain each in itself the entire
plan and life of the coming creature, to the color of a feather, the
trick of a hunting dog and the smile and dimples of a child.
2. The second claim that the course of each embryo traverses its
ancestral history, is not nearly so vociferously made as some
years ago. Prof. A. Agassiz writes, "Anything beyond a general
parallelism is hopeless." Prof. Conn admits "Embryology alone is
not a safe guide, and only when verified by the fossils can it
be relied upon. It seldom gives a true history.... The parallel
is largely a delusion.... It often gives a false history."
(_Evolution of To-day_, pp. 125, 134, 137, 150.) Prof. Thomson
writes, "Recapitulation is due to no dead hands of the past, but
to physiological conditions which we are unable to discover."
(_Outline of Zoology_, p. 63.) He also says that the young mammal
was never like a worm, a fish, or reptile. It was at the most like
the young of these in their various stages. So far from the course
of all being alike, Baer says he can tell the difference between the
embryo of the common fowl and duck on the second day. (_Principles
of Biology_, p. 1.) So far as this claim holds good, it forms an
argument against evolution. For here is a goal or ideal to which
all things strive. This is intention, and plan and purpose, all of
which is opposed to the main idea of Evolution. It is in line with
Creation.
3. The culminating argument for Evolution is given by arranging in
ascending classification the geologic orders of life (which we have
seen do not appear as Evolution demands), and placing alongside of
these the classification of present animals (which we have seen
is not agreed upon, and is as diverse as the writers themselves),
and then laying alongside of these two artificial arrangements,
the embryonic recital (which is now doubted and is often false to
the past history), and triumphantly pointing to the three-fold
combination. The gaps geology shows are thus filled by present forms
and what both lack, by the embryonic recital.
Here are compared three things which radically differ. The geologic
record shows progress from lower to higher, although not that
complete nor unvarying record necessary to the theory, while the
present orders of life exist simultaneously. Both show the existence
of separate things having no individual connection. The embryo is a
single individual, designed from its conception on a predetermined
plan, animated by internal forces, and limited to a certain end and
life. It is as Dawson says, a "closed series." The worlds of living
and fossil creatures consist of myriads of individuals, under many
widely different conditions, and aimed at widely different ends and
lives. The two are contradictory for the uses of Evolution.
What we do see in these three facts are three marks of personal
intelligence. In embryonic growth we see the plan of production.
In the coming of the fossil creatures we see the progress of the
plan in historical appearance. In the present display of nature
we see the ultimate purpose of the whole. It all forms one great
consistent plan and bears all the marks of personal and creative
work.
So that summing up the argument from comparison of the three facts,
the geologic order, the present classification, and the embryonic
growth, we find in the first absolute separation of species, in the
second no genetic connection as already shown under that argument,
and in the third different phenomena having no points in common
with the other two. The whole argument then fails of conclusion and
reverts as the former do, to proof against Evolution.
FACTS OPPOSING EVOLUTION OF SPECIES.
A theory to be proven must meet the facts and account for them. The
theory in question fails lamentably in this. There are countless
facts not only unaccounted for but diametrically opposed to it and
antagonizing it. We cite some of these:
1. _Degeneration in nature._ Nature shows a constant tendency
downward. Prof. E. D. Cope, an eminent evolutionist, writes: "The
retrogradation in nature is as well or nearly as well established
as evolution." The wild varieties of plants and animals are far
inferior to the cultivated kinds. The older species are far
superior to the present. The saber-toothed tiger is far superior
to the present animal. So also is the Mammoth as compared with
the elephant. Plants show degeneration in colors. The order of
superiority is from yellow, the lowest, to white, pink, red, purple
and blue, the highest. When they drop from blue to yellow, it
is degeneration. Some now having green flowers once had colored
blossoms. Progress is not seen to be upward in the flowers. So also
parasitism is degeneration both in plants and animals. The course of
nature is not, as it has not been, constant development upward. The
scripture statement "The whole creation groaneth and travaileth in
pain," describes accurately the condition of nature (_Ro._ 8:22.)
2. _Continued unchanged species for ages._ The crustacea, for
example in Lake Tanganyika, Africa, remain as the receding ocean
left them ages ago.
3. _Species instead of increasing in number have decreased._ There
were 500 species of trilobites. They have all disappeared. There
were 900 species of ammonites; all are gone. Of the 450 species
of nautilus, only three remain. Indeed whole families have become
obliterated. All this is antagonistic to Evolution.
4. _Species continue the same under the most diverse environments._
Environment is claimed as a cause of the changes demanded by
Evolution. But the same species exist in the most diverse regions,
e. g., mosquitoes, whales and oaks.
5. _Adaptation of one species to another._ Darwin says that a
single case of the adaptation of one species to another would be
fatal to his theory. Yet he himself gives the data for hundreds of
such adaptations. He adduces the fact that a hundred head of red
clover produced 2,700 seeds. A similar number protected from insects
produced none. The fertilization of plants by insects is well known.
The Smyrna fig is said to owe its value to its fertilization by the
piercing of an insect. Some of these insects have been introduced
into California for that purpose. There is an orchid which can be
fertilized only by an insect falling into a cup of liquid which the
flower has, and escaping through a side opening in which it touches
the pollen.
Dr. Andrew Wilson writes: The colors of flowers--nay, even the
little splashes of a hue or tint seen on a petal--are intended to
attract insects that they may carry off the fertilizing dust, or
pollen, to other flowers. It is to this end also that your flowers
are many of them sweet-scented. The perfume is another kind of
invitation to the insect world. The honey they secrete forms a third
attraction--the most practical of all.
6. _Complex adjustments of nature._ Evolution in vain attempts to
account for the wonderful complex adjustments we see in nature, such
as the mimicry of animals and plants; the walking stick so closely
resembles a twig that it deceives the closest observer. The withered
leaf butterfly, with spots and wrinkles, is exactly like the thing
it imitates. This is true also of the leaf butterfly and of another
which exactly resembles a bird's dropping. Evolution cannot account
for the ventriloquism of insects, such as the cricket and tree toad;
the battery of the electric eel; the beauty of insects and fish
and shells and birds and flowers, especially the harmony of their
colors. Edible insects are plainly colored, the poisonous kinds
highly colored. Some butterflies have "scare-heads" on their wings,
exactly resembling an owl's head, and other insects have similar
frightful appearances which they thrust out when attacked. All this
tells of design and interest and often has the appearance of humor
in the creation of these numerous creatures.
7. _The mathematical adjustments of nature are as exact as the
multiplication table._ Illustrations of this are the accuracy of the
orbits of the heavenly bodies and the law of gravitation. The growth
of the cell proceeds on geometrical progression in the division of
parts into 2, 4, 8, 16, etc. The climbing plants form their coils
with mathematical accuracy and proportion. The proportions in which
chemicals will mix is mathematically fixed.
Prof. Tyndall thus calls our attention to crystallization: "By
permitting alum to crystallize in this slow way we obtain these
perfect octahedrons; by allowing carbonate of lime to crystallize,
nature produces these beautiful rhomboids; when silica crystallizes
we have formed the hexagonal prisms capped at the end by pyramids;
by allowing saltpeter to crystallize, we have these prismatic
masses, and when carbon crystallizes we have the diamond."
(_Fragments of Science_, p. 357.) "Looking at it mentally we see the
molecules [of sulphate of soda] like disciplined squadrons under
a governing eye, arranging themselves into battalions, gathering
around distinct centers and forming themselves into distinct solid
masses, which after a time assume the visible shape of the crystal
now held in my hand. Here then is an architect at work, who makes no
chips nor din, and who is now building the particles into crystals
similar in shape to these beautiful masses we see upon the table."
(_Belfast Address._)
8. _The structure of living things shows the true principles of
architecture._ A Mr. McLaughlin, a noted Scotch mathematician, tried
by mathematical calculation to ascertain the shape of a building
which would contain the most room with least material and yet embody
the greatest architectural strength in its retaining walls. After
many laborious calculations, he found after he had arrived at a
conclusion that the honey bee had long before given the same plan
of structure in its cell. The human skull is a true dome, and the
spinal column a true pillar. The ribs of the ship are copied from
the fish, the yacht from the duck, and its deep fin from the fish.[2]
[2] See "Number in Nature," Hastings, Boston, for further
illustrations of this.
Evolution pretends to account for every one of these facts by chance
changes, extending through countless ages as has already been shown
in its amazing account of the origin of legs, eyes, backbones and
other members. Surely this is an appeal to credulity! The faith of
the Christian is sometimes taxed but what shall we say of the faith
of the evolutionist? Which is more credible, the simple account of
miraculous creation or this long, involved and absolutely unseen and
unknown process?
9. _The age of the earth._ Prof. George Frederick Wright, the
geologist, tells us that geologic time is not one-hundredth part
as long as it was supposed to be fifty years ago, and the popular
writers who glibly talk of the antiquity of man are behind the
times and ignorant of the new light which as a flood has come from
geology.[3]
[3] See Man in the Glacial Period, by Prof. Geo. Frederick Wright.
Summing up the case, Prof. Francis M. Balfour tells us: "All these
facts that fall under our observation contradict the crude ideas
of those so-called naturalists, who state that one species can be
transmitted into another in the course of generations." So also Sir
David Brewster declares: "We have absolute proof of the immutability
of species, whether we search for it in historic or geologic times."
Dr. Etheridge, the famous English authority on fossils, says:
"Nine-tenths of the talk of evolutionists is sheer nonsense, not
founded on observation and wholly unsupported by fact. Men adopt a
theory and then strain their facts to support it. I read all their
books, but they make no impression on my belief in the stability of
species. Some men are ready to regard you as a fool if you do not go
with them in all their vagaries, but this museum is full of proofs
of the utter falsity of their views."