Great interest has been awakened, of late, by the promulgation of a new
"Theory of Creation"; and non-scientific readers have met with numerous
controversial articles in the journals, magazines, and newspapers of the
day. The name of Darwin, after having been honorably known for a quarter
of a century to the scientists of the world, has become familiar to us
all as that of the author of this new theory. A word has been added to
our vocabulary. "Darwinian" is now a distinctive epithet wherewith to
individualize the new school of thought, and an appellation to designate
its votaries. Notwithstanding the interest which Mr. Darwin's writings
and the replies of his opponents have created, and the constant allusion
to them in publications of all kinds; in spite of the active warfare
they have incited; in spite of the sneers and sarcasms which have been
launched by writers, lecturers, and preachers,--sure means of
advertisement among the people,--few really and thoroughly comprehend
Mr. Darwin's idea. A lecturer, alluding to it lately, says that it will
be worthy of consideration when we see an ape turn into a man; and this
is about the extent, we imagine, to which the great mass of people
understand a theory which has been received as revelation by many of the
first scientific men of the age,--men who have given their lives to
patient, profound, untiring, unimpassioned study of nature, and who rank
among the foremost thinkers of the world.
Leaving the argumentative detail to those whose learning is the only
armory which can supply weapons adequate to the maintenance of the
struggle, let us see if we cannot explain the idea which causes it; nor
consider its verification to lie in the metamorphosis of an ape into a
man.
Darwin's idea is generally conceived to be a new one. This is not
strictly the case. The real foundation was laid long ago. It is the law
of persistent force, acting on the universe. This is as old as Buddha,
and was a dogma of Buddhism. It has been enunciated in some form or
other for ages. But Darwin has infused into it a new vital strength,
has given it new application, has clearly explained its workings, has
been its prophet to the people. To fully understand the history and
progress of the Darwinian theory, we must look back many years, and
trace the influence which theology has had upon the advance of
scientific knowledge.
For centuries the Bible was understood to contain a perfect, exact,
undoubted account of the origin of the world. It was believed by
everybody that the world was made in six days. The very imperfect
acquaintance which the ancients had with geology and physics allowed
them to accept this relation unchallenged. Faith was far stronger than
reason; and, during the long ages in which the Church ruled supreme,
this statement was accepted and implicitly believed by the whole race of
Christians. But as men began to grow more enlightened,--as, one by one,
the secrets of nature were revealed to the students whose desire for
knowledge overbore their tacit acceptance of tradition,--doubts began to
arise as to the possibility of the truth of this long-cherished idea.
When the printing-press came, and enabled these ardent explorers to
communicate freely the results of their studious labors, the leaven of
discredit, thus disseminated, began to work in the mass, and the reason
of men began to rise beneath the superincumbent theological pressure
which had so long weighed upon it. The multitude of facts gathered
together by these careful students became, by and by, so vast, and the
conclusions to which they led so indubitable, that the theologians were
forced, out of simple common-sense, to revise their expoundings of the
sacred writings.
When it was found that the earth was made up of vast depositions of
matter which contained the remains of long-extinct creatures, whose
fragments were buried in solid rocks, once soft, oozy mud; when it was
found that other rocks, hundreds of feet in thickness, were wholly
composed of the imperishable remains of other extinct animals, which
once lived and died and were gathered together in waters which broke
over the very spot where these rocks now rise; when it was found that
untold millions of years were necessary for the formation of one single
group of these rocks, among many equally vast; when it was found that,
in the memory of man, during the lapse of at least five thousand years,
the earth had undergone no appreciable change; when it was found that
the earth was the result of the action of laws existent in matter,--an
upheaving, a washing away, a hardening, a disintegrating through a
period of time beyond the conception of man,--the theologians were
forced to substitute _periods_ for _days_. When the old walls which had
circumscribed man's mind became so crumbled as to allow of egress,
individuals broke through them and revelled in the freedom of
intelligent thought. When these walls were demolished by those who had
themselves erected them, they were leaped, in all directions, by ardent
explorers; and naturalists, no longer restrained by tradition, rushed
upon voyages of discovery into the teeming world before them.
For a while this emancipation exhausted itself in the contemplation of
the physical world, and an inquiry into brute life. Speculations and
theories might riot in a past which was a practical eternity. They had
unlimited space wherein to project, backward, the structure of the
universe. But this long-stretching past was to be peopled only by the
lower orders of animal life. The rocks were found to be filled with
stony remains of animals who perished when the sandstone, which built
old crumbling castles, was sea-shore mud; the chalk hills which bore
them were found to be made up of myriads of little creatures. These
humble representatives of life might be, must be, credited with a remote
antiquity. But man was not an animal. He was a being apart. Although he
was liable to heat and cold, disease and death, although his body was
made of the same materials as the brute's, and was subject to the same
laws of life, he was invested with an individuality which separated him
from them. For a while the old influence of theological rule held even
these venturous explorers to the ancient landmarks of human origin. By
and by, the same impulse which had before led men to examine the proofs
of physical creation induced them to consider the evidence of their own
advent upon earth. Certain Scriptural statements did not appear
reconcilable with each other. Cain went forth and builded a city; and
there were artificers in brass and iron. Now Cain was only one of two
men when he went forth. Whence came the citizens of that early
settlement, and how did they understand the production of brass, a
composite metal? How was it that man always met man wherever he went on
the globe? Five thousand years ago the varied races were known to be
distinct as now, and yet man was formerly said to be but about six
thousand years old. Could one thousand years have produced the changes
then evident, while five thousand succeeding years have scarce altered
these different races? These and many other difficulties led thinkers to
question whether man might not look much farther back into the past for
his origin, and whether the same laws which had governed the birth,
continuance, and distribution of other animals were not always in action
to produce in him kindred results. The old belief, that all men
descended from one man, began to be shaken; and good, honest, faithful
Christians expressed their doubts of the matter. It was surmised that
they were created in numbers. The old idea, that animals were all
created in individual pairs, was found to be incompatible with the
discovery of animal remains, in profusion, in rocks which were mud ages
before any Adam could have existed to give them Hebrew names. Then,
breaking away from the theological bonds, there sprang into active
thought men of far-reaching minds, who began a thorough reconstruction
of the whole theory of creation. The handwriting on the wall was NATURAL
LAW. All creation, man included, was but the result of one undeviating,
unceasing, eternal, all-pervading law, and the state of the universe at
any given moment was the state of evolution which that universe
exhibited. Behind this law was the great inscrutable Spirit-power.
The infinite number of varied, aggregated facts stored up by man's
patient study of this universe are irrelevant here, in a sketch of the
progressive advance of his knowledge of creation. Those who desire to
examine the evidence which has led to this verdict must go over the
records themselves, or accept, out of their own convictions, the result
of the examination. To entirely comprehend the Darwinian idea, one
should be, to a certain extent, familiar with the principles of science.
In other words, he should know more or less of what Darwin knows. He
should be familiar with the general results of man's study in the
different branches of science. He need not be an astronomer, a
physicist, a geologist, a zoologist, a botanist; but he should have a
general acquaintance with the results of the labors of those who are
such. He should, to a certain extent, understand the workings of Natural
Law.
This is the great battle-ground on which the struggle is now taking
place. The point at issue is, whether the physical changes of the
material world, the introduction, continuance, and variation of
organized beings, are due to the direct, special intervention of Deity,
or whether they are the results of primeval laws, inherent in matter,
and out of whose workings spring the phenomena of nature. The adherents
to the former opinion maintain that the Deity has created all animals
individually, or in individual species, by direct action, apart from
natural forces, and indeed by an interference therewith. The votaries of
the latter deny special creation, and maintain that all animals are,
like the rest of the universe, the results of forces acting through all
time, producing, by their diverse changing influences, the variations
which, as they have widened and strengthened, have resulted in the
difference exhibited among animals. The first is the old traditional
idea, having its foundation in belief, and drawing its support from the
Scriptures. The last is the modern conviction, having its foundation in
reason, and drawing its support from the study of nature. How are these
differences among animate creatures--these wide contrasts of form, size,
and habits--produced, if not by God's special creation? This is the
question which Mr. Darwin and his school of thinkers are seeking to
answer.
Some half a century ago, M. Lamarck, a French naturalist, propounded a
theory which excited the derision of the whole world. He accounted for
these variations by suggesting that, as any special want was felt by an
animal, the body took on that structure which was required to relieve
it. To give a broad illustration: if men needed to fly for the support
of life, wings would gradually grow out from their shoulders. Ridiculous
as this may be, it showed that thinkers were at that time endeavoring to
account, on purely natural grounds, for what they considered natural,
and not supernatural phenomena.
Some twenty years ago, a book made its appearance which startled the
whole reading world, and caused as much dispute as Darwin has since
done. This was "Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation." It was
anonymous, and the author has never acknowledged it: to this day he is
unknown. This book was learned and lucid. It was received with delight
by those who were still looking for some explanation of animal origin on
natural grounds; and was derided quite as much as Lamarck's work by the
adherents to the old traditional belief. Scouted by the great majority
of naturalists, who still clung with tenacity to the notions of their
predecessors, stigmatized as atheistic and abominable by theologians, it
was first read with eagerness, and then put aside; and though it went
through many editions, it is now almost forgotten. But this book was the
beginning of Darwinism. It says:--
"We have seen powerful evidence that the construction of this
globe and its associates, and, inferentially, that of all the
other globes in space, was the result, not of any immediate or
personal exertion on the part of Deity, but of natural laws
which are expressions of his will. What is to hinder our
supposing that the organic creation is also the result of
natural laws, which are in like manner an expression of his
will?"
Referring to the Deity as the great motive-power of all the universe,
the author says:--
"To a reasonable mind the Divine attributes must appear, not
diminished or reduced in any way, by supposing a creation by
law, but infinitely exalted. It is the narrowest of all views
of the Deity, and characteristic of a humble class of
intellects, to suppose him acting constantly in particular ways
for particular occasions. It, for one thing, greatly detracts
from his foresight,--the most undeniable of all the attributes
of Omnipotence. It lowers him towards the level of our own
humble intellects. Much more worthy of him it surely is to
suppose that all things have been commissioned by him from the
first, though neither is he absent from a particle of the
current of natural affairs in one sense, seeing that the whole
system is continually supported by his providence.... When all
is seen to be the result of law, the idea of an Almighty author
becomes irresistible, for the creation of a law for an endless
series of phenomena--an act of intelligence above all else we
can conceive--could have no other imaginable source, and tells,
moreover, as powerfully for a sustaining as for an originating
power."