THE RELATION OF EVOLUTION TO MATERIALISM 47 



but the strongest and most reflective minds. Materialism has thus 

 become a fashion of thought; and, like all fashions, must be guarded 

 against. This tendency has been created and is now guided by 

 science. Just at this time it is strongest in the department of biology, 

 and especially is evolution its stronghold. This theory is supposed by 

 many to be simply demonstrative of materialism. Once it was the 

 theory of gravitation which seemed demonstrative of materialism. 

 The sustentation of the universe by law seemed to imply that Nature 

 operates itself and needs no God. That time is passed. Now it is 

 evolution and creation by law. This will also pass. The theory seems 

 to many the most materialistic of all scientific doctrines only because 

 it is the last which is claimed by materialism, and the absurdity of the 

 claim is not yet made clear to many. 



The truth is, there is no such necessary connection between evo- 

 lution and materialism as is imagined by some. There is no dif- 

 ference in this respect between evolution and any other law of Nature. 

 In evolution, it is true, the last barrier is broken down, and the 

 whole domain of Nature is now subject to law; but it is only the 

 last; the march of science has been in the same direction all the time. 

 In a word, evolution is not only not identical with materialism, but, 

 to the deep thinker, it has not added a feather's weight to its proba- 

 bility or reasonableness. Evolution is one thing and materialism 

 quite another. The one is an established law of Nature, the other an 

 unwarranted and hasty inference from that law. Let no one imagine, 

 as he is conducted by the materialistic scientist in the paths of evo- 

 lution from the inorganic to the organic, from the organic to the 

 animate, from the animate to the rational and moral, until he lands, 

 as it seems to him, logically and inevitably, in universal material- 

 ism let no such one imagine that he has walked all the way in 

 the domain of science. He has stepped across the boundary into 

 the domain of philosophy. But, on account of the strong tendency 

 to materialism and the skilful guidance of his leaders, there seems 

 to be no such boundary; he does not distinguish between the induc- 

 tions of science and the inferences of a shallow philosophy; the 

 whole is accredited to science, and the final conclusion seems to 

 carry with it all the certainty which belongs to scientific results. 

 The fact that these materialistic conclusions are reached by some of 

 the foremost scientists of the present day adds nothing to their 

 probability. In a question of science, viz., the law of evolution, their 

 authority is deservedly high, but in a question of philosophy, viz., 



