Man a Natural Outcome 203 



in part the unaccountable marvel of Man's origin 

 that led him to cry out for God. A sense of the mys- 

 terious on being confronted with a baffling problem 

 has often prompted religious interpretation. 



The stirrings of my heart were of Thee ; 

 Thou didst knit me together in my mother's womb. 

 My frame was not hid from Thee, 

 When I was made secretly and richly wrought in the deep 

 of the earth. 

 My spirit awaketh and still I am with Thee. 



(Psalm cxxxix.) 



But according to Darwinism man is the long result 

 of time, an "antiquity," the outcome of a natural 

 process which has been in progress for millions of 

 years and still continues. And not only was evolution 

 the mode of man's becoming, but we can say a little 

 — just a little as yet — in regard to the factors of 

 variation and selection, isolation and entailment, that 

 may have operated. 



The plain fact must be recognized that it is not 

 open to us to pick and choose scientific conclusions. 

 If we have a quarrel with the Law of Gravitation, it 

 will prove the stronger. If we resolve to ignore the 

 Descent of Man because we do not like it, we shall be 

 left behind. There is no alternative to accepting the 

 well-established results of scientific inquiry, and we 

 have no right to say: The consequences of this or 

 that scientific conclusion will be troublesome. At the 

 same time, biologists are not infallible, and the ques- 

 tion arises whether their mode of presenting their 



