94 THE CASE AGAINST EVOLUTION 



ample, the superposed rock contains fossils alleged to be typi- 

 cal of an "earlier" stratigraphic horizon than that to which 

 the fossils of the subjacent rock belong, the former is pro- 

 nounced to be "older," despite the fact that the actual strati- 

 graphic order conveys the opposite impression. "We still 

 regard fossils," says J. W. Judd, "as the 'medals of creation,' 

 and certain types of life we take to be as truly characteristic 

 of definite periods as the coins which bear the image and 

 superscription of a Roman emperor or of a Saxon king." (Cf. 

 Smithson. Inst. Rpt. for 1912, p. 356.) Thus it comes to pass, 

 in the last analysis, that fossils, on the one hand, are dated 

 according to the consecutive strata, in which they occur, and 

 strata, on the other hand, are dated according to the fossils 

 which they contain. 



Such procedure, if not actually tantamount to a vicious 

 circle, is, to say the least, in imminent danger of becoming so. 

 For, even assuming the so-called empirical generalization, that 

 makes certain fossils typical of certain definitely-aged geolog- 

 ical "formations," to be based upon induction sufficiently com- 

 plete and analytic to insure certainty, at least, in the majority 

 of instances, and taking it for granted that we are dealing with 

 a case, where the actual evidence of stratigraphy is not in open 

 conflict with that of the index fossils, who does not see that 

 such a system of chronology lends itself only too readily to 

 manipulation of the most arbitrary kind, whenever the pet 

 preconceptions of the evolutionary chronologist are at stake? 

 How, then, can we be sure, in a given case, that a verdict 

 based exclusively on the "evidence" of index fossils will be 

 reliably objective? It is to be expected that the evolutionist 

 will refrain from the temptation to give himself the benefit 

 of every doubt? Will there not be an almost irresistible ten- 

 dency on the part of the convinced transformist to revise the 

 age of any deposit, which happens to contain fossils that, ac- 

 cording to his theory, ought not to occur at the time hitherto 

 assigned? 



The citation of a concrete example will serve to make our 



