DARWINISM AND THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 209 



even children. It is made from attusli, tlie same material as was 

 formerly used altogether for their clothing. One in my posses- 

 sion is eight feet long. The bark has been roughly hackled, and 

 in the center of the strap is braided into four strands, the outer 

 ones three quarters of an inch wide, being about twice the width 

 of the inner ones. Just at the middle for five inches these are 

 caught together by a cross-weaving of blue and white cotton 

 yarn, in a regular lozenge pattern ; this is the part which is 

 placed over the forehead when carrying a load. About seven and 

 a half inches from this, toward each end, the four strands are 

 brought together into a round, double strand, by a seizing which 

 crosses itself regularly. This seizing extends for nearly four 

 inches, and then the braiding is continued in a single flat plait 

 for about eighteen inches, when it runs out into frayed ends. In 

 using, the bundle is slung upon the back, the broad part of the 

 tara being brought over the forehead, so that, while the back 

 bears the weight, the forehead keeps the bundle in place. 



♦»» 



DARWINISM AND THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 



II. 



"TTP to the point at which we have arrived, a churchman, in 

 ^ accepting Darwinisn, finds no real difficulty. It neither 

 gives nor suggests an alternative for God's primary creation of 

 the world. And though in the " origin of species " it does not 

 offer an alternative for "special creation," a Christian is only 

 called upon to abandon a theory recently admitted into theology 

 for one which is not only soluble in the Christian view of cre- 

 ation, but on grounds both scientific and theological is more in 

 keeping with what we know of God in his present working. 

 Those who have followed the argument of a previous paper 

 will admit Prof. Huxley's statement, that, so far as the " origin 

 of species " is concerned — 



Evolution does not even come into contact with theism, considered as a 

 philosophical doctrine. That with which it does collide, and with which it is 

 absolutely inconsistent, is the conception of creation which theological [^Quaere 

 scientific ?] speculators have based upon the history narrated in the opening of 

 the book of Genesis. 



We are prepared even to go further, and to say not only that 

 theism does not lose, but that it actually gains by the exchange. 

 If Darwinism has destroyed the " dogma of special creation," it 

 has destroyed a " dogma " which was a scientific, or rather un- 

 scientific, theory, and from which Christianity, like science, 

 should be glad to shake itself free. 



VOL. XXXIII. 14 



