Evolution a7id its Consequences 89 



the unknowable, then there can be no reason to predicate of 

 it any one character rather than its opposite. If, on the 

 other hand, we have any reason to predicate goodness rather 

 than mahce, nobility rather than vileness, then let preachers 

 of the unknowable abandon their unmeaning jargon, for it is 

 no longer with the unknowable we have to deal, and we are 

 })lunged at once into a whole world of as distinctly dogmatic 

 theology as can be conceived — a theology the dogmas of 

 which are profoundly mysterious, while they are even more 

 trying, and at the same time more illuminating, to the reason 

 than any others of the whole catena which logically follow. 



Although I have taken up this broad ground in contro- 

 versy, and only contended for truths common to all believers 

 in revelation, nevertheless I would not have it supposed that 

 I in any way shrink from openly avowing my position as a 

 Catholic Christian, and I cannot consider it other than a 

 compliment to my creed that Professor Huxley, in his attack 

 on Christianity generally, singles it out for his special 

 hostility. All Christians owe a debt of gratitude to Professor 

 Huxley for calling forth more clearly the certainty that their 

 religion has nothing to fear from the doctrine of Evolution. 

 It is, however. Catholic Christians Avho are pre-eminently 

 beholden to him for occasioning a fresh demonstration of the 

 wonderful way in which their greatest teachers of bygone 

 centuries, though imbued with the notions and possessing 

 only the rudimentary physical knowledge of their day, have 

 yet been led to emit fruitful principles by which the Church 

 is prepared to assimilate and harmonise even the most 

 advanced teachings of physical science. 



Professor Huxley indulges in rhetorical declamation as to 

 a ' blind acceptance of authority,' but such acceptance is as 

 much repudiated by me as by Professor Huxley. The Church 

 in addressing unbelievers appeals to 'reason' and 'conscience' 

 alone for the establishment of that Theistic foundation on 



