168 MODERN IDEAS OF EVOLUTION 



and we know enough to be assured that in the 

 origin and development of even the humbler 

 forms of life they may be vastly more multiform and 

 complex than those employed in the most complicated 

 combinations of machinery or of process in the works 

 of man. Newton felt himself to be like a child play 

 ing with the sands on the shore of a boundless ocean ; 

 and in the presence of any organised being we are but 

 as infants gazing on the mysterious movements of 

 some intricate machine, and whose thoughts as to its 

 origin, operation, and uses may be of the crudest 

 character. Yet one great advantage we have as 

 thcists is that we can hold by the hand of a Father 

 who knows all the secrets of the mighty fabric which 

 perplexes us, and can explain to us, little by little, so 

 much of it as it may be useful to us to know. Thus, 

 however much we may be mistaken in our first im 

 pressions, we may hope to arrive at some measure of 

 truth, and can find relief from the difficulties of our 

 own imperfections and of the pressure of our environ 

 ment, in faith in the loving and all-wise Father of our 

 spirits. 



Le Conte sums up this view of the matter in a 

 short chapter, which clearly sets forth the compati 

 bility of the spiritual world and revelation ; not with 

 any of the usual theories of evolution, but with 

 natural law, on the supposition of the divine energy 

 operating on different planes of being ; and this rela 

 tion of the natural and spiritual holds equally good 



