GENERAL CONCLUSIONS 227 



being. If man is merely an accidentally improved 

 descendant of apes, his intuitions and decisions as to 

 things unseen must be valueless and unfounded. 

 Hence it is a lamentable fact that the greater part of 

 evolutionist men of science openly discard all religious 

 belief, and teach this unbelief to the multitude who 

 cannot understand the processes by which it is arrived 

 at, but who readily appreciate the immoral results 

 to which it leads in the struggle for existence or the 

 stretching after material advantages?! 



It is true that there may be a theistic form of 

 evolution, but let it be observed that this is essentially 

 distinct from Darwinism or Neo-Lamarckianism. It 

 postulates a Creator, and regards the development of 

 the universe as the development of His plans by 

 secondary causes of His own institution. It neces-l 

 sarily admits design and final cause. It can even set 

 up plausible analogies between the supposed material 

 development and that which is moral and spiritual, 

 many of which are, however, based on misstatements 

 as to natural facts. The weakness of this position 

 consists in the objections to the doctrine of evolution 

 itself as a means of explaining nature, and in the in 

 congruity between the methods supposed by evolution 

 and the principles of design, finality, and ethical purity 

 inseparable from a true and elevating religion. The 

 theistic evolutionists have also before them the danger 

 that in the constant flux of philosophic opinion 

 they will find their system of theology, which at 



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