232 RAMBLES AND REVERIES. 



Darwin nowhere affirms the eternity of matter, nor 

 the spontaneous generation of the living out of 

 the non-living, nor the blind, fortuitous action of 

 law. Darwin's theory was concerned in the origin of 

 species, and he begins with the assumption of life. 



But creation covers the material or inorganic as 

 well as the living or organic ; and hence we are 

 led on to the nebular hypothesis as a part of 

 modern evolution. La Place taught that the solar 

 system arose from the gradual condensation of a 

 diffused incandescent gas or vapour. Norman 

 Lockyer's recent modification of this is too new 

 and too little considered by the scientific world to 

 make it necessary for us to take it into account. 

 La Place probably wished the inference to be drawn 

 that all other systems or worlds which exist in the 

 remote regions of space were similarly developed. 

 But even he does not show how the primary 

 nebula originated, nor does he demonstrate that 

 the development was anything but the effect of 

 a Supreme Will acting everywhere throughout 

 space. The origin of matter and of force and the 

 beginning of life are vital elements in the case, 

 and are attributed by the majority of evolutionists 

 to the action of some external Power. 



With these data, evolutionists start out to explain 

 how Nature came to be what it is. Through all the 

 aeons of the geological -realm, into all the intricacies 

 of biological science, Darwin travels with a keenness 

 of vision and a strength of intellect almost super- 

 human, and at length arrives at what he considers 

 the universally applicable law of evolution. 



