310 THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. [CHAP. 



probationary action. A moral element enters into the 

 acceptance of that system. 



And so it is with natural religion, with those religious 

 ideas God, Creation, and Morality which are anterior 

 to revelation and repose upon reason. Here again it 

 evidently has not been the intention of the Creator to 

 make the evidence of His existence so plain that its non- 

 recognition would be the mark of intellectual incapacity. 

 Conviction, as to theism, is not forced upon men as is the 

 conviction of the existence of the sun at noon-day. 1 A 

 moral element enters also here, and the analogy which 

 exists in this respect between Christianity and theism 

 speaks eloquently of their primary derivation from one 

 common author. 2 



Thus we might expect that it would be a vain task to 

 seek anywhere in nature for evidence of Divine action, 

 such that no one could sanely deny it. God will not allow 

 Himself to be caught at the bottom of any man's crucible, 

 or yield Himself to the experiments of gross-minded and 

 irreverent inquirers. The natural, like the supernatural, 

 revelation appeals to the whole of man's mental nature and 

 not to the reason alone. 8 



None, therefore, need feel disappointed that evidence of 



1 By this it is not, of course, meant to deny that the existence of God 

 can be demonstrated so as to demand the assent of the intellect taken, so 

 to speak, by itself. 



2 It is reasonable to believe that, in matters of belief as well as of 

 practice, God has not thought fit to annihilate the free will of man, but has 

 permitted speculative difficulties to exist as the trial and the discipline of 

 sharp and subtle intellects, as He has permitted moral temptations to form 

 the trial and the discipline of strong and eager passions." M ANSEL, 

 Bampton Lectures, 4th edition, p. 166. 



3 See some excellent remarks in the Rev. Dr. Newman's Parochial 

 Sermons the new edition (1869), vol. i. p. 211. 



