XII.] THEOLOGY AND EVOLUTION. 269 



In the strictest and highest sense "Creation" is the 

 absolute origination of any thing by God without preexist- 

 ing means or material, and is a supernatural act. 18 



In the secondary and lower sense, " Creation " is the 

 formation of any thing by God derivatively / that is, that 

 the preceding matter has been created with the potentiality 

 to evolve from it, under suitable conditions, all the various 

 forms it subsequently assumes. And this power having 

 been conferred by God in the first instance, and those laws 

 and powers having been instituted by Him, through the 

 action of which the suitable conditions are supplied, He is 

 said, in this lower sense, to create such various subsequent 

 forms. This is the natural action of God in the physical 

 world, as distinguished from His direct, or, as it may be here 

 called, supernatural action. 



In yet a third sense, the word " Creation " may be more 

 or less improperly applied to the construction of any com- 

 plex formation or state by a voluntary self-conscious being 

 who makes use of the powers and laws which God has im- 

 posed, as when a man is spoken of as the creator of a 

 museum, or of "his own fortune," etc. Such action of a 

 created conscious intelligence is purely natural, but more 

 than physical, and may be conveniently spoken of as hyper- 

 physical. 



We have thus (1) direct or supernatural action; (2) phys- 

 ical action ; and (3) hyperphysical action the two latter 

 both belonging to the order of nature. 13 Neither the phys- 

 ical nor the hyperphysical actions, however, exclude the 



12 The author means by this, that it is directly and immediately the 

 act of God, the word " supernatural " being used in a sense convenient 

 for the purposes of this work, and not in its ordinary theological sense. 



13 The phrase "order of nature" is not here used in its theological 

 sense as distinguished from the " order of grace," but as a term, here 

 convenient, to denote actions not due to direct and immediate Divine in- 

 tervention. 



