The Evolution of Organisms 139 



earth. If any one has good reason for believing 

 that the long process of Becoming, which has 

 eventually led to ourselves and our complex ani- 

 mate surroundings, is altogether too mysterious or 

 too marvellous to admit of successful treatment by 

 ordinary scientific methods, then he denies at the 

 outset the validity of the evolution formula There 

 is no use going further. Here is the parting of 

 the ways, and there is no via media. The facts 

 of history as the rocks reveal them will remain, but 

 the book is shut for science. The order of Nature 

 remains, but it is no longer the order of scientific 

 intelligibility. 



If any one decides on a priori grounds that there 

 is no hopefulness in attempting a scientific anal- 

 ysis of the confessedly vast and perplexing prob- 

 lem of genesis, then let him remain poet or artist, 

 philosopher or theologian. There is no sense in 

 niggling criticism if the scientific method is pre- 

 judged as invalid. 



On the other hand, if the scientific attempt at 

 formulating the steps in genesis is legitimate, and 

 if it has made good progress, considering its youth, 

 then let us rigidly exclude from our science all other 

 than scientific interpretations ; let us cease to juggle 

 with words by attempting a mongrel mixture of 

 scientific and transcendental formulation; let us 

 stop trying to eke out demonstrable factors by as- 

 suming in the same breath alongside of these, 



