EVOLUTION BEFORE DARWIN II 



naissance with marvelous vitality, starting the world 

 to think afresh great thoughts that would not die, but 

 would grow from that time on with ever-widenin^- 

 scope. 



Among the Jews and early Christians the stately 

 and beautiful account in Genesis sufficed for all the 

 needs of minds fully occupied with other questions. 

 With the growth of philosophy among Christian 

 minds again came the need of a satisfactory solution. 

 St. Augustine was probably the greatest of the so- 

 called "Fathers" of the church. His mind was emi- 

 nently philosophical, and he was learned in the writ- 

 ings of the older Greeks. He believed the language 

 of Genesis to mean that in the beginning God planted 

 in chaos the seed that afterward sprang up into the 

 heavens and the earth. He further says that the six 

 days of creation were not days of time, but a series 

 of causes, and that, in the order described as these 

 six days, God planted in chaos the various beginnings 

 of things. These in the fullness of time sprang up 

 into the world as we know it now. The problem was 

 not a question about which the church cared to trouble 

 itself, and with the oncoming of the Dark Ages the 

 whole matter dropped nearly out of the thoughts of 

 men. 



When the times began to lighten we find the school- 

 men, among the greatest of whom was Thomas 



