1 6 THE DEVELOPMENT HYPOTHESIS, 



I may be in error in taking this serious view of the mat- 

 ter ; and, if so, would feel grateful to the man who could 

 point out to me that special link in the chain of inference 

 at which, with respect to the bearing of the theory on the 

 two theologies — natural and revealed — the mistake has taken 

 place. But if I be in error at all, it is an error into which 

 I find not a few of the first men of the age, — represented, as 

 a class, by our Professor Sedgwicks and Sir David Brewsters, 

 — have also fallen ; and until it be shown to he an error, and 

 that the development theory is in no degree incompatible 

 with a belief in the immortality of the soul, in the responsi- 

 bility of man to God as the final Judge, or in the Christian 

 scheme of salvation, it is every honest man's duty to protest 

 against any ex parte statement of the question that would 

 insidiously represent it as ethically an indifferent one, or as 

 unimportant in its theologic bearing, savo to " little religious 

 sects and scientific coteries." In an address on the fossil 

 flora, made in September last by a gentleman of Edinburgh 

 to the St Andrew's Horticultural Society, there occurs the 

 following passage on this subject : — " Life is governed by 

 external conditions, and new conditions imply new races; but 

 then, as to their creation, that is the ^mystery of mysteries.^ 

 Are they created by an immediate fiat and direct act of the 

 Almighty ] or has He originally impressed life with an elas- 

 ticity and adaptability, so that it shall take upon itself new 

 forms and characters, according to the conditions to which it 

 shall be subjected ? Each opinion has had, and still has, its 

 advocates and opponents ; but the tinith is, that science, so far 

 as it knows, or rather so far as it has had the honesty and 

 courage to avow, has yet been unable to pronounce a satis- 

 factory decision. Either way, it matters little, physically or 

 morally ; either mode implies the same omnipotence, and 

 wisdom, and foresight, and protection ; and it is only your 

 little religious sects and scientific coteries which make a po- 



