2i 4 FRANCIS ORPEN MORRIS 



It would not here be fitting to enter at all into 

 the details of those animated discussions in pam- 

 phlets, periodicals, and papers in which he took 

 part ; this much, however, may be said of them, and 

 ought to be said of them, that so far as he himself 

 was concerned there was no personal feeling in the 

 matter ; it was the unsound arguments advanced to 

 which he so strongly and persistently objected, and 

 not to those who advocated them. Consequently 

 he felt that there was nothing unbecoming to him 

 as a clergyman in taking up the position he did. 

 Nay more, and of this I am well assured, he would 

 as soon have thought of offering no resistance to 

 one who, he knew, had entered his home to take 

 from him all he had, as of holding his peace when, 

 according to his sincerest convictions, the very 

 foundations of that faith which he held more dear 

 than all besides were being undermined a faith, 

 too, which he had solemnly promised to do his 

 utmost to maintain and defend. 



He believed that nothing in recent times had 

 done more to unsettle the minds and the religious 

 opinions and beliefs of many than the unwarrant- 

 able conclusions that had been drawn from the 

 writings of Darwin. With the main point arrived 

 at by many of the disciples of Darwinism namely, 

 " that all the organised beings which have ever lived 

 on this earth have descended from some one pri- 

 mordial form "-he wholly disagreed. There were to 

 him insuperable difficulties in the way of accepting 

 anything approaching to such a sweeping conclusion. 



