CHAPTER VIII. 



OBJECTIONS AGAINST EVOLUTION. 

 Declarations of Anti- Evolutionists. 



HAVING considered some of the arguments 

 which are usually adduced in support of Evo- 

 lution, we may now proceed to examine certain of 

 the objections which are urged against it. But as it 

 would require a large volume for anything approach- 

 ing a detailed presentation of the reasons advanced 

 for the acceptance of Evolution, so, likewise, would 

 it demand far more space than can here be afforded 

 for even a cursory discussion of the difficulties 

 which anti-evolutionists have raised against a theory 

 which, they contend, is discredited both by sound 

 philosophy and the incontestable facts of science. 

 " The theory is easy," declared De Quatrefages, " but 

 the application is difficult ; hence it is that those 

 transformists who have attempted this application 

 have invariably found that their hypotheses have led 

 to conditions which are inadmissible." ' 



1 Journal des Savants, May, 1891. 



It was in view of the hypothetical character of current 

 evolutionary teachings, especially of natural selection, that 

 Mgr. d'Hulst in referring to them expressed himself in the 

 following forcible and epigrammatic manner: " Le besoin de 

 vivre creant la vie, le besoin d'organes creant les organes, le 

 besoin d'ordre creant 1'harmonie." Le Correspondant, Dec. 

 25, 1889. 



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