300 EVOLUTION AND DOGMA. 



spiritual being, both those that are included in 

 the visible creation and those which are pure in- 

 telligences, bear in the activity of their will, which 

 acts upon all that is around it, a yet nearer resem- 

 blance to the charity of the Creator. Assuredly, 

 then, the causal activity of finite being is not 

 superfluous ; even though God can, by His sole 

 omnipotence, do all that is effected by His crea- 

 ture." 1 



Such then, is the theistic conception of Evolu- 

 tion ; such the Catholic idea as developed and taught 

 by the Church's most eminent saints and Doctors. 

 It were easy to add the testimony of other philoso- 

 phers and theologians ; but this is not necessary. It 

 is not my purpose to write a treatise on the subject, 

 but merely to indicate by the declarations of a few 

 accredited witnesses, to show from the teachings of 

 those "whose praise is in all the churches," that 

 there is nothing in Evolution, properly understood, 

 which is antagonistic either to revelation or Dogma ; 

 that, on the contrary, far from being opposed to 

 faith, Evolution, as taught by St. Augustine and St. 

 Thomas Aquinas, is the most reasonable view, and 

 the one most in harmony with the explicit dec- 

 larations of the Genesiac narrative of creation. 

 This the Angelic Doctor admits in so many 

 words. God could, indeed, have created all things 

 directly ; He could have dispensed with the coopera- 

 tion of secondary causes; He could have remained in 

 all things the sole immediate efficient Cause, but in 

 His infinite wisdom He chose to order otherwise. 



1 "Metaphysics of the School," vol. Ill, part I, pp. 36 and 28. 



