414 EVOLUTION AND DOGMA. 



also the history of the species, yea, even the history 

 of the class and of the kingdom to which the indi- 

 vidual belongs, gives quite a different answer. If 

 ontogeny, the history of the individual, affords no 

 clue to the raison d'etre of these nascent and rudi- 

 mentary organs, we interrogate phylogeny, the his- 

 tory of the species or the class. " Organs, which on 

 the old theory of special creation were useless and 

 meaningless, are now seen to have their explanation 

 in the past or in the future, according as they are 

 rudimentary or nascent. There is nothing useless, 

 nothing meaningless in nature, nothing due to ca- 

 price or chance, nothing irrational or without a cause, 

 nothing outside the reign of law. This belief in the 

 universality of law and order is the scientific ana- 

 logue of the Christian's belief in Providence." l 



Evolution, Scripture, and Theology. 



Evolution accentuates design, without which, as 

 Von Hartmann observes, all were " only a dark chaos 

 of obstinate and capricious forces." It gives a truer 

 and more majestic account of causation, because it 

 brings home to us the truth, that the facts of nature 

 are the acts of God, and emphasizes the teaching of 

 our faith, that the laws of nature are the expressions 

 of "a supreme will and purpose belonging to an 

 Eternal Mind." 



Evolution has been denounced as anti-Scriptural, 

 and yet, the most remarkable feature about the Gene- 

 siac account of creation, is the ease with which it 

 lends itself to the theory of Evolution, that is, of 



1 " Science and the Faith," by Aubrev L. Moore, p. 197. 



