426 EVOLUTION AND DOGMA. 



Commenting on this question, the learned Belgian 

 Jesuit, Father Bellinck, asks : " What matters it if 

 there have been creations prior to that which Moses 

 describes : what matters it whether the periods re- 

 quired for the genesis of the universe were days or 

 epochs ; whether the apparition of man on the earth 

 was at an earlier or later date ; whether animals have 

 preserved their primitive forms, or whether they have 

 undergone gradual transformations; whether even 

 the body of man has experienced modifications, and, 

 finally, what matters it whether, in virtue of the 

 Creative Will, inorganic matter be able or not to 

 produce plants and animals spontaneously? 



"All these questions are given over to the disputes 

 of men, and it is for science to distinguish truth from 

 error." 1 



These are pertinent questions. W T hat matters it, 

 indeed, from the standpoint of Catholic Dogma, if 

 they are all answered in the affirmative? If science 

 should eventually demonstrate that spontaneous gen- 

 eration is probable, or has actually occurred, or is 

 occurring in our own day, what matters it ? The 

 Fathers and Schoolmen found no difficulty in be- 

 lieving in abiogenesis, and most of them, if not all 

 of them, believed in it so far as it concerned the 

 lower forms of life. More than this. As we learned 

 in the beginning of our work, spontaneous generation 

 was almost universally accepted until about a cen- 



moins dans leur agencement generale." " Les Enchainements 

 du Monde Animal dans les Temps Geologiques," introduc- 

 tion, p. 3. 



1 Vid. M Revue des fitudes Historiques et Litteraires,'' 1864. 



