48 READINGS IN EVOLUTION, GENETICS, AND EUGENICS 



materialism, it is far otherwise. If the pure scientists smile when 

 theological philosophers, unacquainted with the methods of science, 

 undertake to dogmatize on the subject of evolution, they must 

 pardon the philosophers if they also smile when the pure scientists 

 imagine that they can at once solve questions in philosophy which 

 have agitated the human mind from the earliest times. I am anxious 

 to show the absurdity of this materialistic conclusion, but I shall try 

 to do so, not by any labored argument, but by a few simple illustra- 

 tions. 



1. It is curious to observe how, when the question is concerning a 

 work of Nature, we no sooner find out how a thing is made than we 

 immediately exclaim: "It is not made at all, it became so of itself!" 

 So long as we knew not how worlds were made, we of course con- 

 cluded they must have been created, but so soon as science showed 

 how it was probably done, immediately we say we were mistaken — 

 they were not made at all. So also, as long as we could not 

 imagine how new organic forms originated, we were willing to believe 

 they were created, but, so soon as we find that they originated by 

 evolution, many at once say: ''We were mistaken; no creator is 

 necessary at all." Is this so when the question is concerning a work 

 of man? Yes, of one kind — viz., the work of the magician. Here, 

 indeed, we believe in him, and are delighted with his work, until we 

 know how it is done, and then all our faith and wonder cease. But 

 in any honest work it is not so ; but on the contrary, when we under- 

 stand how it is done, stupid wonder is changed into intellectual 

 delight. Does it not seem, then, that to most people God is a mere 

 wonder-worker, a chief magician ? But the mission of science is to 

 show us how things are done. Is it any wonder, then, that to such 

 persons science is constantly destroying their superstitious illusions ? 

 But if God is an honest worker, according to reason — i.e., according 

 to law — ought not science rather to change gaping wonder into 

 intelligent delight, superstition into rational worship ? 



2. Again, it is curious to observe how an old truth, if it come only 

 in a new form, often strikes us as something unheard of, and even as 

 paradoxical and almost impossible. A little over thirty years ago a 

 little philosophical toy, the gyroscope, was introduced and became 

 very common. At first sight, it seems to violate all mechanical laws 

 and set at naught the law of gravitation itself. A heavy brass wheel, 

 four to five inches in diameter, at the end of a horizontal axle, six or 

 eight inches long, is set rotating rapidly, and then the free end of the 



