HUXLEY AND EVOLUTION. 329 



uniform succession, or secondary or evolutionary cause. 

 It was " creation." Why could not Professor Huxley as- 

 sume that the defenders of the " creation theory " were 

 logical enough to seek creation in an act which is crea- 

 tion, and not in something which one holding his view 

 of evolution could not rationally denominate creation? 

 And then, getting his eye once on that which can be rec- 

 ognized as creation, why did he not proceed to show that 

 no such creation ever took place? 



Happily the lecturer has himself supplied the answer 

 to this question. He recognizes the certainty that the 

 present course of events had a beginning; and he admits 

 that we have no authority to deny that there was " a 

 time when Nature did not follow a fixed order," and (if 

 we understand him) " when external agencies did inter- 

 vene in the general course of nature." Well, we believe 

 this position to be sound; we also hold that an "external 

 agency " acted before the " general course of nature was 

 established"; and it must be this "external agency" which 

 stands as the alternative of an eternal series in the ex- 

 planation of the existence of the " course of nature." 

 This relation of things brings to view a real creation. 

 This is a creation which Professor Huxley suggests first 

 by implication and then by declaration. Now why, I ask 

 again, having brought the conception of a true creation 

 clearly into view, did he not proceed to " demonstrate " 

 that belief in such creation is an "untenable hypothesis"? 

 Why did he turn from that which he had shown to be 

 a fact, answering the requirements of creation, to some- 

 thing which, on his own assumptions, could not be viewed 

 as creation? Did the sight of the enemy against whom 

 he had registered an oath drive his courage away? 



