THIRD DAY'S SITTING. 73 



Lord C. Do you think, Mr. Darwin, that science alone 

 will account for the existence of man ? Has a Creator 

 never intervened ? 



Darwin. I do not assert, my Lord, that a Creator has 

 never intervened. 



Homo. In his work on "The Origin of Species," my Lord, 

 Mr. Darwin says, " There is a grandeur in this view of life, 

 with its several powers, having been originally breathed by 

 the Creator into a few forms or into one." I do not find, 

 in his present work, any such acknowledgment of the in- 

 tervention of a Creator. He says, " the idea of a universal 

 and beneficent Creator of the universe does not seem to 

 arise in the mind of man, until he has been elevated by 

 long-continued culture." (Vol. ii., p. 395.) But whether or 

 not he now regards this idea of a Creator as a correct one, 

 does not appear. 



Lord C. It will be but just to Mr. Darwin to regard him 

 as retaining Ms formerly avowed belief in a Creator, until 

 he expressly repudiates it 



Homo. I quite agree with your Lordship, and have certainly 

 n ->t the least desire to do injustice to Mr. Darwin. I cannot 

 understand, however, why, in his present work, which seems 

 as much as his former one to lead to the subject, he does 

 not a f ain indicate his belief in the intervention of the 

 Creator. I suppose he feels that the weak point of his 

 argument is ju.-t here. For, if he admits that the 

 Creator must have breathed life "into a few forms," why 

 may not man have been one of these forms ? I might, 

 besides, ask Mr. Darwin if it be a "scientific explana- 

 tion" to assert that the Creator has breathed life into 

 any form whatever? Mr. Darwin himself falls away 

 from "scientific explanation" when he brings in the 

 Creator. 



