THE ATTITUDE OF PHILOSOPHY 



the case in early and barbaric mythologies ; or 

 else, as is the case with modern uneducated 

 Christians, they are supposed to have been in- 

 troduced by miracle at a definite era of history. 

 In similar wise the existing order of things is 

 legitimately to endure until abruptly terminated 

 by the direct intervention of an extra-cosmic 

 Power endowed with the anthropomorphic attri- 

 butes of cherishing intentions and of acting out 

 its good pleasure. Facts of palaeontology, such 

 as the extinction of myriads of ancient animal 

 and vegetal species, are explained as the result 

 of innumerable catastrophes determined by this 

 same extra-cosmic Deity ; and strange geologic 

 phenomena are interpreted by the myth of a 

 universal deluge which left them once for all 

 just as we see them. Likewise the social insti- 

 tutions and the religious beliefs now existing by 

 express divine sanction must remain essentially 

 unaltered under penalty of divine wrath as mani- 

 fested in the infliction upon society of the evils 

 of atheism and anarchy. Hence, as the Doc- 

 trine of Creation is itself held to be one of these 

 divinely sanctioned religious beliefs, the scien- 

 tific tendency to supersede this doctrine by the 

 conception of God as manifested not in spas- 

 modic acts of miracle, but in the gradual and 

 orderly evolution of things, is stigmatized as an 

 atheistical tendency, and the upholders of the 

 new view are naturally enough accredited with 



3'^3 



