270 THE GENESIS OF SPECIES. [CHAP. 



idea of the Divine concurrence, and with every consistent 

 theist that idea is necessarily included. Dr. Asa Gray has 

 given expression to this. 14 He says, " Agreeing that plants 

 and animals were produced by Omnipotent fiat does not 

 exclude the idea of natural order and what we call second- 

 ary causes. The record of the fiat ' Let the earth bring 

 forth grass, the herb yielding seed,' etc., 'let the earth 

 bring forth the living creature after his kind ' seems even 

 to imply them," and leads to the conclusion that the various 

 kinds were produced through natural agencies. 



.Now, much confusion has arisen from not keeping 

 clearly in view this distinction between absolute creation 

 and derivative creation. With the first, physical science 

 has plainly nothing whatever to do, and is impotent to 

 prove or to refute it. The second is also safe from any at- 

 tack on the part of physical science, for it is primarily 

 derived from psychical not physical phenomena. The 

 greater part of the apparent force possessed by objectors 

 to creation, like Mr. Darwin, lies in their treating the asser- 

 tion of derivative creation as if it was an assertion of abso- 

 lute creation, or at least of supernatural action. Thus, he 

 asks whether some of his opponents believe " that, at innu- 

 merable periods in the earth's history, certain elemental 

 atoms have been commanded suddenly to flash into living 

 tissues." ] Certain of Mr. Darwin's objections, however, 

 are not physical, but metaphysical, and really attack the 

 dogma of secondary or derivative creation, though to some 

 perhaps they may appear to be directed against absolute 

 creation only. 



Thus he uses, as an illustration, the conception of a man 

 who builds an edifice from fragments of rock at the base of 

 a precipice, by selecting, for the construction of the various 



14 " A Free Examination of Darwin's Treatise," p. 29, reprinted from 

 the Atlantic Monthly for July, August, and October, 1860. 



15 "Origin of Species," 5th edit., p. 571. 



