Xir.] THEOLOGY AND EVOLUTION. 281 



movomcnt of Liitlior, Suarcz may be taken as a writer widely 

 venerated as an authority, and one whose orthodoxy has 

 never been questioned. 



It must be borne in mind that, for a consideral)le time 

 after even the last of these writers, no one had disputed the 

 gcncrally-reeeived view as to the small age of the world or 

 at least of the kinds of animals and plants inhabiting it. It 

 becomes therefore much more striking if views formed under 

 such a condition of opinion are found to harmonize with 

 modern ideas regarding "Creation " and organic life. 



Now, St. Augustine insists in a very remarkable manner 

 on the merely derivative sense in which God's creation of or- 

 ganic ft)nns is to be understood ; that is, that God created 

 them by conferring on the material world the power to evolve 

 them under suitable conditions. lie says in his book on 

 Genesis : '* " Terrestria animalia, tanquam ex ultimo elc- 

 mento mundi ultima ; nihilominus potentialUer, quorum nu- 

 meros tempus postea visibiliter explicaret." 



Ag-ain he savs : 



" Sicut autem in ipso grano invisibiliter crant omnia 

 simul, qune per tempora in arborem surgerent ; ita ipse mun- 

 dus cogitandus est, cum Dcus sumd 0)7i7iia creav it, hahuisso 

 simul omnia qure in illo et cum illo facta sunt quando factus 

 est dies; non solum coelum cum sole et lunA, et sideribus 

 . . . . ; sed etiam ilia qua? aqua et terra produxit potcntialitcr 

 atque causaliter, priusquam per temporum moras its cxori- 

 rcntur, rpiomodo nobis jam nota sunt in eis operibus, quns 

 Deus usque nunc operatur." " 



" Omnium quippe rerum qure corporaliter visibiliterque 

 nascuntur, occulta quondam semina in istis corporeis mundi 

 liujus dementis latent." " 



2^ «' De Gencsi ad Litt.," lib. v., cap. v., No. 14 in Ben. Edition, vol 

 ill,, p. 180. 



" Lib. cit., cap. xxii., No. 41. 



«« Lib. cit., " Dc Trinitatc," lib. iii., cap. viii., No. 14. 



