" IN THE BEGINNING " 5 



The simplest creatures with backbones are the fishes ; and probably the 

 first creatures with backbones sprang from some other marine animal, perhaps 

 a kind of worm. Later on, some of these backboned animals came ashore, and 

 learned how to breathe the open air instead of the oxygen in water. Instead 

 of gills, these creatures used lungs; instead of fins, they evolved limbs. So 

 from the fish we get the idea of the frog, a creature that is " amphibious" 

 double-lived, because when young it lives as a fish, when full grown it is an 

 air-breathing animal. 



From the amphibia came reptiles and these are the undoubted ancestors 

 of the birds ; but from the amphibia also came the ancestors of man a 

 wonderful order of creatures which we call mammals animals that feed their 

 young with milk. The mammals nearest to man are the apes, especially the 

 anthropoid apes, known as gorillas, chimpanzees, orang-utans, and gibbons. 

 It is not true to say that man has descended from the apes ; but it is 

 true to say that man and the apes have come from the same far-away 

 ancestors. 



No one can say when the first human being was evolved, but we know 

 that tens of thousands of years ago there were human beings of different 

 kinds. Of these, all died out but the one kind best fitted to survive and 

 from that kind the human race of to-day was derived. 



That first type of man was very different from his modern descendants. 

 He was hairy, and had much larger teeth, and no chin, larger muscles and 

 bones, and a head not so developed in front as to-day, and therefore with a 

 lesser brain. None the less, that first type of man was cleverer than the 

 other animals around him. We can still see the bones of the animals, larger 

 and stronger than himself, which he killed for food ; and we can see the stone 

 weapons with which he overcame them. 



That is the story of how man came to be what he is : it begins with some 

 worm-like animal in the sea where does it end ? There is no end to the story. 

 But if man can be evolved from that lowly form of life, what may not be evolved 

 from man ? 



The power of God is still working from within ; " Creative Evolution " 

 (to give it the name by which it is called to-day) is still going on. Where it 

 will end no one can tell ; but one thing is quite clear : all life is divine every 

 living thing is an expression of the Spirit of God, in whom all things live and 

 move and have their being. We look upon Nature with fresh light, and greater 

 reverence, the more we realize this truth ; all life becomes to us a holy and 

 mysterious thing ; and as we learn to understand and appreciate Nature 

 round about us, in the gardens and the fields or at the seaside, we take off our 

 shoes from our feet, because round about us, in truth, is holy ground. 



[NOTE. Much of the material in the above is derived from the charming articles by Dr. Saleeby 

 written for The Children's Encyclopedia and elsewhere, to which, not for the first time, I am 

 greatly indebted.] 



