89 



"I readily grant that, a priori, the one mode of creation 

 would be just as wonderful a proof of the almighty power of 

 God as the other, each perhaps even seeming more wonderful 

 than the other, were we to think of it by itself. 



" But where is the setting forth of the doctrine of Evolution 

 in the Book of Genesis ? I see no trace or sign of it ; but I do 

 see what is agreeable to the reason which God has given me, 

 which most assuredly the Darwinian doctrine is not, when looked 

 at hi the light of the facts of nature, and put forth moreover as 

 it is with the most flagrant, the most palpable, the most 

 egregious self-contradictions, the most extravagant demands, 

 contradicted by common sense, and in direct opposition, to the 

 teaching of Astronomy, which proves that in the inconceivably 

 vast space of time which Darwin demands for his theory it was 

 utterly impossible for life of any sort to have existed on the 

 earth (while it was, as the Sacred Scripture says, ' without 

 form and void.') 



" You have mentioned some eminent names who have pro- 

 nounced against his doctrine, and you might have added to them 

 Dr. Carruthers as a botanist, and Mr. Davidson as a geologist. 

 Davidson says ' Year after year has passed away without my 

 being able to trace the descent with modifications among the 

 Brachiopoda which the Darwinian doctrine requires;' and Dr. 

 Carruthers, that * no single case of Evolution of one species from 

 another has come within the observation of man.' 



"Dr. Allen Thomson states in his address that it requires a 

 practised eye to distinguish between the embryos of animals, 

 birds, and reptiles, in the earliest stages of their existence, 

 What is this but to admit that in those earlier stages of their 

 existence there is a ' distinction and a difference ' between them, 

 and that it is distinguishable ? 



" But even if it were not so, what then ? The mere state- 

 ment of a fact proves nothing unless you draw, or can draw, 

 some valid conclusion from it. By itself it is vox et prceterea 

 nihil. Science has to do with facts, not with fancies. 



" Further, he states that the original, apparent, or, even if we 

 were to grant, real, similarity, gradually changes into diversity. 



