IX 



EECENT ADVANCES IN NATURAL SCIENCE IN 

 RELATION TO THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 1 



I HAVE been requested by the Subjects Committee of the 

 Congress to place before you a brief statement of some of the 

 advances which have recently been made in natural science, 

 with a view to open a discussion upon their relations, real or 

 supposed, to religious belief. The particular advances which, 

 as I am given to understand, were especially in the minds of the 

 Committee in proposing this question, are those which have 

 resulted in the more or less general adoption by scientific men 

 of the view of the sequence of events which have taken place 

 and are still taking place in the universe, to which the term 

 " evolution " is now commonly applied. 



All that is embraced by this term, the various realms of 

 nature in which its manifestations are traced, the various 

 shades of meaning attached to it by different persons, would 

 constitute far too large and complex a subject to be treated of 

 in the time to which addresses to this meeting are wisely 

 restricted. I will therefore select for special consideration the 

 only point in the application of the theory upon which I can 

 speak with any practical knowledge one which is, however, 

 in the eyes of many of very vital interest. It is the one, 

 at all events, which at the present moment attracts most 

 attention ; the new ideas upon it being received with en- 

 thusiasm by some, and with distrust, if not with abhorrence, 

 by others. 



The doctrine of continuity, or of direct relation of event 

 to some preceding event according to a natural and orderly 



1 Paper read at the Church Congress (Reading Meeting), 2nd October 1883. 



