388 REV. H. J. CLARKE 
energy which we call Life unrelated to one another, save as 
having their issue from the same unoriginated source ? or are 
they developed forms, which, through the operation of dis- 
similar external conditions, have all alike insensibly acquired 
their several characteristics in the course of a continuous 
evolution of immense duration from some initial rudimentary 
type? ‘Two opposite views in respect to the mode of the 
original genesis of organisms are respectively indicated in the 
alternative hypotheses just stated, and it is between them that 
we have to choose. 
17. Whether or not the question at issue admits of an answer 
which may be accepted as conclusive, it behoves us to 
observe that, as regards certain points of paramount import- 
ance, these two hypotheses I now submit to you have equal 
claims ; indeed, it does not matter in the least to which of 
them the preference be given. They both agree in represent- 
ing different types to be distinct creations, and also in 
accounting for their existence teleologically ; whereas, how- 
ever, in the former the notion of origination is compara- 
tively simple, leaving out of view all else but cause and plan 
and purpose, the latter resolves the process, separating the 
commencement from the state at present reached by an 
immense interval of gradual development, and thereby modi- 
fying and enlarging the first-formed conception of inter-rela- 
tions. What, then, we desire to be assured of is, whether 
the phenomena which have suggested the development 
hypothesis find in it their true interpretation. For my own 
part, assuming, as I do, that a primitive conception of origi- 
nation, although inbreathed from above, would in the nature 
of things obtain for its medium of imaginative thought the 
simplest notions through which it could be symbolically 
grasped, retained, and rendered fruitful, and that its 
literary expression would, as a matter of course, receive 
from these a characteristic shape and colour, I am not aware 
of any argument in favour of the earlier hypothesis grounded 
on rightly-venerated authority, nor can I see any reason for 
hesitating to regard it as a mere alternative to which science 
must necessarily revert in the event of its failing to establish 
the doctrine of a gradual development of organic types. 
1s. The arguments, however, which have been submitted to 
thoughtful readers in support of this doctrine I pass by; 
they are to be found fully and elaborately set forth in works 
of distinguished ability, and no summary could I hope to 
produce that would give an adequate impression of their 
amplitude and weight. But as even its strenuous advocates, 
if serious and candid, will assuredly confess, the objections 
