Anniversary Address. 435 



in the application of its principles to the human race, for it 

 is as impossible, in the Darwinian scheme, to leave Man 

 entirely out of the question, as it is to debate his physical 

 without reference to his whole nature. 



People everywhere have been asking, " Oh ! but do you 

 think we come from apes ? " and the reports of the alleged 

 discovery of a man somewhere in America with a lusus 

 naturw in the shape of a two-inch tail, and of another with 

 more hair on his body than usual, have been received by 

 many with feverish interest and excitement, as if tremendous 

 truths were at stake, as if we were only waiting for another 

 such " tale " or two to determine whether God created man 

 in his own image, or whether natural selection improved 

 him out of high class apes. 



To deduce that man and apes are closely related, and have 

 a common origin, on certain homologous evidence, is to say 

 the least, surely hasty, especially in view of the total absence 

 of connecting links, a difficulty which in this case applies 

 with special force ; because if man does come from monkey 

 there must be hundreds of transition forms ; for even ultra- 

 evolutionists admit that between the lowest known form of 

 man and the highest of apes, there is a wide gulf. We do 

 not, in this instance at all events, detect those progressive 

 variations on which the doctrine of evolution is expressly 

 founded ; they may exist, but not a true trace of them living 

 or dead has ever been produced. 



Did time allow, it would be interesting, and I think not 

 very difficult to throw some light upon the causes which 

 have facilitated the extraordinary success of the evolution 

 theory, especially among the rising generation of students, 

 to whom, rather than to the older school, Darwin said that 

 he looked for full acceptance of his views. But violent are the 

 fluctuations of the barometer not only in the Meteorological 

 but in other domains besides ; and if we feel unsettled, it will 

 be wise to bide the time when the intensity of the Darwinian 

 Cyclone shall have blown over, and when the atmosphere 

 having fairly recovered its normal condition, people will be 

 ip. a better condition to judge how much there is in it all. 



