36 THE LIGHT OF DAY 



is no escape. If one man fails to become a 

 Christian, the law is broken as truly as if a bird's 

 egg were to hatch out a mouse, or an acorn to pro- 

 duce a cabbage. But in the scientific Calvinism of 

 Professor Drummond, every bird is not a bird ; only 

 one here and there has the bird-form thrust upon it. 

 The number of Christians is of necessity very 

 limited. Salvation, and hence immortality, are for 

 the few, not for the many. Our Christian philoso- 

 pher is actually driven by the necessities of his 

 argument into maintaining the truth of a special and 

 limited immortality. Immortality is not for the 

 whole human race, any more than the principle of 

 life is for the whole inorganic kingdom. 



" Some mineral, but not all, become vegetable ; 

 some vegetable, but not all, become animal ; some 

 animal, but not all, become human ; some human, 

 but not all, become divine." But the principle is 

 the same, as if all mineral did become vegetable, etc. 

 It may become vegetable, probably in its turn will 

 become vegetable ; there is no partiality or prefer- 

 ence on the part of ITature. The same in the 

 higher spheres. All men are approximately divine, 

 such men as Plato and Paul vastly more so, of 

 course, than the great mass of men ; but the differ- 

 ence is one of degree, not of kind, like the difference 

 between the half fliers and the perfect fliers among 

 the birds. Yet Professor Drummond dare affirm 

 that certain members of a species are endowed with 

 a kind of life which is denied to certain other mem- 

 bers of the same species, and he makes this declara- 



