1890.] The Teeth as Evidence of Evolution. 225 
At the same time the law of gravity, if a true one, ought to 
explain the phenomena of shooting stars, although it might fail 
to convey a proper conception of its grandeur and universality ; 
so should evolution afford a full explanation of the complexity 
and adaptability of the teeth and jaw, and this I firmly believe 
can be readily done. 
Before we proceed with a presentation of the other side of the 
question, it might be well to offer a few good-natured criticisms 
of Dr. Bonwill’s definitions and claims. 
I take issue with his very first sentence, “ It must be creation 
or evolution—creation by some personality placing a perfect 
organic being at one master-stroke into life and action; or by 
some impersonality, from the lowest point of life, by slow devel- 
opment reaching higher and higher in the scale of being until 
man has been reached.” 
I deny that such a view of evolution is the only one which can 
be entertained. That the evolution of life upon this planet was 
the outcome of an impersonal nature, acting by forces strictly 
physical and without a directing mind, is the belief held by the 
materialistic school exclusively. To classify all evolutionists as 
materialists would do the greatest injustice to many of the most 
eminent scientists in this country and Europe. These men see 
nothing inconsistent in the belief in evolution as a method by 
which a personal Creator accomplished his ends, and the account 
of Moses. 
The late Dr. Asa Gray, of Cambridge, accepted as authority 
throughout the whole scientific world to a degree perhaps never 
attained by any other American, voices this school when he says: 
“I am scientifically—and in my own fashion—a Darwinian ; 
philosophically, a convinced theist ; and religiously, an acceptor 
of the creed ‘commonly called the Nicene, as the exponent of 
the Christian faith.” 
So when Dr. Bonwill declares : “ It must be creation or evolu- 
tion,” he could more correctly have written: “ It must be creation 
éy evolution.” This is theistic evolution. 
I also take exception to the loose and unscientific manner with 
which Dr. Bonwill uses “organs” and “ organisms ” as words of 
