1 882.] Recent Literature. 497 



being atheistic it is the very reverse, and is no more opposed to 

 the Biblical account of the creation than those geological doc- 

 trines regarding the structure and formation of the earth's crust, 

 which were once regarded as heretical and dangerous, but are now 

 to be found in every class book, and are taught in every school." 



The three first chapters are excellent examples of a common- 

 sense interpretation of some of the events recorded in Genesis and 

 Exodus in the hyperbolical and oriental language of a childish 

 age of mankind, and they are written in a most interesting, 

 graphic style. 



In lecture xvi on the Mosaic Record and Evolution, Dr. Brun- 

 ton thus carries his readers in the following manner across the — 

 to paraphrase a Latin expression— pons simiarum : 



" But by far the most serious objection to the hypothesis is its 

 necessary extension to man. If we accept it, we must give up 

 the bel.ef which we all learned in our childhood, that a single 

 man was created out of lifeless mud, became a living soul, and 

 was the progenitor of the whole human race. We must believe, 

 instead, that men are descended, not from any of the species or 

 genera of monkeys now living, but from creatures which were the 

 common ancestors of man and monkeys, and much lower in the 

 scale of existence than either. If such progenitors existed, they 

 were probably somewhat like the lemurs of the present day, 

 though still lower in the scale of existence than they. From 

 these hypothetical common ancestors of man and monkeys, two 

 different races started. Man developed onwards towards greater 

 and greater intellectual powers; he learned to light fires, and 

 gained all the power which this could give him ; learned to com- 

 municate with his fellows, not merely by verbal signs, but by visi- 

 ble ones, either in the way of drawing or writing, and thus was 

 enabled to pass on the accumulated knowledge of one generation 

 to another. The monkeys on the other hand, developed rather 

 Ptysi tH) than intellectually, they became admirably adapted for 

 an arboreal life, but the satisfaction of their hunger, or the gratifica- 

 tion of their other appetites, were the utmost ends to which their 

 mental development enabled them to attain. Believers in evolu- 

 ion do not, however, fancy that a monkey can now become a 

 "an, or that monkeys of the present day can ever develop into 

 "?en ; for between men and monkeys there is a great gulf fixed. 

 n u* y have sta rted from a common point long ago, but the 

 aces have now diverged so far that it is perfectly hopeless for the 



e ever to pass into the other. 

 A he doctrine of a common descent of man and monkey from 

 W uT anim al, seems at first sight to cut at'the root of all re- 

 J'gious beliefs. But again we musfask the question, does it do 



• Many people seem to believe that, according to the theory 



