Religious Belief . 189 



it is just at these points that new organic groups are 

 introduced without any intermediate forms to link 

 them with the preceding ones. In another series 

 of papers, I shall endeavour to show the futility of 

 the argument so far as it is founded upon the imper- 

 fection of the geological record.'* 



Everywhere in this and other papers we note the 

 reverential feeling of the naturalist. The idea of a 

 creative God, a Maker, a Divine Architect, never 

 left him, and while Darwin was being attacked by 

 the clergy for his belief, Agassiz received the sneers 

 and scoffs of many for what they termed his bigoted 

 views. He simply expounded his belief, never 

 urging its adoption, and how liberal was his teaching, 

 how little tinctured with the spirit of bigotry, is seen 

 in the fact that to-day, with perhaps one exception, 

 all of his pupils are believers in the modern theory 

 of evolution as expounded by Darwin. 



In referring to classification, Agassiz believed it 

 meant simply the creative plan of God as ex- 

 pressed by inorganic forms. Referring to man and 

 his position and spiritual nature, he says : Even 

 in the lowest members of this highest group of the 

 Vertebrates, at the head of which stands man him- 

 self, looking heavenward it is true, but nevertheless 

 rooted deeply in the Animal Kingdom, we have the 

 dawning of those family relations, those intimate 

 ties between parents and children, on which the 

 whole social organisation of the human race is based. 

 Man is the crowning work of God on earth ; but 

 though so nobly endowed, we must not forget that 

 we are the lofty children of a race whose lowest 



