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DH. ALFRED T. SCHOFIELD OX 



a reason why so many animals were furnished with the means of 

 causing pain to others ; a thing which appeared at first sight in- 

 compatible with a beneficent Creator. He thought the explanation 

 with regard to the present Creation might lie in the fact that the 

 fall of man, who was really God to the lower animals, had affected 

 them, as indeed appeared from the Scripture. " The whole Creation 

 groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now,'' Romans 8, 22. 



But this would not explain the evidences in fossil remains that 

 animals before the advent of man were furnished with weapons 

 with which they could torture one another. It might possibly be 

 that at that time this world was inhabited by some superior 

 creatures who had passed away and whose passions affected animals. 



However, there did not appear to be any clear and full explana- 

 tion, which should make us humble and remember the limitations 

 of our knowledge, and that in many things we had to walk by faith 

 and not by sight. 



The Rev. J. E. H. Tho:5j:son, M.A., D.D., writes: — I appreciate 

 very highly Dr. Schofield's paper, and should have been delighted 

 had circumstances permitted me to be present on the 6th of this 

 month. While agreeing with the author in the ambiguity of the 

 term, I yet think that " Evolution may have a thoroughly theistic 

 meaning. If it is regarded as indicating the method the Creator 

 followed; that Creation was not the result of the "Fiat'' of a 

 moment, but a process by which step by step the more complex was 

 evolved from the more simple according to a purpose. This may 

 quite well be true. 



There may even be an excuse for saying " Nature '' when we mean 

 " God" : it may result from a reverence analogous to that which 

 leads the Jews to avoid the sacred name when reading the Law. 

 This does not affect the difficulties pointed out by Dr. Schofield. 

 which really apply to the purposeless evolution of modern science. 

 Personally, I have been impressed with the millions of "missing 

 links " needed to render complete the process of a fortuitous 

 "Evolution." 



The purpose in evolution cannot have been merely the emergence 

 of " Man." There are numerous highly specialised forms of life 

 which appear to be terminals, e.g-, the ostrich, the elephant, and 

 in geologic time, the Pterodactyl. These cannot be steps to further 

 evolution. There is an interesting region for enquiry : the instincts 

 which in so many animals lend themselves to domestication and 

 modification by man. This leads to the question whether it may 

 not be that, parallel with evolution of man, there was the evolution 

 of animals to fit them to be subjects of man's rule. If it be objected 

 that this applies to few genera, the mysterious fact of the Fall may 

 explain this. The suppression of reproduction by gemmation, by 

 bi-sexual reproduction and the care of the young, seems to find its 

 reason in the evolution of altruism. 



