46 



" All that the modern theologian has to do, therefore, is to confess that 

 his interpretation of the first chapter of Genesis was inadequate, and requires 

 correction ; and that he has to thank science for having pointed out his 

 mistake." 



Now, nothing there is said about evolution, but it is clearly implied that 

 we are all mistaken in supposing that we had gained a right idea from the 

 words, " God created man." When last here, I said that I, for one, was 

 quite prepared to give up the old doctrine that God created man, and to 

 accept the new one that the monads had developed him, upon good reason 

 being shown ; but the reason has not been shown, and until it is, I must 

 hold that " no man having drunk old wine straightway desireth new ; for he 

 saith, the old is better." Mr. Henslow, in page 18, says it is nothing to him 

 whether he is the descendant of an ape or not : — 



" It neither prevents nor helps me to do this, to hear either that I was or 

 was not descended from an ape, an ascidian, or an amoeba ! If the probability 

 be proved to outweigh the improbability, I am ready to accept it ; and I care 

 not so long as truth prevail." 



Now, I do not believe that such is my descent ; and I say, further, that if I 

 were to hold this theory, the moral efiect on me would be unspeakable when 

 contrasted Avith the actual knowledge that my first father was made in the 

 image of the Creator. I cannot take it as nothing that my first father was 

 made in God's image, and that has a very difterent moral eff'ect upon me 

 from what is told here. Where is the evidence to support the evolutionists' 

 view ? They talk of the eye ; but Darwin himself confesses the immense 

 difficulty in accounting for the origin of the eye, even in its most rudi- 

 ' mentary forms. Eemember, we are dealing with what Professor Whewell 

 calls " dead matter," and with the theory that life itself was produced from 

 dead matter. The highest authorities maintain that there must have been 

 a period of 30,000 years for the coral reefs of Florida to have been raised ; 

 but what is Dr. Carpenter's testimony as to the foraminifera there ? He 

 tells us that there is no evidence of an advance in type, and that what we 

 do see is that variations concur to attest this fact, that the foraminifera, 

 however much they vary, never turn into anything else, but must always 

 remain what they were. But I do not dwell upon such facts as that the 

 Silurian fuci and algpe, and the plants in the coal-measures would disprove 

 the progressive developments, nor upon the fact that the development for 

 which Darwin contends is not continuous ; and yet if not continuous it is 

 discontinuous, for it is not development unless you can bring all the links 

 together. But I come to such a fact as this, that Darwin himself admits : 

 I cannot account for the rudiment of an eye." I do not wonder at it, 

 because you have to get it out of something as unlikely to form an eye as 

 this pencil — you have to get it out of the inorganic. No doubt Mr. HensloAV 

 says, " I contend for a vitalized organism," but I am speaking of the theory 

 as it is propounded by others who will not accept it with his limitations. 

 The author of the Vestiges of Creation says that the first step in the 



