255 



10. Mr. Darwin and his disciples have taught that mind or 

 intellect and the reason of man have been ''^ evolved in like 

 manner from the lowest known psychical attributes of animals 

 far down in the scale of existence, passing through the same 

 formulae of 'Wariation/^ "struggle/^ survival/^ and what they 

 term natural selection/^ — which preserves those who live 

 through the struggle, and which is one day the most powerful 

 factor and backbone of the system, and the next is broken 

 down and acknowledged by Mr. Darwin himself to be imper- 

 fect and to have been too much relied upon in the exposition 

 of his theory. 



11. I have thus broadly laid down the two definitions which 

 were necessary to make this paper intelligible ; and I have been 

 more explicit in this because in the present day a common mode 

 of criticising the statements of an opponent is to accuse him of 

 ignorance.* 



12. I undertake to prove that a belief in Darwinism and 

 revelation is incompatible and irreconcilable, and in the 

 argument I will first take the most favourable view of evolution 

 as a means of creation by law ; and as Mr. Darwin in his recent 

 work, the Descent of Man, has fully adopted the doctrine of 

 evolution, it will only be necessary to treat of the whole as one 

 hypothesis under the title of Darwinism. 



13. A belief in Darwinism then implies that in the beginning 

 a living thing came into being. It did so, according to Darwin, 

 by the power of the Creator breathing into one form or more 

 the breath of life. According to Mr. Spencer, it might have 

 been evolved : to use his own words, thus '^construed in terms 

 of evolution, every kind of being is conceived as a product 

 of modifications wrought by insensible gradations on a pre- 

 existing kind of being; and this holds as fully of the supposed 

 ^commencement of organic life ^ as of all subsequent develop- 

 ments of organic life. It is no more needful to suppose an 

 ^ absolute commencement of organic life,' or a ^ first organism,' 

 than it is needful to suppose an absolute commencement 

 of social life and a first social organism. '^t 



^ Agassiz, the great naturalist of the NeAv World, in a recent address at 

 San Francisco, on the result of his exploring expedition in the Hasslcr, 

 describes evolution, as taught in this couutry, the Avork of blind forces, 

 of forces without intelligence, Avithout discriniinatiug power, and without 

 forethought/' and that the object of the study of nature as so taught is "to 

 determine whether we ourselves are descended from monkeys, or whether 

 we are the work of a beneficent Father." A writer in Nature, October 24, 

 1872, in commenting upon these remarks, calls them " singular misrepre- 

 sentations" ! 



^t_This passage is quoted by Dr. Bastian, without reference, in hli 

 Beginnings of Life. As there are no indices to Mr. Spencer's works in my 

 library, I cannot give a special indication vrhere the passage occurs, 



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