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of Edinburgh, Session 1864 - 65 . 
nothing what those means have been. I agree with Mens. Guizot 
when he says that “ Those only would be serious adversaries of 
the doctrine of Creation who could affirm that the universe — the 
earth and man upon it — have been from all eternity, and in all 
respects just what they are now.”* But this cannot be affirmed 
except in the teeth of facts which Science has clearly ascertained. 
There has been a continual coming-to-be of new forms of life.f 
This is Creation, no matter what have been the laws or forces 
employed by Creative Power. The truth is, that the theory 
which fixes upon inheritance as the cause of organic likeness, 
startles us only when it is applied to forms in which unlikeness is 
more prominent than resemblance. The idea, for example, that 
the different kinds of Pigeon, or of Humming-birds, have all de- 
scended through successive variation from some one ancestral pair, 
whether it be true or not, would not startle any one. Yet, if this 
be true, we must be prepared for the same surmise extending 
farther. The advocates of development urge that time is a power- 
ful factor. They say that if small changes, but constant enough, 
and definite enough to constitute new species, can and do arise out 
of born varieties, it is impossible to fix the limits of divergence 
which may be reached in the course of ages. Yet it surely does not 
follow that there is no such limit because we cannot fix it. It does 
not necessarily follow that because we admit the idea of the Eock- 
dove, and the Turtle-dove, and the Eing-dove being all descended 
from one ancestral Pigeon, we are bound to accept the idea of 
the Whale, and the Antelope, and the Monkey being all descended 
from some one primeval mammal. Mr Darwin says, truly enough, 
that inheritance “ is that cause which alone, as far as we positively 
know, produces organisms quite like, or nearly like, each other.” 
But this is no reason why we should conclude that inheritance is 
the only cause which can produce organisms quite unlike, or only 
very partially like, each other. We are surely not entitled to 
assume that all degrees and kinds of likeness can only arise from 
this single cause. Yet until this extreme proposition be proved. 
Meditations siir I’Essence de la Religion Chretienne, p. 49. 
t “ We discern no evidence of a pause or intermission in the creation or 
coming-to-be of new plants and animals .” — Instances of the Power of God as 
manifested in His Animal Creation, by Professor Owen. 
2 p 
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