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signification. Every one knows that there is a religious view of all the sub- 
jects which engage us here ; and we must not he debarred from using common 
phrases in discussion. It leads people from the truth, and gives an appearance 
of pettiness to our discussions, to have issues raised in debate which are not 
worthy of debate. Now with respect to the Darwinian theory, I think it was 
incumbent upon Dr. Gladstone to define what he meant when he made a dis- 
tinction between Mr. Darwin and the Darwinian theory. The force of his argu- 
ment was that a man might be a good Darwinian and be at the same time a 
sound Mosaical theologian ; but at the present moment I am in doubt as to what 
he meant when he said that the Darwinian theory might be held by those who 
considered the Bible substantially true throughout. Of course I could put a 
meaning upon it, because in the Christian Church there has been a theory 
(though it has not been ordinarily discussed amongst us) which very closely 
approximates to that which I suppose to be the Darwinian theory, and it 
has been held by great men without the least rebuke. I remember, some time 
ago, reading a sermon by Father Yentura, preached in Rome and Paris, which 
received the direct approbation of the Pope, and it begins with a statement 
which I recently had occasion to quote. It occurs in a sermon on the certainty 
of the instruction of the Catholic Church ; and in it the preacher states : 
“ There is no father of the Church, there is no doctor of Catholic antiquity, 
who does not acknowledge that everything in the system of grace is cor- 
respondent with something which had previously existed in the realm of 
nature.” He attempts to show from that the truth, that there is nothing 
whatever in the new creation which had not its dim parallel shadowed before- 
hand in the previous operations of what we call nature. That I suppose may 
harmonize to a great extent with Darwinism. I remember distinctly, when I 
quoted this in a sermon, that several good old Churchmen were shocked at 
it, and said it was Darwinism. I suppose I must not mind being called hard 
names, but I think a Christian clergyman standing up in this metropolis of 
Christianity, in this city which we might regard as the centre of intellectual 
Christendom, ought not to be called names for maintaining a truth which, ac- 
cording to Le Pere Yentura, and according to his present Holiness the Pope, 
has been laid down by all the doctors and fathers of the Church unanimously. 
But all this only shows that we might eliminate that whole discussion from 
our present debate ; and I think we might spare altogether that part of Mr. 
W arington’s observations. I do not think it was ad rem to-night. He came at 
at last to the point. He came to consider whether there was anything like a 
tradition in the world, of a savage people having civilized themselves. Now, 
1 think our essayist threw down the challenge boldly. And, indeed, this is 
not a matter in respect to which there need be any doubt. As to the obscure 
and more than obscure tradition existing in some races, that their ancestors 
had originally derived fire from the discovery of their fellow-men, I would 
put it to the conscience of Mr. Warington, whether that tradition is not 
more like poetry than history ? It is a sort of imagination. Being accustomed 
to the comforts and blessings of fire, it was not unnatural, in the savage state 
to which they had sunk, that they should have some vague tradition of this 
