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greatly indebted for their testimony in reference to geological science. I 
find in the earliest works of Bishop Sumner — his “ Records of Creation ” — 
some admirable remarks which fully bear me out. I turn to Cardinal Wise- 
man’s Lectures on Religion and Science, and I find that he speaks upon the 
intimate connection which exists between geology and revelation. I may 
refer also to Martineau’s lectures, and to the eloquent discourse of Professor 
Sedgwick, “ On the Studies of the University of Cambridge.” I find 
in all these that much is said of the true connection between religion and 
science. When I turn to Dr. Melville, I find that he furnishes a further 
evidence of the respect with which the leading men amongst the clergy have 
regarded the doctrines of science. Let us remember, then, that there are 
clergymen who have given ample testimony to the relations between science 
and theology, and, as has been said, we ought never to shut our eyes to the 
onward progress of science ; for if theology is not able to keep pace with 
philosophy, it will hardly be able to cope with infidelity. 
Rev. Dr. Irons. — I have been somewhat surprised to have heard it 
stated that the clergy shrink from science. I have previously affirmed the 
opposite of that proposition, and I again affirm that the clergy have evinced 
a strong love of science ; and the names just mentioned by Professos Morris 
might have appeared in the address which I delivered at Sion College, and 
which Professor Huxley seemed to think very apropos to the whole question. 
But this question has assumed, though through no fault of ours, somewhat of 
a personal character. There is no doubt that it was brought forward in an 
unfortunate way by Professor Huxley. In the presence of about 200 clergy 
and laity he charged us as a body with being obstructives and opposed to the 
course of science. I think I demonstrated on that occasion that the very 
opposite of that statement was the truth ; but I admitted also, that it was a 
most unfortunate issue — that it was a most unhappy thing for scientific men 
to quarrel with us, and that it was an equally unhappy thing for us to 
quarrel with scientific men. I also wholly demur to what has been stated 
by Dr. Gladstone, who tells us he hears clergymen make statements from the 
pulpit on scientific matters, which could be contradicted by young men, who 
hear them and know them to be utterly opposed to the plainest facts, and to 
truth. I can only say that I am a little older than Dr. Gladstone, and that 
I never heard such a thing in my life. I do not believe that the clergy are 
in the habit of doing so, and I never heard it imputed to them, except by 
scientific men, who, I again say, do not read our side of the question. I never 
knew a scientific man who studied theology. The men whom Professor 
Morris has mentioned were theologians who studied science, but I have 
never known a purely scientific man who had studied theology at all. I 
have m conversation examined not a few of them quite as closely as I should 
wish to be examined by them, and I publicly repeat, knowing that my words 
v ill be taken down, that scientific men who are not theologians by profession 
are not in the habit of reading our side of the question. With respect to the 
question of the antiquity of man and the antiquity of the world, the clergy 
do not flinch from going into that question ; it is the scientific men who 
