45 
ORDINARY MEETING, February 15, 1869. 
The Rey. Walter Mitchell, M.A., Vice-President, in the 
Chair. 
The Minutes of the last Meeting were read and confirmed, and the follow- 
ing elections were announced : — 
Members : — H. T. Yanner, Esq., 27, Darnley Crescent, Hackney ; John S. 
Barker, Esq., Bramwell Grange, near Stockport. 
Associates, 1st Class : — John Henderson, Esq., Merchant, Glasgow ; 
Samuel Finley, Esq., Montreal, Canada. 
In the absence of the Author, the Honorary Secretary read the follow- 
ing Paper : — 
ON THE DOCTRINE OF CREATION ACCORDING TO 
DARWIN , AGASSIZ, AND MOSES. By the Rev . 
John Kirk, Professor of Practical Theology in the Evan- 
gelical Union Academy , Glasgow ; Author of “ The Age of 
Man Geologically considered in its hearing on the Truths 
of the Bible ” 8fc. } fyc . ; Mem. Viet. Inst . 
I T is not wonderful that men should search after the origin 
of earthly things, though it does seem wonderful that any 
should fancy that they find that origin in a nebula. We are 
accustomed to say of certain matters that they “ end in 
smoke ” ; and perhaps that which has such an ending may 
have had an equally intangible beginning; but that a self- 
condensing gas should prove to have been the prime source of 
all which goes to make up this wondrous world, draws, we 
confess, too heavily on our believing powers. Such, however, 
is the logical terminus of all the evolutionary schemes of 
creation. We are led by them, if we are disposed to go “all 
the way,” to imagine that all things and all beings, in the 
terrestrial universe at least, are but the results of self-moving 
“ gemmules ” from a luminous mist, rather than the works of 
an Almighty Maker. 
