kingdoms into a universal brotherhood. It will be holy, not because of sacrosanct orders, nor sacramental ordinances, nor covenanted mercies, nor apostolic succession, but because it will write upon life as an interpretation, and as an ideal: "Holiness unto God." It will be measured not by the institutions which it sustains, but by the inspiration which it imparts. It will stand upon the massive foundation laid by Jesus Christ and interpret to men His faith, His God, and His principles. The Christian church will yet come up to these mountain-tops, these peaks of glory. It will take these things of faith, faith in God, faith in souls, faith in the interminable future, it will take these splendid things of faith and go out and interpret them to human souls.

The

This, it seems to me, will be the church of the future. way has been, and still is, thorny and stony, but when at last the Christian Church does range up to the level of its Master, then all the glory and all the shame of the past shall be forgotten. It shall render unto God an acceptable sacrifice, and unto men an inspiring service.

ALLENTOWN, PA.

II.

EVOLUTION AND CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE.

BY THE REV. JOHN B. RUST, PH.D.

It seems to be taken for granted by nearly everyone that the theory of evolution has become the generally accepted theory of the universe, not only among men of science, but also among the leading minds of the Church. The conclusion, however, betrays a want of circumspection and differentiation on the part of those who have adopted it.*

*"No theory of evolution clashes with the fundamental ideas of the Bible as long as it is not denied that there is a human species, and that man is distinguished from the lower animals by attributes which we know that he possesses." (Fisher, "Grounds of Theistic and Christian Belief," p. 478.)

"The theories of Darwin and Spencer are doubtless not demonstrated; they are to some extent hypothetical, just as all the theories of physical science are to some extent hypothetical, and open to doubt. Judging from the immense number of diverse facts which they harmonize and explain, I venture to look upon the theories of evolution and natural selection in their main features as two of the most probable hypotheses ever proposed. I question whether any scientific works which have appeared since the Principia of Newton are comparable in importance with those of Darwin and Spencer, revolutionizing as they do, all of our views of the origin of bodily, mental, moral, and social phenomena. Granting all this, I cannot for a moment admit that the theory of evolution will destroy theology." (Jevon, "Principles of Science," p. 762.)

"It is the glory of our finite reasons to be able to discern in some measure the course and direction in which the Infinite Reason has been working through millions of ages. We not only believe but certainly know that there were millions of ages during which through stage after stage of merely physical development, preparation was made for organic and animal life, and also that when the preparation was complete the life appeared, and through stage after stage far more wonderful and in forms innumerable, was developed, but ever in the main onward and upwards. We, further, not only believe but know that those stages of the evolution of the earth issued in the appearance of man, a being distinct from all other beings of the earth, in that he feels himself akin in

In like manner when one describes the process of evolution as being simply God's method of creation, and places Spencer and Haeckel, Buechner and Feuerbach in the same category with the theistic evolutionists as exceptional benefactors of mankind, an arbitrary and incorrect generalization is made, and there is manifested a lack of proper understanding of the scope and purpose of the theory of evolution, as conceived and wrought out by the most famous of its modern exponents, Darwin and Spencer, Tyndall and Huxley. If the burden of evidence seems to be so strongly in favor of the theory of evolution as almost to compel its acceptance, the facts will need to be interpreted, as far as possible, in such a manner as to bring their meaning, where any can be found, into harmony with the teachings of Revelation. Otherwise those teachings will have to be modified beyond recognition, or abandoned altogether. The invention of new definitions of the term, supposed to be more in consonance with theism, cannot his personality and in his spiritual affinities and aspirations to the Divine. The formation of man is, according to the development theory itself, the goal towards which the physical world has tended from the beginning." (Flint, Agnosticism," pp. 508, 509.)

66

"In the light of ancient history and the result of recent excavations, it is possible, now as never before, to study the varied influences and forces employed by God in the past to open the spiritual eyes of mankind, to see Him and His truth. The geological evidence suggests that man, as man, has lived on this earth fifty, perhaps one hundred thousand years." (Kent, "Origin and Value of the Old Testament," p. 41.)

"But at any rate the analogies of nature are now all in favor of creation by evolution. And it is now believed that this theory is not only not inconsistent with the Christian idea of God and the universe, but that it is far worthier of God and far more in harmony with what we know of the organic universe, than is the old carpenter theory." (Dr. William Rupp, THE REFORMED CHURCH REVIEW, July, 1902, p. 391.) "Theologians who once scouted the development theories of Neander and Schaff, are now no longer afraid of the evolution theory of Darwin and Spencer. They have come to know these theories better than they once knew them, and they have come to understand that they are not at all hostile to religion. In fact they have come to perceive, with Huxley, that "evolution has no more to do with Theism than the first book of Euclid has." (Dr. William Rupp, "The Evolution Theory in Theology," THE REFORMED CHURCH REVIEW, July, 1902.)

possibly effect a compromise with the reasoning and conclusions of Darwin and Spencer. On the other hand, the mere appeal to the seeming confusion and to the many definitions common among various friends of the theory of evolution, will not, as a counter argument, serve as an adequate refutation of the theory. Darwin and Spencer certainly knew what they meant by the term they used. All the works written from their standpoint, plainly show that their disciples, despite minor differences, are fully aware of the trend of the theory in relation to Christianity.

I. DEFINITION OF THE TERM, AND THE DENIAL OF THE ARGUMENT FROM DESIGN.

The interpretation which Darwin places upon the facts of biology, and Spencer upon all the phenomena of life, mind and history, involves the denial of the argument from design. Professor John Fiske, as his writings on the subject show, constantly apologized for and combatted the monistic and materialistic implications of the theory of evolution. He idealized the theory and saved it from utter condemnation as a working hypothesis of science, which could at all in any degree be brought into adjustment even with a Unitarian view of Christianity. Though a close personal friend of Mr. Huxley, he frankly confessed to the latter that he was not in sympathy with his (Huxley's) serious doubt concerning the immortality of the human soul.+ At the same time Fisk declares that Huxley was not a materialist. "Nobody saw more clearly than he the philosophic flimsiness of materialism, and he looked with strong disapproval upon the self-complacent negations of Ludwig Buechner. Nevertheless, with regard to the belief in an immortal soul his position was avowedly agnostic, with perhaps just the slightest possible tacit though reluctant leaning toward the negative." The question whether new forms arose by direct divine interposition and creative fiat, John Fiske, "Reminiscences of Huxley," Smithsonian Report for p. 720.

1900,

Darwin answers in the negative. By processes entirely natural, determined by changes in environment and necessary readaptation, by inbreeding and natural selection, and by gradual emergence from preceding forms, the progressions in different directions being governed and modified by varying circumstances, conditions and locations, there finally resulted the vast multiplicity of living types and forms visible and present everywhere on land and in the sea.

Darwin, it is true, acknowledges the difficulty of surrendering the idea of design,* and sees, or seems to see purpose in certain peculiar characteristics of the sexual instinct. While he denies that the belief in God is innate or instinctive, a position he must take to maintain the logic of his theory, and parries the charge of irreligion which he felt conscious would be brought against him because of his doctrine of descent,‡ he confesses that to his mind it accords better with what we know of the laws impressed upon matter by the Creator, to ascribe the production and extinction of the past and present inhabitants of the globe to secondary causes, like the birth and death of the individual.§ The view here expressed may be classified as Deistical in character. But Professor Schmidt criticises even this meager concession to those who believe in creation by a personal God, declaring that it is incompatible with the doctrine of descent, and that by making it, Darwin is untrue to himself. He quotes Zoellner, who says: "The hypothesis of an act of creation for the beginning of life, would not be a logical but a merely arbitrary limitation of the causal series against which our intellect rebels, by reason of its inherent craving for causality. Whoever does not share this craving is beyond help, and he cannot be convinced. To hold the beginning of life as an arbitrary act of creation is to break with the whole theory of cognition."|| In opposition to both "Descent of Man," p. 607.

|| Oscar Schmidt, "Descent and Darwinism," pp. 161, 162.