Professor Alfred Russell Wallace, when referring to the question as to how life originated in this planet, affirmed that power was exercised from without. In a word, life was given to the earth.

Mr. W. HOSTE said: I hardly think Dr. Schofield need have been so apologetic at the beginning of his admirable paper. If he is an outsider, there are no "insiders." Even a Max-Müller could not pose as an expert on the language of primitive man; the best of cartographers could not produce a reliable map of the other side of the moon. It is difficult to see how a man can be an " esoteric Evolutionist. No one has ever seen evolution in process, nor is there one direct proof that any of the four foundations of Darwinism, unlimited variability, unlimited time for variation, transmission of acquired characteristics or natural selection, repose on anything more solid than assumption. We can all read books. The man who reads the most on this subject, unless he has something better than man's word to go by, should be the most muddled, for the voices are very conflicting. I think Dr. Schofield might have added, to his modern gods and goddesses-"Science," a swollen puffed-out word, glibly used by the scientists of the penny Press; but the best scientists allow there is much more outside than inside it. Dubois-Raymond says of natural selection : 'We seem to have the sensation in holding to this doctrine of a man hopelessly sinking, who is grasping a single plank that keeps him above water." Then why hold to it? Weissman long ago assured the scientific world that if they gave up Evolution," and especially Darwinism," nothing remained but Creation, of course, a reductio ad absurdum; but Wilser writes: "He is no scientist who has not settled accounts with Darwinism.' Hæckel was so anxious to prove

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Evolution" that he used to do a little forging on his own account in his embryological diagrams. When forced to confess this, as he did in the “Münchener Allegemeiner Zeitung," of January 9, 1909, he covered his retreat by asserting: "The great majority of all morphological, anatomical, histological and embryological diagrams

are not true to Nature, but are more or less doctored, schematized, and reconstructed." It is the little boy's excuse for robbing the orchard. It might not be without use to remember this when visiting the South Kensington Museum. Hæckel became very unpopular with his fellow scientists. Some scientists have been known to develope cannibalistic tendencies. The odium scientificum is as real as the "odium theologicum."

As for the process of Evolution itself, should we not have expected in the earliest strata containing organic fossils, that these would have been at first all of one sort, gradually merging by a series of infinitely small variations into new types? In reality it is disconcerting to find on the contrary at the very start a large variety of animal remains, some of which disappear altogether, while others persist for ages, unchanged, like the ammonites; while new forms

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are constantly and suddenly appearing. As the eighth Duke of Argyle wrote: "The new forms always appear suddenly from no known source, and generally, if of a new type, exhibit that type in great strength as to numbers." How exactly this fits in with that progression," which, as Dr. Schofield remarks, is so characteristic of Gen. i.! To meet above difficulty the possible "Imperfection of the Record is suggested. But Science knows no resting place on "may be" and "perhaps." and "perhaps." As a fact we have, as Urquhart shows in his "Bible and how to read it," rocks, such as the Jurassic, in which occur continuous and undisturbed series of long and tranquil deposits, 1,300 ft. in thickness, in which as many as 1,850 new species have been counted, all of them suddenly born, invariable as far as they go, and superseded by still newer forms. Hæckel hailed Darwin as a great deliverer from the tyranny of the Scriptural Record, which he considered, no doubt rightly, to be the greatest obstacle to the acceptance of Evolution. Darwin provided what Hæckel called an anti-Genesis." Certainly Gen. i. in scientific language would be an amusingly pedantic document, and as Dr. Schofield asks pertinently what scientific "language would be the up-to-date one?" The language of Gen. i. is not in advance of the science of any time, it is not behind the science of any time. Professor G. Dana, the well-known geologist, in his " Geology," pp. 760, 770, writes: "This document (i.e., the first chapter of Genesis), if true, is of divine origin. It is profoundly philosophical in the scheme of creation it presents. It is both true and divine. It is a declaration of authorship both of creation and the Bible." When W. E. Gladstone proposed Dana as arbitrator between himself and Huxley in their great controversy as to the scientific accuracy of Genesis i., Huxley replied: "There is no man to whose judgment I would more readily bow than Professor Dana." I cannot help strongly deprecating the placing of Christ (see p. 91) as a sort of superman-the last development, by whatever process you please, in a progressive series, beginning with the protozoa and mounting up through the invertebrates to "the natural man." I think this gives the case away, degrades Christ, and contradicts the facts of our Lord's origin, as presented to us in the Scriptures, three things the lecturer would never do wittingly.

Mr. THEODORE ROBERTS desired to add another difficulty in the way of the evolution theory, which he remembered the late Lord Salisbury mentioned when delivering his address as President of the British Association nearly 30 years ago.

It was that the biologists declared that they required at least 50 million years for the development of the first protoplasm into a man, whereas the geologists affirmed that some two million years ago the surface of this earth must have been so hot as to make life impossible.

He thought that many had been attracted to evolution as finding

a reason why so many animals were furnished with the means of causing pain to others; a thing which appeared at first sight incompatible with a beneficent Creator. He thought the explanation with regard to the present Creation might lie in the fact that the fall of man, who was really God to the lower animals, had affected them, as indeed appeared from the Scripture. "The whole Creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now," Romans 8, 22. But this would not explain the evidences in fossil remains that animals before the advent of man were furnished with weapons with which they could torture one another. It might possibly be that at that time this world was inhabited by some superior creatures who had passed away and whose passions affected animals. However, there did not appear to be any clear and full explanation, which should make us humble and remember the limitations of our knowledge, and that in many things we had to walk by faith and not by sight.

The Rev. J. E. H. THOMSON, M.A., D.D., writes:-I appreciate very highly Dr. Schofield's paper, and should have been delighted had circumstances permitted me to be present on the 6th of this month. While agreeing with the author in the ambiguity of the term, I yet think that "Evolution 27 may have a thoroughly theistic meaning. If it is regarded as indicating the method the Creator followed; that Creation was not the result of the “ Fiat" of a moment, but a process by which step by step the more complex was evolved from the more simple according to a purpose. This may quite well be true.

There may even be an excuse for saying "Nature "" when we mean "God" it may result from a reverence analogous to that which leads the Jews to avoid the sacred name when reading the Law. This does not affect the difficulties pointed out by Dr. Schofield, which really apply to the purposeless evolution of modern science. Personally, I have been impressed with the millions of "missing links" needed to render complete the process of a fortuitous

"Evolution."

The purpose in evolution cannot have been merely the emergence of "Man." There are numerous highly specialised forms of life which appear to be terminals, e.g., the ostrich, the elephant, and in geologic time, the Pterodactyl. These cannot be steps to further evolution. There is an interesting region for enquiry: the instincts which in so many animals lend themselves to domestication and modification by man. This leads to the question whether it may not be that, parallel with evolution of man, there was the evolution of animals to fit them to be subjects of man's rule. If it be objected that this applies to few genera, the mysterious fact of the Fall may explain this. The suppression of reproduction by gemmation, by bi-sexual reproduction and the care of the young, seems to find its reason in the evolution of altruism.

DR. W. WOODS-SMYTH wrote:-I am glad to get a glimpse of Dr. Schofield's paper. I am an evolutionist, because, like Hæckel, I found it in the Bible. The succession of living organisms revealed by geology agrees with the doctrine of evolution, and that succession is absolutely in harmony with Genesis i. as far as the Scripture goes. The Bible alleges the earth to be an efficient cause in the bringing forth of living organisms. In the Hebrew the word is in the causative voice this denotes all that the earth stands for, namely, the life given to it by God, the environment, natural selection, etc. Man by his feeble powers and limited vision, by his use of selection, has produced varieties which, had they been found in Nature, would have been placed not simply in different species, but in different genera. Man, by experiments on a few organisms has produced varieties of organisms which are inherited through generations, and the permanency of the new characters, which are inherited, depends upon the length of time they have been subject to changed conditions. Natural selection works on many millions of organisms, and through long millions of ages-hence its achievements. True natural selection alone cannot produce a species of living organism. No more can its Biblical correlative, election, alone produce a Christian. The elect of Christ and Darwin are ever the Overcomers. The point is by what means do they overcome? Nietzsche, in his narrow soul, thought of might, power, force; this was a mistake. The great saurians excelled in strength the mammals, but the mammals by more brains and alertness of body were the overcomers. earlier gigantic mammals excelled in strength their later congeners, yet the later overcame and displaced them by more efficient adjustments. Man has the dominion over all creatures, but not by might or force; and Christ overcomes by the revelation of the love of God and the majesty of Him who loves.

The

Note by Dr. Schofield on Dr. Woods-Smyth's remarks: If evolution means only succession it is too vague for controversy. Neither water nor earth were efficient causes of animal life, for God had to create and make every living creature. I do not consider natural selection and God's election as correlatives. Might, power, force, is not confined by Nietzsche and others to what is physical.

639th ORDINARY GENERAL MEETING,

HELD IN COMMITTEE ROOM В,

THE CENTRAL HALL, WESTMINSTER, S.W., on Monday, February 20th, 1922, at 4.30 p.m.

LIEUT.-COLONEL G. MACKINLAY IN THE CHAIR.

The Minutes of the previous Meeting were read, confirmed and signed and the HON. SECRETARY announced the following elections :-A. G. Wilkinson, Esq., as a Member, and Captain Ralph Carr-Gregg as an Associate.

The Chairman then introduced Mr. W. Dale, F.G.S., F.S.A., who read his paper on "Christianity in Roman Britain," illustrated by lantern slides of great interest.

CHRISTIANITY

IN ROMAN BRITAIN.

BY WILLIAM DALE, ESQ., F.G.S., F.S.A.

The subject of the introduction of Christianity into our land during its occupation by the Romans is one of the deepest interest. The evidence available is, unfortunately, of the most meagre description, so that there have not been wanting those, including no less an authority than Thomas Wright, who have denied altogether that Christianity was known in Roman Britain, and was not introduced until the coming of Augustine. Our knowledge in this direction has, however, of late years been reinforced, and it is satisfactory to find that one of the greatest and best authorities on early Christian Art, Mr. O. M. Dalton, F.S.A., has, in a recently published guide book of the British Museum, placed the matter beyond controversy.

I purpose to lay before you a few of the actual facts we possess, and to mention some of the traditions and legends which have come down to us, upon which many have built their faith. One might also adduce as an argument the reasonableness of the supposition that with the Roman invasion the Gospel came. The roads which still stretch across our Country, made by the army, were the first thing to occupy the attention of the invaders. By the side of one there was found in the last century in Hampshire an ingot of lead from the mines in the Mendip Hills bearing on it the stamp of the Emperor Nero, with his titles so fully set out that Roman students can date it with certainty at A.D. 60. At that time the great Apostle of the Gentiles was living in the Capital in daily contact with soldiers of the army, and penned the