birth. The natura naturans, the present equilibrium of the universe, producing the in-coming equilibrium of the universe, or the natura naturata.

Mere science has nothing to do with origins, or causes, or final ends. It is concerned only with phenomena and their fixed relations in time and space. It is obvious that in this definite view of the range of science, the phenomena of the physical world at least do present in their ceaseless successions the appearance which the evolutionist describes. The solar system is passing before our eyes through constant changes. The sun as it grows cooler is becoming more like Jupiter, Jupiter more like the earth, and the earth more like the moon. The earth and its zones are passing without interruption along a line of graduated change to which the fauna and flora of all continents are continually being adjusted. The various species of plants and animals rise from the simplest to the most complex in an ideal order, and new permanent varieties spring up before our eyes out of the unity of ancient species under new physical conditions. The human race itself has been differentiated into innumerable varieties by means of differences of climate, and social conditions and the like, and all these changes are progressing in unbroken continuity through our own age. into the future, just as they have through all past stages of human history.

The scientific doctrine of evolution emphasizes this view of the succession of phenomena, and applies it as a hypothetical law, or working hypothesis, in every depart

ment of scientific investigation; to the inorganic kingdom, as cosmical evolution; to the kingdom of life alike vegetable and animal; to the origination of species as well as that of varieties and of individuals; to the kingdom of mind, to account for the origin of ideas, and laws of thought; and to the kingdom of social and political life as traced in the origin and progress of human societies.

Now when strictly confined to the legitimate limits of pure science, that is, to the scientific account of phenomena and their laws of co-existence and of succession, this doctrine of evolution is not antagonistic to our faith as either theists or christians. It is only when this theory assumes to be a philosophy, or becomes associated with a philosophy supplying the ideas, the causes, and the final ends which give a rational account of the facts collected, that it can challenge our interest as christians, or threaten our faith. Evolution as connected with a materialistic philosophy will, of course, as are all phrases of materialism, be inconsistent with natural theism and revealed religion. The same is equally true if the theory of evolution is worked out on a basis of pantheism. If evolution is itself erected into a complete philosophy, and be put to the magical task of tracing the growth of all things out of nothing, and of a rational and all-comprehensive system of knowledge out of agnostic premises, then of course the result must be equally fatal to human reason and to christian faith. If again, progress along the entire line of biological advance is explained wholly on the hy

pothesis of an all-directioned variation, and the selection of special forms by an accidental environment (the pre cise position of Darwin), then certainly the universe and its order is referred to Chance, teleology is impossible, theism stripped of its most effective evidence, and therefore Dr. Charles Hodge was abundantly justified in indicating this phase of evolution as atheistic. Moreover a theory of evolution which refuses to coalesce for any reason with spiritual views of man and God and their relations, which admits of the possibility of no interruption at any time or for any end; of no influence of any active agents exterior to the limited group of natural agents subject to the test of experiment, and hence of quantitative determination, will of course lead to a denial of the supernatural, and render prayer a delusion and all religion superstitious.

But it is evident that any doctrine of evolution which intelligently recognizes the plain facts of man's spiritual nature, his reason, conscience, and free-will, will equally recognize the same attributes as the property of God. Evolution considered as the plan of an infinitely wise Person and executed under the control of His everywhere present energies can never be irreligious; can never exclude design, providence, grace, or miracles. Hence we repeat that what christians have cause to consider with apprehension is not evolution as a working hypothesis of science dealing with facts, but evolution as a philosophical speculation professing to account for the origin, causes, and ends of all things. Science owes its special

authority to its close adherence to facts capable of verification. But the philosophy of evolution has nothing to distinguish it from the great multitude of transient speculations which for thousands of years have been broken on the eternal facts of man's spiritual nature like the tides of the sea are broken upon the granite rock of the coast. The claim for finality and of superior authority put forth by this philosophy is simply absurd. But the conduct of some weak christian apologists who hasten with super-serviceable zeal to abate the claims of revelation, and to adjust the doctrines of christianity to the demands of the passing mode of thinking of the hour, surpasses all else in absurdity. It is inconsistent with honest faith to fear any possible outcome of genuine scientific progress. True science leads only to the truth, and all truth is congruous with true religion. We should heartily bid science God speed. Since our religion is true, matured science can only confirm and illume it. We have nothing to fear from the ultimate results of the doctrine of evolution as a factor in science. For the same reason it is not becoming the christian faith for its representatives to show haste in bringing forth. crude schemes for reconciling our time-tested interpretations of Scripture with the transient interpretations of nature presented by science in its hypothetical stage.

In the meantime, while we wait, it will suffice to indicate certain boundary lines which the scientific doctrine of evolution must not pass; and the passing of which

can alone be rightly regarded as a casus belli by the christian church.

Every rational doctrine of evolution must recognize its own limitations, and presuppose a creative and rational basis on which it rests. The evolving agencies and the laws of their evolution must necessarily precede and can never be accounted for by the process of the evolution itself.

A true doctrine of evolution can never violate the fundamental laws of human thought. The universal causal judgment affirms that every new thing coming into being must have been preceded by a cause adequate to account rationally for its existence. No possible evolution of molecular mechanics can account for the origin of life, nor for the peculiar properties of living beings, such as organic form, or function, reproduction, heredity, and the like. Much less can such a cause account for the origin of sensation, consciousness, instinct, or intelligence.

Much less can any doctrine really scientific pretend to account for the origination of the higher reason of man, and especially for his conscience and its imperial dictates, by any evolution from preceding non-rational or non-moral existence. The new facts are not composites resulting from the synthesis of pre-existing elements. They are ultimate, incapable of analysis, essentially distinct, and they could have been introduced into the flow of natural evolution only by an immediate act of God, as a new thread is shot by the hand of the