Evolution

Part 1

Transcribed from the [1885?] Elliot Stock edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org

EVOLUTION.

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BY REV. EDWARD HOARE, M.A.

VICAR OF TUNBRIDGE WELLS, AND HONORARY CANON OF CANTERBURY.

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Reprinted from THE CHURCHMAN.

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LONDON: ELLIOT STOCK, 62, PATERNOSTER ROW, E.C.

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Price Twopence.

EVOLUTION.

IT may appear a very rash thing for any person who does not claim to be a man of science to presume to give an opinion on any of the theories of scientific men. But there is a vast difference between the facts of science and the theories suggested for their explanation. The facts are, as it were, the property of the investigators. The investigators have a power of investigation which we outsiders have not, and it would be folly for us who have not that power to presume to call in question their information. But it is a very different matter with the theories either founded on these facts or invented to explain them. When science has given us the facts common-sense can discuss the theories founded on them; and, without presuming to call in question the ascertained results of scientific investigation, any person of ordinary intelligence may form his own opinion as to the conclusions derived from the known facts. The scientific men know the facts, and we do not; but, when they have told us the facts, we can think as well as they. This point was exceedingly well put by Canon Garbett at the Norwich Church Congress in 1865. He said: “Beyond a certain point the conclusions and arguments of the man of science cease to be exclusively his own, and become the common property of all men. All argument rests on common principles, and when once the facts of the case are clearly ascertained, any man who is trained to reason correctly is competent to judge of them.” Again: “Let the man of science,” said Canon Garbett, “reign supreme within his own sphere, and let none but those trained in the same school and learned in the same craft venture to dispute with him as he gathers his facts and generalizes his rules. But when all this is done, and he proceeds to reason, then it is different. He steps out of his special department into a sphere open to all men alike. Tell me what your facts are, and if I sufficiently master them I am as competent to judge of the validity of the conclusions drawn from them as the man of science himself.”

There is scarcely any subject to which this principle applies more completely than it does to Evolution; for what is called “the doctrine of Evolution” is only a theory. It is not a collection of facts, but a theory which some of its warmest advocates—as, e.g., Professor Drummond—declare to be “still unproved.” {3} While, therefore, we fully recognise that it would be the utmost folly “to debate a point of natural history with Darwin, or a question of comparative anatomy with Owen,” we may, by the aid of common-sense, form an opinion possibly as sound at theirs on the unproved theory which has been founded on the ascertained facts which those great investigators have placed within our reach. This is all that I would attempt to do in the present paper. I do not propose to call in question a single fact ascertained by men of science. All that I would venture to do is to exercise the ordinary powers of thought in considering one of the theories which some scientific men have suggested as an explanation of those facts. I say “some scientific men,” for there is a very great difference of opinion amongst scientific men, and no one can read the admirable papers produced by the Victoria Institute without perceiving now much accurate observation, how wide a scientific knowledge, and how great a force of Baconian philosophy is arrayed against the theory just now in the fashion.

Let us begin, then, with a few facts respecting which we are all agreed, and which as they are sometimes called by the name of Evolution, are supposed to supply evidence of the correctness of the theory.

(1) We all believe in growth. It is a matter of fact that the world is full of growth. And this growth is not limited to gradual, or continuous, enlargement or development; but consists sometimes in most remarkable sudden changes, as when the egg becomes a chicken, the caterpillar a chrysalis, and the chrysalis a butterfly. Every living creature, whether plant or animal, has its own mode of growth; and no living creature is born into the world in the fulness of its stature. The man was once in his cradle, the eagle in its egg, the oak in its acorn; and no one can point to any living thing, either in the animal or vegetable kingdom, that began life with the full development of all the powers or properties of its species. Whatever men may think of any theory, as a matter of fact there is invariably growth as the first, and most certain, accompaniment of life.

(2) Within certain limits we all believe in variations. Both plants and animals of the same species vary according to circumstances, and are all more or less affected by country, by climate, and by culture. Amongst dogs, e.g., there are countless varieties of breed, to say nothing of all the mongrels. Just so amongst flowers; there are countless varieties of the rose, and these varieties may be multiplied to any extent by culture. There is, moreover, a power of adaptation to climate and other circumstances. In colder climates animals of the same species have thicker coats than they have under the tropics. There cannot be a question that both plants and animals will begin at once, if placed in a new position, to adapt themselves to it; and, as a general rule, if they fail in such adaptation, they die. Beyond all doubt, as a matter of fact, there are variations resulting both from parentage and environment. We are told by naturalists that some of these variations are not of a permanent character, as, e.g., in the case of pigeons, of which it is stated by Darwin that any number of breeds, if left to themselves, will in time revert to the common Rock. But still the fact remains, that within certain limits there are numberless variations, and that these variations may be transmitted to posterity. Some of these appear to have been produced in one way, and some in another; but, however produced, there they are; and no one, whether scientific or unscientific, can for one moment call in question the fact.

(3.) We all believe in progression. We see progression all around us. It appears to be a universal law that there should be perpetual movement. Sometimes there is advance, and sometimes retrogression—but always movement; for when there is no advance, there is invariably decline. Then, again, as far as observation is concerned, we find this progression gradual and continuous. Characters are gradually formed; learning is gradually acquired; power is gradually gained; and the whole world advances by the gradual attainment of increasing knowledge. Such progression is seen both in creation and revelation.

In Creation, for no one supposes that the world was created and peopled by one instantaneous act of the Creator. There may be difficulties in some of the commonly received interpretations of some of the statements of that most wonderful narrative contained in Gen. i.; but there can be no doubt whatever that it teaches progression. It begins with chaos, and leads us step by step to a perfected cosmos. At the outset; “the earth was waste, or without form, and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep.” And at the end we see a fertile world covered with vegetation, peopled by countless living creatures, with man, in the image of God, at their head, all enjoying the bright light of the sun in heaven; and all in so perfect a condition that “God saw everything that He had made, and behold it was very good.” But this change did not take place by one solitary act. The world did not leap by one bound from one condition to the other. There were, according to Scripture no less than six successive steps in the process. Let people explain the six days as they please, and I fully acknowledge that there may be legitimate differences in their explanations. But no one can doubt that the narrative teaches progression; and that, according to that narrative, it pleased God by a series of successive acts to complete the work which He pronounced to be very good. No one, therefore, who believes in the Book of Genesis can for one moment doubt progression in the work of the creation.

Nor can there be the slightest doubt as to progression in Revelation. Some people seem to speak of this as if it were a new discovery connected with the theory of Evolution. Such persons ought to read an admirable book called “The Philosophy of the Plan of Salvation,” written many years ago, and new published by the Religious Tract Society. It is perfectly impossible to read through the Old and New Testaments as a complete book without seeing progression. It is deeply to be deplored that such a man as Professor Drummond should have said, as he is reported to have said in his Sunday lectures, at Grosvenor House, {5a} “The Book of Genesis must be regarded as presenting truth to children’s minds;” and should have illustrated this by George Macdonald’s poem, “The Baby,” adding, “not literally true, but true for the child. So Moses gave truth in the form of a poem. If you say it is a scientific book, I give it up; but if you regard it as a poem, then I can deal with it.” This appears to teach that the Book of Genesis is regarded by him as something like a nursery rhyme. But the report {5b} is evidently abridged; and I hope it is incorrect. We know that there are sixty-six books in the Bible; but we also believe that it is “a Book” complete in itself, and with all its parts so beautifully proportioned that it forms one perfect whole for the gradual development of the whole counsel of God. Thus we believe that the one verse (Gen. iii 15), “I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel,” is the seed, or germ, of the whole Gospel; and that just as the oak is in the acorn, so in these few words is contained the whole covenant of God. The first twelve chapters of the Book of Genesis trace the pedigree of that seed of the woman till the call of the chosen family in Abraham; the historical books record the varied history of that family, and show how sorely the heel of the woman’s seed first bruised by the serpent; while the prophecies enlarge, and expand the blessed hope of final victory in the promised One. At length the Gospels reveal the long-expected Christ; and the Acts and the Epistles unfold the principles and progress of His kingdom, till the whole is complete in the Apocalypse, where we read of “the new heavens and the new earth,” with the curse of sin gone for ever, with Satan cast into the lake of fire, and with the seed of the woman triumphant over death and hell. As the acorn to the oak, so is that first promise to the Apocalypse. It is no poem, no myth, no nursery rhyme, but the germ of the whole counsel of God—a germ containing the whole Gospel, and requiring no less than four thousand years for its development.

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