The Other Side of Evolution: Its Effects and Fallacy

CHAPTER I.. Evolution Is an Unproven Theory.

EVOLUTION IS AN UNPROVEN THEORY.

Nearly all evolutionists admit this. -- Citations from Tyndall, Spencer, Huxley, Prof. Conn, Whitney, Dr. J. A. Zahm, Dr. Rudolph Schmidt, and others. -- Evolution rejected by many and opposed. -- Complaint of Prof. Haeckel on this. -- Prof. Virchow's opposition. -- List of scientists who do not advocate Evolution. -- Discarded theories of the past. -- Uncertainty of scientific theories in general. 5

CHAPTER II.. The Evolution of the Universe and Earth.

THE EVOLUTION OF THE UNIVERSE AND EARTH.

The four problems facing Evolution, the origin of matter, of force, the formation and orderly adjustment of the universe and the origin of life. -- Evolution makes no attempt at the first two. -- Spencer admits it is the unknowable. -- Lord Kelvin's testimony. -- Prof. George Frederick Wright on the Nebular Hypothesis. -- The solar system unique. -- The fire-mist and its wonderful contents. -- Failure as to origin of life. -- Le Conte's theory. -- Testimony of Tyndall, Wilson, Conn, against spontaneous generation. 17

CHAPTER III.. Evolution of Species.

EVOLUTION OF SPECIES.

Evolution's great field. -- No case of evolution known --No cause of evolution known. -- How evolution originated species. -- Argument from Geology. -- Geologists opposing it; Sir J. W. Dawson, Sir R. Murchison, Barrande. -- Prof. Conn's admissions. -- Haeckel's admissions. -- The argument from Morphology. -- Rudimentary parts. -- The Eohippus, "Old Horse." -- Argument from classification of species. -- No agreed classification. -- Evolution's phantom tree. -- No changes in Egypt's 4,000 years or prehistoric man's longer time. -- Distribution of plants and animals. -- Argument from Embryology. -- The three-fold argument of Evolution. -- Facts opposing Evolution. 26

CHAPTER IV.. The Evolution of Man.

THE EVOLUTION OF MAN.

The vital question. -- All evolutionists agree here. -- The two accounts of Bible and Evolution. -- Arguments from origin of species. -- Argument from similarity of structure. -- Argument from human characteristics. -- Rudimentary organs in man. -- The "gill-slits." -- How the brute became man. -- Prof. Edward Clodd's account of "The Making of a Man." -- Edward Morris' description of primeval man. -- The Theistic Evolutionist's Adam and how he fell. -- The Missing Link. -- The Calaveras skull. -- Neanderthal skull. -- Haeckel's "Pithecanthropus-Erectus." -- The Colorado monkey's skeleton. -- Croatia skeletons. -- Argument from the brain. -- Prof. Clodd's story of how man got his brain. -- Argument from language. -- Prof. Max Mueller's protest. -- Argument from prehistoric man.--Antiquity of man. -- Testimony as to man's recent origin from Prof. George Frederick Wright, S. R. Pattison, Prof. Friedrich Pfaff, Winchell, Dr. J. A. Zahm.--Argument from uncivilized races. -- Argument from history of limits of man's history. -- Evolution and religion. -- Evolution's ethics. -- Christian experience.--Christ and evolution. 60

CHAPTER V.. Evolution Unscientific and Unphilosophical.

EVOLUTION UNSCIENTIFIC AND UNPHILOSOPHICAL.

Four steps necessary to proof, Facts, Classification, Inferences, Verification. -- Fails to account for facts. -- Has no classification. -- False in inferences and has no verification. -- Rests on imagination. -- Tyndall's "Scientific Use of the Imagination." -- Evolution the Doctrine of Chance revamped and clothed in scientific terms. 112

CHAPTER VI.. Evolution and the Bible.

EVOLUTION AND THE BIBLE.

Evolution has no scriptural argument. -- The two accounts mutually exclusive. -- Bible account appealed to by all Scripture writers as Fact. -- Evolution's interpretation of Scripture. -- Christ's testimony to the facts of Scripture. -- Evolution and Bible doctrines. -- Importance of Adam as basis of Scripture doctrine. -- Man's state and remedy as given by Evolution and by the Bible. -- The future of the Bible and of Evolution. -- Evolution in its logical form is Atheism.--Evolution a relic of heathenism.--Testimony of James Freeman Clarke, Sir J. William Dawson. 120

CHAPTER VII.. The Spiritual Effect of Evolution.

THE SPIRITUAL EFFECT OF EVOLUTION.

Must affect the spiritual state. -- Effect on candidates for ministry. -- Latent effect on faith. -- On experimental religion. -- Evolution as a state of heart. -- A comfortable theory to the impenitent. -- Prepares for "isms." -- Weakens pulpit power. -- Eliminates faith in the supernatural and eternal. -- Education's place in modern giving. -- Is this the last form of unbelief? -- The common people and the Gospel of the Cross. 137

PREFACE.

Evolution is claimed by its advocates to be the greatest intellectual discovery of the past century, and, by some, the greatest thought that ever entered the mind of man. In the words of its greatest philosopher, Herbert Spencer, "It spans the universe and solves the widest range of its problems, which reach outward through boundless space, and back through illimitable time, resolving the deepest problems of life, mind, society, history and civilization." It has woven into one great philosophy the history of the material universe, the entire organic creation, man and all his faculties, the whole course of human history and the origin and progress of all religion.

It also undertakes to account for the Bible, for what is popularly called higher criticism represents the biblical branch of Evolution. It has reconstructed the Bible and remanded its miraculous narratives to the realm of myth. It has formulated a theology in which the most sacred doctrines of evangelical belief are discarded. In its central theory of the origin of man, it vitally affects the doctrines of the nature of man, of sin and penalty, man's need and the work of Christ. It even touches the person of Christ, for many of its advocates say that He too comes within its scope. In its radical and most consistent form, it utterly discards belief in God. Most of the great teachers of Evolution, such as Ernst Haeckel of Jena, are and have been atheists.

It is true that many evolutionists are theistic. But it is not enough to be theistic. The devil is "theistic," so was Thomas Paine. Christianity is far more than theism. It is the grossest sophistry to teach that because a belief has some truth in it we must therefore tolerate it. All false doctrine is sugarcoated with truth. That we are not overstating the dangerous nature of the theory will appear from the following opinions of competent scholars and observers.

Prof. George Frederick Wright, the eminent geologist, says of Evolution: "It is the fad of the present, which is making such havoc and confusion in the thought of the age, leading so many into intellectual positions, whose conclusions they dare not face and cannot flank, and from which they cannot retreat except through the valley of humiliation." (Bibliotheca Sacra, April, 1900.)

Prof. George Howison sounds this alarm: "It is a portent so threatening to the highest concerns of man, that we ought to look before we leap and look more than once. Under the sheen of the evolutionary account of man, the world of real persons, the world of individual responsibility, disappears; with it disappears the personality of God." (Limits of Evolution, pp. 5, 6.)

There is a vital connection between Facts, Doctrines, Experiences, Conduct and Prospects. These successively flow from each other. Christianity rests on facts, from these we derive doctrines and from doctrines come experiences, which give rise to conduct and that ends in suitable prospects. Facts form the basis of Christianity. When, therefore, Evolution attacks the Facts of the Bible, it attempts to undermine the very basis of all Christianity. President Francis L. Patton has said: "You may put your philosophy in one pocket and your religion in another and think that, as they are separate, they will not interfere, but that will not work. You have to bring your theory of the universe and your theory of religion together. This is the work of this age."

While all do not go the length of the radical evolutionists, yet such is the natural working of the human mind, that this will be its logical conclusion. If this theory is accepted, we must look for widespread lapse from all Christian faith and, as conduct follows belief in all intelligent creatures, we shall see also great moral declension.

To the ordinary man, the matter appears in this light: If we cannot believe a man's statements we will not take his advice. If we cannot believe the Bible's narratives why should we believe its religion? If it is not trustworthy as to facts of this world, why depend upon it as to the other world? If it cannot teach correctly the nature of insects and animals, why should it be able to tell us the nature of God? The common man reasons rightly. The Bible must stand or fall by its reliability all along the line of truth of every kind.

Evolution is being taught, or taken for granted to-day in high schools, academies, colleges, universities, and seminaries. It meets the Sunday School scholar at the first chapter of Genesis. A busy city pastor says he has been asked about it every day in the week. It is a living question and must be met. In every free library are the works of Spencer, Darwin, Tyndall, Huxley and others, and these are read continually.

It does seem as if the other side of such a question ought to be given and considered, if there be another side, and there certainly is.

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