The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1877-07-11
A TEST CASE.


to speak with sort of cOntemptuous pity of
the old-time doctrine of especial creations;
and even religious men are carried away BY
the fashionable philosophy of the day, and
do a sort of quasi,hOmage to the great idol
which has been set up under the name Of
Nature, to the obliteration and Disbursement
of personally active and Living God.
The theory of trsnsmutation or the uni
versal development of all forms of life out
of lower forms, is posted primarily on the
feeling that special creation (Of birds, for
example-or of mammals) at any special mo-
ment of time, by the Deity, is incredible and
not to be entertained. Science puts its foot
on the miraculous; everything is required
to proceed in a methodical and orderly way
-an ever-unfolding development, but no
sensible transitions.
1t is for this reason that the Mosaic ac-
count of creation must be frittered away until
all creative action is evapOrated from the
sacred record.
Persons styling themselves believers are at
least called upon to decide whether this is to
them the only rational philosophy or not
Have they reflected? If the supernatural
is to be banished entirely from the world,
what becomes of Christ ? Did He, eighteen
hundred years ago, rise from the dsad9
Ia not that against nature? Can science
explain-Or accept that ?
But it occurred d: it is matter of history.
We know the fact; and the farther fact that
this same Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead,
and did many miracles.
We know also Gf we believe our Bible
that there was Flood-destroying the whole
human race. Was this dsvelOped9 And
the plaques of Egypt, and all the miraculous
element of the Old Testament-including
prophecy--will the Christian. reduce them to
the level of natural selection, and exclude
altogether the activity of personal God?
The Intervention of God in human affairs
is proved by the apparitiOn of Christ, and
his life, miracles, and resurrectiOn-as well
as by the history of the Apostles and the
Primitive Church.
But if God interviewed nineteen hundred
years ago by sending his Son among us, and
four thousand years ago by sending food
on the earth, is it incredible that by spe-
ci6c act he created man, or that by specific
act he created the beasts of the field? In
other words, if We can prove special acts Of
interpOsitiOn on the part of God, why should
Geology repudiato the possibility of special
creations
An this by way of preliminary; our i'm
mediate object is to challenge Pal@ontOlOgy
and Geology land Archaeology to point out
the pedigree of man. II cannot be done, and
all efforts to do it have not only failed, but
left all who believe in evolution hopeless of
ever doing it.
The busy explorations of the past thirty
years-commencing with M. Boucher de
Perthes-have found nothing back of Qua
ternary mantle man of the pale olithic
caves, and this man, by general admission,
was equal in every respect, in brain and
body, to the man of the present day. He
was, as Mr.. Primer Boy remarked of the
pal@olithic skulls from Solutre, "man in the
full force of the term"
Now behind this, in the Glacial, the PHO
Gene, the MiOcene, the Eocene strata, there
is nOtAiag anthrOpOidal in type-absOlutely
nothing. All attempts to find Pliocene or
Miocene man have Signally failed.
There was then no development; but man
appeared upon the scene abruptly and sud.
denly, and with all the intelligence which he
now possesses.
In fact primeval man in the East makes
his appearance on the plains of Bsbylonia,
and in the valley of the Nile, erecting great
works of masonry-or in the Aryan villages
on the Oxus acquainted with the metals,
with agriculture, and letters.
No name stands higher in the scientific
world than that of Mr.. Alfred Russell Wal
lace, the divider with Mr.. Darwin of all the
hOnors of the current theory of development.
His declarations in this connection are,
therefore, entitled to peculiar weight, and
the following testimony, extracted from his
address before the British Association at its
last meeting, is of especial value.
No anthropoid apes of any kind have been
found in the tertiary strata, and the progen-
itors of man are, therefore, sll missing. The
only answer that has been attempted to this
is that the special habitat of the higher apes,
the tropical regions of Western Africa and
the Malay Islands, have not been geologi- |
oally explored, and that it is in these regions
that we would most naturally expect to dis
cover the ancestors of man.
But Mr.. Wallace observes that " this OBJ
lection is hardly valid, because existing an
shropoid apes are wholly dependent on per-
ennial supply of easily accessible fruits,
which is only found near the equator, while
not only had the south of Europe an almost
.ropical climate in MiOcene times, but We
must suppose even the earliest ancestors of
nan to have been terrestrial and omniverous,
nce it mus. hsge taken ages of slow modi6-
~ t;nr "a hnro rrnInnnd thn nnrfnntlu nrnnt |