The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1884-10-29

integration Of matter, and concomitant
dissipation of motion, during which the
matter passes from an indefinite, inco-
herent homogeneity to definite coherent
heterogeneity and during which the re-
tained motion undergoes parallel trans
formation Compare it with the account
Of Moses. God said, let the waters
bring forth abundantly the moving crea-
ture that hath life. Let the earth
bring forth the living creature after his
kind. To the truly scientific mind does
not, the earth bringing forth and the
waters bringing forth, equally well ex-
plain the very doing of the thing as the
integration and concomitant dissipation,
and the passing from some sort of ,indef-
mite homogeneity into another sort of
heterogeneity. Yet it is over this sort
OF moonshine that the philosophic John
Flske goes into raptures after this fash
ION. Now that we have arrived at this
formula we find ourselves expressing it
IN terms that are universal. Instead of
mere law of biology we have enunciated
the
Widest Generalization Concerning the
Con crete Universe as a Whole.
This leap of inference on Mr. Spencer s
part, like the similar leap taken by New
ton from the fall of the apple to the mo-
tions OF the moon, is the daring act which
completes the formation Of the hypothe-
sis So that when a man says that the
joining of stuff into lump then the
equal unjoining and sending out of move
ment from 1T, the making stuff pass from
a no sort of unstickingness into some sort
Of keeping g-togetherness while the move
ment not sent out undergoes a ike
change from no sort of keeping together
ness, into some sort of stieking-you
have the explanation in nutshell Of the
whole concrete universe. Really we
should not have known it unless very
phllosophic people had assured us.
1t is manitestly impossible that we can
know the exact conditions in which or
ganic life begins. The living centres are
far more central than the eye or highest
magnifying power can penetrate. With
IN these centres proceed changes of which
the most advanced physicist and chemist
fail to afford us the faintest conception.
The Evolutionist can do no more than
make guesses. And the guess that seeks
to explain 1t all by descending from or
ganiem to organism, quantitively and
qualitively, going down from organic to
inorganic, from masses to atoms is no ex-
planation for the atoms are only the
masses writ small"-the mystery re-
mains.
Without Life Organism is not Possible.
yet life Is constantly transmitted to non
living matter and converts it into living
organizations. There must consequently
be predicated some adequate power to
transmute the matter that has not been
made to live into this infinite variety and
speciality of life forms Herein lies the
problem which is not escaped by remov-
ing it to an infinite distance OF by reduc-
ing IL to an infnitessimal point. 1t is as
real problem pulverized into organic
dust as it is aggregated in an organic
world. In either, God is the only ade.
9uate solntion-and the only term con.
slstent with all the facts of life. Those
who degrade man to the level of the
beast in the end, clutch at the dagger
with which to slay God-but like that
which hovered before Macbeths magma
ton, it refuses to be grasped. The
gouts Of blood y upon its blade and
dudgeon y no eye but their own can see
man lives and moves, has his being in
God L. NJ. G.