Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-04-07

nlgner order to crown the worlds compile
ton! For hundreds Of years before Christ
came, in what wide regions remote we find
this hope, this aspiration, this presenti-
ment OF humanity in the direction of help
from above, more than mortal mower
sprung from earth's highest virgin puritv
vitalized from the unseen universe.
If the revelation Of God in the long
history of man is trustworthy must there
not be some essential truth to meet this wide
expectation?
Science SCOTS the possibility. Does science
never hint the possibility? Are the Sc
quences of nature unbroken? Science has
spoken some significant words of late.
1t is common scientific statement that
the laws governing the higher forms of life
can be rightly comprehended only by an
acquaintance with the lower and more
formative types of being. In noproblem
is this more true than that Of sex.
1t is not until we go below the invertebrate
series and contemplate the invertebrate and
vegetable worlds that we really begin to
find the data for a philosophical study of
the meaning of sex.
This is the impartial major premise of
science. Since we cannot then complete q
philosophical cycle OF the highest life until l
we learn the lowest, what does that investi-
CATION teach for a minor premise?
That there is great world of life that
wholly antedates the appearance of sex, the
world of asexual life; and that the resources
of nature for perpetuating life instead of
being monopolized by the uniformity of sex
are infinitely varied. But, so far as sex can
be predicated of this world of asexual life,
it is feminine. The asexual parent must be
contemplated, says science, as to all intents
and purposes maternal. The genesis is par
thenogenesis. The parthenogenetic parent
is in all essential respects a mother. There
are numberless cases in which the female
form constitutes the type of life.
NO LIMITS TO EVOLUTION.
1t follows then-it is still science speak
ing, not THAT the argument from biology
that the existing relations between the
sexes in the human race are perfect and
permanent, comprise all that nature ever
intended and have no further significance,
leads logically to absurdity. Those who
rightly interpret the facts cannot avoid
learning that the relations of the sexes
among the higher animals are widely ab-
normal; that the female sex is primary in
point both of origin and of Importance, in
the history and economy of organic life.
And as life is the highest product of nature,
and human life the highest type of life, it
follows that the grandest fact in nature is
woman; that woman is the racel
Evolution has no limits. If these princi-
pies, laid down by science, are correct, in
the far away ages of the lowest forms of life
may be discerned the signs of the coming of
the Son of Man. The unbroken sequences
of nature, SO far from disproving the Christ,
foreshadow Him. The sequences of nature
are broken to testify of Him. Far off His
coming shines.
The mystery of Christ's incarnation is no
greater than the mystery of every incarna-
tion;- both are absolutely inscrutable.
Science confesses herself no nearer the solu-
ton of the problem to-day than she was at
the beginning of time. But the one is in
the order of nature we say.
How long an order? How wide nature?
A point of time, moment sspace. For we
see that even in this one little world of yes
terday, the sequences are not unbroken.
Even here nature herself points to diViner
plan.
If the 1mmanent had chosen to reveal
Himself through the common ways it would
have been none the less revelation. Is it
less revelation If from the first throes of life
TO this nineteenth century, eyes that can
see, nay, read the signs of higher order,
may see in the incarnation what the pro-
toplasm meant, may read the mystery OF re-
1emption in the riddle of the partheno-
yenetic sphynx; may discern along this one
shining pathway how the unknown and
invisible universe has come down with its
'wn divine order to touch our lower order
With the breath of its higher life?
ALACK OF KNOWLEDGE.
1t is not breadth or culture or science but |
. lack of all which says that the order of
the order Of to-day is the Eternal
Order; that the order of here and the order
If there is the Universal Order. But now
hat science herself confesses that the order
If here is not the order of there, that the
order of now is not the order of then, that
argument should disappear forever from the
launts of logic.
From what we know of the long history
,f man, from the myths of the early ages to |
he news of the morning paper, from the |
Messiah of the Old Testament and the Christ |
If the New Testament emerging slowly out |
If shadow, ruling to-day in the heart and at |
he head of the world, 1 gather that when
he fullness of time was come when the |
,rderly evolution of life had reached the des- |
ined stage, the absolute energy, the AL |
mighty God which had already at some pre-
7ious unknown stage breathed into man
Ind man alone the breath of divine life, i'm
parted now to the divine life in man a new
'uCISys duNduCeu ulu Nv d ITeSH OF
he eternal love TO loftier spiritual heights.
which had been already forever
Differentiated from the beast by the breath
# distinct life, received now the highest
cal of its conservation to spirit by the mani
estation of God in the flesh.
The incarnation of God in Christ was no |
more a miracle than was the incarnation of
rod in man; the individualizing of absolute
orce in limited personality. 1t vas the
anne kind of miracle operating at higher
tage of evolution. OF the constitution of
pirit we are utterly ignorant. OF the alli-
nee between spirit and matter we know
'ut the alphabet. We live on the shores of
he spiritual ocean. It's invigorating
'reath is on our brows. Its surge sweeps at
ur feet. Its murmur, inarticulate but in
Torth or joy or hope is waited to US in the
'reath of that immeasurable sea. But
Fhither it bears US we cannot know till we
mbark on its my sterious tide.
A WAVE OF ETERNAL LOVE.
Foolish, false, trivial rumors of miracles
10 more invalidate miracle than false and
polish men forbid the dignity Of humanity.
Documents have their worth; but the exist
nee of man upon the earth is not matter
f documents, and the existence of the earth
'rior to the advent of man upon it is not
natter of documents.O Yet at some time be-
ween the two came a miracle. Whether it
anne suddenly in full measure or subtlv in
mailer measure matters not. There was
moment when human reason did not people
he earth. There was another moment when
uman reason was astir. At the moment
'etween when human reason came there was
miracle. Something was here that was not
ere before. A new wave of the absolute
orce Aever refuent overspread the earth.
Such another wave from the eternal en-
rgy,. which is also-science teaches it
ternal love-swept over the world so pow
rfullv in Christ that it stands once for all
n the long history of man as The Advent.
wave never spent, for when the humanity
{ Christ ceased in visible form, as must be
f God were to assume humanity, Holy
pIrit remained, a vital power remains to-
ay, diffused, prevailing; independent of
hurch or State OF school or creed, though
sing all for the, behoof of men, the largest
q sweep from the spiritual world this world
as ever known; slowly but surely eating