The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1897-05-22
CREATION AND EVOLUTION.

GIVEN God as the great cause and
providence of all, how is he related to
the process Of creation or evolution?
Our inquiry will be confined to the
planet on which we live. We know
more about this planet than any
other, and so we will confne our
selves to this earth and its inhabi-
tants. One thing is conceded on all
hands, aud that is, that this planet,
the world and its inhabitants, did not
come into existence all at once, but
through long process of some kind;
that this process begins with man
and extends back to the far distant
nebula and that by this process all
that is or has been has come to be.
This process is called evolution.
Now, modern supernaturalism has
no objection to this word as denoting
a plan or order, as indicating an adj
vance movement from the beginning
until now, or as setting forth the we'll
known process of development or
growth. 1t objects to it only when
it is made the cause of all that is;
when it is used to push God out of
the world, and when things are
claimed for it which it does not and
cannot do. Rather than evolution,
therefore, it would prefer Progressive
Creation. It requires the whole pro-
cess as in some sense creative. Allow
that one form is evolved, or comes out
of another, as the solid globe out of
the nebula, or the animal out of the
plant, in certain sense the new form
is created. 1t is created in TIE sense
of being made, formed or grown out
of the old form. The process is
creative process. 1t produces some
thing that did not exist before. Hence
the law of evolution, so far as it holds
good, is Gods law of creation.
| 1t is not cause but a method, not
a power but process. 1t is only the
way in which some power acts, and
when you get down to the last analy-
sis, that power is God. There is no
escape from this. Suppose we say
that this evolution is by natural Sc
lection" what then? Have we gained
anything so far as cause is concerned?
We have explained one process by
another; that is all. We are no nearer
the ultimate cause than before. Ma
tural selection is only process which
must be accounted for just as much as
any other process. Nature does not
select save as ordained Of God to Sc
lect. So there is no escape from the
conclusion that evolution, in whatever
form it may be held, is process of
creation ordained of God. 1t is
process whereby one form is produced
from another by the power of God. 1t
may be called process of mediate
creation. God uses existing forms to
create new forms.
Modern supernaturalism, therefore,
sees God in all this process of evolu-
ton. Its evolution is absolutely
theistical. God is in it all, but he is
not of it. The evolution neither
creates God nor absorbs him.
But further. modern supernatural
ism sees not only progressive pro-
cess of creation but special creative
acts, sees not only mediate but i'm
mediate creation.
Evolution cannot account for the
beginning of any absolutely new
force. 1t is merely system of trans
formism. Itshows how one force is
transformed into another, or one
form into another, it does not and
cannot show the beginnings or origin
of any new force. Force is the ulti-
nation of all science now. Science
revolves everything into force and it
is admitted that the mineral force
comes first.
This force in it's various forms
reigned in and over the world from
the state of nebula until the earth
was fitted for the coming of life. This
will not be questioned, we think.
! Now for the origin of this force evo-