The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-01-16
PRIEST AND SCIENTIST
THE REV. DIR. JOHN A. ZAHM AND
HIS ADVANCED THEORIES.
Graduate of Notre Dame, Who Is at
the Head of the Order of the Holy
Cross in the United States.
Washington Letter.

Rev. DR.. john "A. Zanm as provincial Ol tHe
Order of the Holy Cross for the province of
the United States is regarded here as a dis
tinct triumph for the progressive scientific
party in the Roman Catholic Church. Dr.
Zahm represents the extreme forward posi-
ton of many learned men in the church who
have surrendered to the arguments of the
evolutionists, but who yet contend for the
truth Of the dogmas if Roman Catholicism
About five years ago DR.. Zahm startled the
country by coming out fiat for the Darwin
ian theory. His eminence as Roman Cath
olic educator, his great reputation for learn
ing and his fame. especially among his own
coreligionists for his scientific and philo-
sophical requirements, served to give keen
emphasis to his openly expressed opinion
that man, as well as all the things in the
visible world, are the products of evolution
When the fact filtered down to Catholics in
general that the great DR.. Zahm was teach
ing that God did not create man in his pres
ent form many persons lay as well as
cleric, opened wide their eyes. Darwin has
been the bette noir of orthodox Christians
ever since he published his Origin of Spe-
cies," and the spectacle Of a Roman Catho-
tic priest and professor insisting not only
that Darwinism was true but that it agreed
perfectly with Catholic teaching, was some
LnlIlS lOr winch the ISllStOuS WOAlO was
hardly prepared.
On all sides sprang up severe criticism
and many were the predictions that the
brilliant priest-scientist of Notre Dame
would be rebuked, if not "unfrocked," for
his pains. The DIRECTORS to DR.. Zahm's
teaching waited eagerly for the Pope to
summon the eminent professor to Rome, but
the summons was delayed until their pa
thence was pretty well exhausted. "A year
later the doctor read a paper before the IN
ternational scientific congress at Brussels.
This paper was such a notable document
that DR. Zahm was called to Rome by the
Pope, but not for the purpose OF making
him face a charge of heresy, but TO clothe
him with the degree of doctor. This action
seemed to quell the noise that was being
made by the professors critics. 1t was EVIL
dent that the Vatican had no intention OF
disciplining the brilliant American.
Pronounced as this new honor was, Dr.
Zahms critics were finally put to complete
rout when he was called to Rome to be
the procurator of the Order of the Holy
Cross in the very seat of Catholic activities.
He now comes back to his native country
Darwinism, evolution and all intacD to be
the supreme head in America OF the Dig
religious order in which he has for TWEEN
ty-five years held a prominent place as pro
fessor Of physics He was by the way, the
ship in the French Society of Physics.
DR.. Zahm takes the ground that the theory
of evolution was distinctly taught by such
eminent fathers of the church as Augustine
and Thomas. He repudiates the view held
by many of his own colleagues in the church
that evolution is the philosophy Or lDud
and the gospel of dirt, and he pays MS
compliments to such in terms that are posi-
| Bile only to the man who takes high groundi
| in science. a really genuine discovery OF
| the doctors, and one that caused much sur
prise among contemporary scientific men,
| involved his assertion that the nebul1r the
| DRY of cosmogony was originated by st.
| Gregory, an Oriental churchman OF Nyssa.
| The names of Kant, La Place and Herschei
| had alN avs been associated with the neDu-
| lar hypothesis. Dr. Zahm claims that II
| Gregory went one mile, Augustine went
twain. Augustine says DR.. Zahm, believed
in and taught spontaneous generation, and
| held that God created matter in a So-called
nebulous state and impressed the
| potentiality of development into all the
varied forms we now see. Thus Or Zahm
| urges that Augustine believed in Professor
Huxley's primordial atom, which, contained
| the promise and potency OF all torms OF
| life. But Huxley does not say that any
| thing whatever has been created either in a
| nebulous form otherwise.
Or. Zahm asserts that Thomas taught
evolution in the same way as Augustine.
| DIR. Zahm defines his own position in these
words: Spontaneous generation was never
! a stumbling block either to the fathers or
| the scholasticS, because the creation act
| was always acknowledged and because God
| was ever recognized as the author, at least
| through second agents, of the divers forms
| of life, which were supposed to originate
| from inorganic matter. Whether then, the
germ of life was specially created for each
| Individual creature or whether matter was
| endowed with the power OF evolving Wn niat
| atoms and the molecules of which matter
| is constituted. was from their point of view
| immaterial so far as dogma was concerned.
| AS a matter of fact, no positive evidence has
| been adduced in support of the slmlan origin
| of man. Since the publication OF Darwin
| Origin Of Species naturalists have been ex-
| ploring every portion of the globe for some
| trace of the missing link between man and
the highest known animal-a link which
| they they say must exist somewhere If the
| hypothesis of the evolution of man be true
| But granting that the search for the link
| connecting man with the ape has been SO
| far futile: admitting with Virchow that the
| future discovery. of this proanthropose is
| highly improbable may we not neverthe-
| less believe as a matter of theory that there
| has been such a link and that corporally
man is genetically descended from some I'M
| known species of ape or monkey? Analogy
| and scientific consistency would seem 70 re-
| uuire us to admit that mans bodily frame
| has been subject to the same law of evolu-
| tanned for the inferior animals.
DR. Zahm may be called an eyolutionlst,
| If by evolution, he declares, is meant the
| purely mechanical, casual, natural. planleSS
change which the evolutionists nave suosi u
tuted for the Creator, he cannot indorse it.
| He is an evolutionist with dogmatic Chris
| tianity added unto himself. 1t must not.
therefore, be understood that the head or
| the Holy Cross congregation stands for The
| goddess evolution of most or Darwin S most
| lucid opponents. He is content to remove
| the Deity as far back as any body will ask
| to remove Him, but he positively declines
| to get rid of the Deity altogether.
The Bible he believes to be all true, and
warmly contends that established scientific
truths do not conflict with it. His po-
| sition is said to be that God did not make
| the world in six days of twenty-four
| hours EACH but that He produced GER
] tain quantity of hazy. nebulous form
| less matter and then let it work out its
| own evolution. In the light of evou-
| ton the Bible is revealed to be the most
| iutionist of the dualistic school. He could
| not accept the monistc position and remain
| in the church, for in that position, as
| Laplace said of his theory, there is no
| room for a Deity. He holds. with no at
| tempt at scientific demonstration that the
| body of man was evolved from lower forms.
| and that when mans body was quite
! evolved it was endowed with a rational
| soul by the Creator. Without pointing out
| the precise time when mans body had
| reached that perfect state, and without con-
| tending that 1t is not YET evolving, he adj
| mits that his theory encounters several
| grave difficulties in the metaphysical and
| cxegetical field, but hopes these difficulties
| are not insurmountable
DR.. Zahm born in New Lexington.
| o.. forty-eight years ago, of German and
| Irish parentage. He was educated in Notre
Dame University. and soon after his grad
uation Joined the order and became pro-
fessor of metaphysics for his alma mater.
| He has been very prominent as a lecturer
in the Catholic summer schools of Madison
and of Plattsburg, and it was at the latter
place he first conspicuoasly announced his
compromise with the theory of fiation He
has Travelled $50 COO miles and speaks many