Chapter IX: Part 9

"It must be borne in mind that for a considerable time even after the last of these writers no one had disputed the generally received belief as to the small age of the world, or at least of the kinds of animals and plants inhabiting it. It becomes, therefore, much more striking if views formed under such a condition of opinion are found to harmonize with modern ideas concerning 'Creation' and organic Life.

"Now St. Augustin insists in a very remarkable manner on the merely derivative sense in which God's creation of organic forms is to be understood; that is, that God created them by conferring on the material world the power to evolve them under suitable conditions."

Mr. Mivart then cites certain passages from St. Augustin, St. Thomas Aquinas, and Cornelius à Lapide, and finally adds:--

"As to Suarez, it will be enough to refer to Disp. xv. sec.
2, No. 9, p. 508, t.i. edition Vivés, Paris; also Nos. 13--15.
Many other references to the same effect could easily be
given, but these may suffice.

"It is then evident that ancient and most venerable
theological authorities distinctly assert _derivative_
creation, and thus their teachings harmonize with all that
modern science can possibly require."

It will be observed that Mr. Mivart refers solely to Suarez's fifteenth Disputation, though he adds, "Many other references to the same effect could easily be given." I shall look anxiously for these references in the third edition of the "Genesis of Species." For the present, all I can say is, that I have sought in vain, either in the fifteenth Disputation, or elsewhere, for any passage in Suarez's writings which, in the slightest degree, bears out Mr. Mivart's views as to his opinions.[1]

[Footnote 1: The edition of Suarez's "Disputationes" from which the following citations are given, is Birckmann's, in two volumes folio, and is dated 1630.]

The title of this fifteenth Disputation is "De causa formali substantiali," and the second section of that Disputation (to which Mr. Mivart refers) is headed, "Quomodo possit forma substantialis fieri in materia et ex materia?"

The problem which Suarez discusses in this place may be popularly stated thus: According to the scholastic philosophy every natural body has two components--the one its "matter" (_materia prima_), the other its "substantial form" (_forma substantialis_). Of these the matter is everywhere the same, the matter of one body being indistinguishable from the matter of any other body. That which differentiates any one natural body from all others is its substantial form, which inheres in the matter of that body, as the human soul inheres in the matter of the frame of man, and is the source of all the activities and other properties of the body.

Thus, says Suarez, if water is heated, and the source of heat is then removed, it cools again. The reason of this is that there is a certain "_intimius principium_" in the water, which brings it back to the cool condition when the external impediment to the existence of that condition is removed. This _intimius principium_, is the "substantial form" of the water. And the substantial form of the water is not only the cause (_radix_) of the coolness of the water, but also of its moisture, of its density, and of all its other properties.

It will thus be seen that "substantial forms" play nearly the same part in the scholastic philosophy as "forces" do in modern science; the general tendency of modern thought being to conceive all bodies as resolvable into material particles and forces, in virtue of which last these particles assume those dispositions and exercise those powers which are characteristic of each particular kind of matter.

But the Schoolmen distinguished two kinds of substantial forms, the one spiritual and the other material. The former division is represented by the human soul, the _anima rationalis_; and they affirm as a matter, not merely of reason, but of faith, that every human soul is created out of nothing, and by this act of creation is endowed with the power of existing for all eternity, apart from the _materia prima_ of which the corporeal frame of man is composed. And the _anima rationalis_, once united with the _materia prima_ of the body, becomes its substantial form, and is the source of all the powers and faculties of man--of all the vital and sensitive phenomena which he exhibits--just as the substantial form of water is the source of all its qualities.

The "material substantial forms" are those which inform all other natural bodies except that of man; and the object of Suarez in the present Disputation, is to show that the axiom "_ex nihilo nihil fit_," though not true of the substantial form of man, is true of the substantial forms of all other bodies, the endless mutations of which constitute the ordinary course of nature. The origin of the difficulty which he discusses is easily comprehensible. Suppose a piece of bright iron to be exposed to the air. The existence of the iron depends on the presence within it of a substantial form, which is the cause of its properties, e.g. brightness, hardness, weight. But, by degrees, the iron becomes converted into a mass of rust, which is dull, and soft, and light, and, in all other respects, is quite different from the iron. As, in the scholastic view, this difference is due to the rust being informed by a new substantial form, the grave problem arises, how did this new substantial form come into being? Has it been created? or has it arisen by the power of natural causation? If the former hypothesis is correct, then the axiom, "_ex nihilo nihil fit_," is false, even in relation to the ordinary course of nature, seeing that such mutations of matter as imply the continual origin of new substantial forms are occurring every moment. But the harmonization of Aristotle with theology was as dear to the Schoolmen, as the smoothing down the differences between Moses and science is to our Broad Churchmen, and they were proportionably unwilling to contradict one of Aristotle's fundamental propositions. Nor was their objection to flying in the face of the Stagirite likely to be lessened by the fact that such flight landed them in flat Pantheism.

So Father Suarez fights stoutly for the second hypothesis; and I quote the principal part of his argumentation as an exquisite specimen of that speech which is a "darkening of counsel."

"13. Secundo de omnibus aliis formis substantialibus (sc.
materialibus) dicendum est non fieri proprie ex nihilo, sed
ex potentia praejacentis materiae educi: ideoque in effectione
harum formarum nil fieri contra illud axioma, _Ex nihila
nihil fit_, si recte intelligatur. Haec assertio sumitur ex
Aristotele 1. Physicorum per totum et libro 7. Metaphyss.
et ex aliis authoribus, quos statim referam. Et declaratur
breviter, nam fieri ex nihilo duo dicit, unum est fieri
absolute et simpliciter, aliud est quod talis effectio fit ex
nihilo. Primum propriè dicitur de re subsistente, quia ejus
est fieri, cujus est esse: id autem proprie quod subsistit et
habet esse; nam quod alteri adjacet, potius est quo aliud est.
Ex hac ergo parte, formae substantiales materiales non fiunt
ex nihilo, quia proprie non fiunt. Atque hanc rationem reddit
Divus Thomas I parte, quaestione 45, articulo 8, et quaestione
90, articulo 2, et ex dicendis magis explicabitur. Sumendo
ergo ipsum _fieri_ in hac proprietate et rigore, sic fieri
ex nihilo est fieri secundum se totum, id est nulla sui parte
praesupposita, ex quo fiat. Et hac ratione res naturales
dum de novo fiunt, non fiunt ex nihilo, quia fiunt ex
praesupposita materia, ex qua componuntur, et ita non fiunt,
secundum se totae, sed secundum aliquid sui. Formae autem
harum rerum, quamvis revera totam suam entitatem de novo
accipiant, quam antea non habebant, quia vero ipsae non fiunt,
ut dictum est, ideo neque ex nihilo fiunt. Attamen, quia
latiori modo sumendo verbum illud _fieri_ negari non potest:
quia forma facta sit, eo modo quo nunc est, et antea non erat,
ut etiam probat ratio dubitandi posita in principio sectionis,
ideo addendum est, sumpto _fieri_ in hac amplitudine, fieri
ex nihilo non tamen negare habitudinem materialis causea
intrinsecè componentis id quod fit, sed etiam habitudinem
causae materialis per se causantis et sustentantis formam quae
fit, seu confit. Diximus enim in superioribus materiam et esse
causam compositi et formae dependentis ab ilia: ut res ergo
dicatur ex nihilo fieri uterque modus causalitatis negari
debet; et eodem sensu accipiendum est illud axioma, ut
sit verum: _Ex nihilo nihil fit_, scilicet virtute agentis
naturalis et finiti nihil fieri, nisi ex praesupposito
subjecto per se concurrente, et ad compositum et ad formam,
si utrumque suo modo ab eodem agente fiat. Ex his ergo rectè
concluditur, formas substantiales materiales non fieri ex
nihilo, quia fiunt ex materia, quae in suo genere per se
concurrit, et influit ad esse, et fieri talium formarum;
quia, sicut esse non possunt nisi affixae materiae, a qua
sustententur in esse: ita nec fieri possunt, nisi earum
effectio et penetratio in eadem materia sustentetur. Et haec
est propria et per se differentia inter effectionem ex nihilo,
et ex aliquo, propter quam, ut infra ostendemus, prior modus
effciendi superat vim finitam naturaliam agentium, non vero
posterior.

"14. Ex his etiam constat, proprie de his formis dici non
creari, sed educi de potentia materiae."[1]

[Footnote 1: Suarez, _loc. cit_. Disput. xv. § ii.]

If I may venture to interpret these hard sayings, Suarez conceives that the evolution of substantial forms in the ordinary course of nature, is conditioned not only by the existence of the _materia prima_, but also by a certain "concurrence and influence" which that _materia_ exerts; and every new substantial form being thus conditioned, and in part, at any rate, caused, by a pre-existing something, cannot be said to be created out of nothing.

But as the whole tenor of the context shows, Suarez applies this argumentation merely to the evolution of material substantial forms in the ordinary course of nature. How the substantial forms of animals and plants primarily originated, is a question to which, so far as I am able to discover, he does not so much as allude in his "Metaphysical Disputations." Nor was there any necessity that he should do so, inasmuch as he has devoted a separate treatise of considerable bulk to the discussion of all the problems which arise out of the account of the Creation which is given in the Book of Genesis. And it is a matter of wonderment to me that Mr. Mivart, who somewhat sharply reproves "Mr. Darwin and others" for not acquainting themselves with the true teachings of his Church, should allow himself to be indebted to a heretic like myself for a knowledge of the existence of that "Tractatus de opere sex Dierum," I in which the learned Father, of whom he justly speaks, as "an authority widely venerated, and whose orthodoxy has never been questioned," directly opposes all those opinions, for which Mr. Mivart claims the shelter of his authority.

In the tenth and eleventh chapters of the first book of this treatise, Suarez inquires in what sense the word "day," as employed in the first chapter of Genesis, is to be taken. He discusses the views of Philo and of Augustin on this question, and rejects them. He suggests that the approval of their allegorizing interpretations by St. Thomas Aquinas, merely arose out of St. Thomas's modesty, and his desire not to seem openly to controvert St. Augustin--"voluisse Divus Thomas pro sua modestia subterfugere vim argumenti potius quam aperte Augustinum inconstantiae arguere."

Finally, Suarez decides that the writer of Genesis meant that the term "day" should be taken in its natural sense; and he winds up the discussion with the very just and natural remark that "it is not probable that God, in inspiring Moses to write a history of the Creation which was to be believed by ordinary people, would have made him use language, the true meaning of which it is hard to discover, and still harder to believe."[1]

[Footnote 1: "Tractatus de opere sex Dierum, seu de Universi Creatione, quatenus sex diebus perfecta esse, in libro Genesis cap. i. refertur, et praesertim de productioue hominis in statu innocentiae." Ed. Birckmann, 1622.]

And in chapter xii. 3, Suarez further observes:--

"Ratio enim retinendi veram significationem diei naturalis est
illa communis, quod verba Scripturae non sunt ad metaphoras
transferenda, nisi vel necessitas cogit, vel ex ipsa scriptura
constet, et maximè in historica narratione et ad instructionem
fidei pertinente: sed haec ratio non minus cogit ad
intelligendum propriè dierum numerum, quam diei qualitatem,
QUIA NON MINUS UNO MODO QUAM ALIO DESTRUITUR SINCERITAS,
IMO ET VERITAS HISTORIAE. Secundo hoc valde confirmant alia
Scripturae loca, in quibus hi sex dies tanquam veri, et inter
se distincti commemorantur, ut Exod. 20 dicitur, _Sex diebus
operabis et facies omnia opera tua, septimo autem die Sabbatum
Domini Dei tui est_. Et infra: _Sex enim diebus fecit Dominus
caelum et terram et mare et omnia quae in eis sunt_, et idem
repetitur in cap. 31. In quibus locis sermonis proprietas
colligi potest tum ex aequiparatione, nam cum dicitur: _sex
diebus operabis_, propriissimè intelligitur: tum quia non est
verisimile, potuisse populum intelligere verba illa in alio
sensu, et è contrario incredibile est, Deum in suis praeceptis
tradendis illis verbis ad populum fuisse loquutum, quibus
deciperetur, falsum sensum concipiendo, si Deus non per sex
veros dies opera sua fecisset."

These passages leave no doubt that this great doctor of the Catholic Church, of unchallenged authority and unspotted orthodoxy, not only declares it to be Catholic doctrine that the work of creation took place in the space of six natural days; but that he warmly repudiates, as inconsistent with our knowledge of the Divine attributes, the supposition that the language which Catholic faith requires the believer to hold that God inspired, was used in any other sense than that which He knew it would convey to the minds of those to whom it was addressed.

And I think that in this repudiation Father Suarez will have the sympathy of every man of common uprightness, to whom it is certainly "incredible" that the Almighty should have acted in a manner which He would esteem dishonest and base in a man.

But the belief that the universe was created in six natural days is hopelessly inconsistent with the doctrine of evolution, in so far as it applies to the stars and planetary bodies; and it can be made to agree with a belief in the evolution of living beings only by the supposition that the plants and animals, which are said to have been created on the third, fifth, and six days, were merely the primordial forms, or rudiments, out of which existing plants and animals have been evolved; so that, on these days, plants and animals were not created actually, but only potentially.

The latter view is that held by Mr. Mivart, who follows St. Augustin, and implies that he has the sanction of Suarez. But, in point of fact, the latter great light of orthodoxy takes no small pains to give the most explicit and direct contradiction to all such imaginations, as the following passages prove. In the first place, as regards plants, Suarez discusses the problem:--

"_Quomodo herba virens et caetera vegetabilia hoc [tertio] die
fuerint producta._[1]

[Footnote 1: "Propter haec ergo sententia illa Augustini et
propter nimiam obscuritatem et subtilitatem ejus difficilis
creditu est: quia verisimile non est Deum inspirasse Moysi,
ut historiam de creatione mundi ad fidem totius populi adeo
necessariam per nomina dierum explicaret, quorum significatio
vix inveniri et difficillime ab aliquo credi posset." _(Loc.
cit._ Lib. I. cap. xi. 42.)]

"Praecipua enim difficultas hîc est, quam attingit Div. Thomas
I, par. qu. 69, art. 2, an haec productio plantarum hoc die
facta intelligenda sit de productione ipsarum in proprio esse
actuali et formali (ut sic rem explicerem) vel de productione
tantum in semine et in potentia. Nam Divus Augustinus libro
quinto Genes, ad liter, cap. 4 et 5 et libro 8, cap. 3,
posteriorem partem tradit, dicens, terram in hoc die accepisse
virtutem germinandi omnia vegetabilia quasi concepto omnium
illorum semine, non tamen statim vegetabilia omnia produxisse.
Quod primo suadet verbis illis capitis secundi. _In die quo
fecit Deus coelum et terram et omne virgultum agri priusquam,
germinaret_. Quomodo enim potuerunt virgulta fieri antequam
terra germinaret nisi quia causaliter prius et quasi in
radice, seu in semine facta sunt, et postea in actu producta?
Secundo confirmari potest, quia verbum illud _germinet terra_
optimè exponitur potestativè ut sic dicam, id est, accipiat
terra vim germinandi. Sicut in eodem capite dicitur _crescite
et multiplicamini_. Tertio potest confirmari, quia actualis
productio vegetabilium non tarn ad opus creationis, quam ad
opus propagationis pertinet, quod postea factum est. Et hanc
sententiam sequitur Eucherius lib. 1, in Gen. cap. 11, et illi
faveat Glossa, interli. Hugo. et Lyran. dum verbum _germinet_
dicto modo exponunt. NIHILOMINUS CONTRARIA SENTENTIA TENENDA
EST: SCILICET, PRODUXISSE DEUM HOC DIE HERBAM, ARBORES, ET
ALIA VEGETABILIA ACTU IN PROPRIA SPECIE ET NATURA. Haec est
communis sententia Patrum.--Basil, homil. 5; Exaemer. Ambros.
lib. 3; Exaemer. cap. 8,11, et 16; Chrysost, homil. 5 in Gen.
Damascene, lib. 2 de Fid. cap. 10; Theodor. Cyrilli. Bedae,
Glossae ordinariae et aliorum in Gen. Et idem sentit Divus
Thomas, _supra_, solvens argumenta Augustini, quamvis propter
reverentiam ejus quasi problematicè semper procedat. Denique
idem sentiunt omnes qui in his operibus veram successionem et
temporalem distinctionem agnoscant."

Secondly, with respect to animals, Suarez is no less decided:--

_De animalium ratione carentium productione quinto et sexto
die facta._[1]

"32. Primo ergo nobis certum sit haec animantia non in virtute
tantum aut in semine, sed actu, et in seipsis, facta fuisse
his diebus in quibus facta narrantur. Quanquam Augustinus
lib. 3, Gen. ad liter, cap. 5 in sua persistens sententia
contrarium sentire videatur."

[Footnote 1: _Loc. cit._ Lib. II. cap. vii. et viii. 1, 32, 35.]

But Suarez proceeds to refute Augustin's opinions at great length, and his final judgment may be gathered from the following passage:--

"35. Tertio dicendum est, haec animalia omnia his diebus
producta esse, IN PERFECTO STATU, IN SINGULIS INDIVIDUIS, SEU
SPECIEBUS SUIS, JUXTA UNIUSCUJUSQUE NATURAM.... ITAQUE FUERUNT
OMNIA CREATA INTEGRA ET OMNIBUS SUIS MEMBRIS PERFECTA."

As regards the creation of animals and plants, therefore, it is clear that Suarez, so far from "distinctly asserting derivative creation," denies it as distinctly and positively as he can; that he is at much pains to refute St. Augustin's opinions; that he does not hesitate to regard the faint acquiescence of St. Thomas Aquinas in the views of his brother saint as a kindly subterfuge on the part of Divus Thomas; and that he affirms his own view to be that which is supported by the authority of the Fathers of the Church. So that, when Mr. Mivart tells us that Catholic theology is in harmony with all that modern science can possibly require; that "to the general theory of evolution, and to the special Darwinian form of it, no exception ... need be taken on the ground of orthodoxy;" and that "law and regularity, not arbitrary intervention, was the Patristic ideal of creation," we have to choose between his dictum, as a theologian, and that of a great light of his Church, whom he himself declares to be "widely venerated as an authority, and whose orthodoxy has never been questioned."

But Mr. Mivart does not hesitate to push his attempt to harmonize science with Catholic orthodoxy to its utmost limit; and, while assuming that the soul of man "arises from immediate and direct creation," he supposes that his body was "formed at first (as now in each separate individual) by derivative, or secondary creation, through natural laws" (p. 331).

This means, I presume, that an animal, having the corporeal form and bodily powers of man, may have been developed out of some lower form of life by a process of evolution; and that, after this anthropoid animal had existed for a longer or shorter time, God made a soul by direct creation, and put it into the manlike body, which, heretofore, had been devoid of that _anima rationalis_, which is supposed to be man's distinctive character.

This hypothesis is incapable of either proof or disproof, and therefore may be true; but if Suarez is any authority, it is not Catholic doctrine. "Nulla est in homine forma educta de potentia materiae,"[1] is a dictum which is absolutely inconsistent with the doctrine of the natural evolution of any vital manifestation of the human body.

[Footnote 1: Disput. xv. § x. No. 27.]

Moreover, if man existed as an animal before he was provided with a rational soul, he must, in accordance with the elementary requirements of the philosophy in which Mr. Mivart delights, have possessed a distinct sensitive and vegetative soul, or souls. Hence, when the "breath of life" was breathed into the manlike animal's nostrils, he must have already been a living and feeling creature. But Suarez particularly discusses this point, and not only rejects Mr. Mivart's view, but adopts language of very theological strength regarding it.

"Possent praeterea his adjungi argumenta theologica, ut est
illud quod sumitur ex illis verbis Genes. 2. _Formavit Deus
hominem ex limo terrae et inspiravit in faciem ejus spiraculum
vitae et factus est homo in animam viventem_: ille enim
spiritus, quam Deus spiravit, anima rationalis fuit, et PER
EADEM FACTUS EST HOMO VIVENS, ET CONSEQUENTER, ETIAM SENTIENS.

"Aliud est ex VIII. Synodo Generali quae est
Constantinopolitana IV. can. 11, qui sic habet. _Apparet
quosdam in tantum impietatis venisse ut homines duas animas
habere dogmatizent: talis igitur impietatis inventores et
similes sapientes, cum Vetus et Novum Testamentum_ _omnesque
Ecclesiae patres unam animam rationalem hominem habere
asseverent, Sancta et universalis Synodus anathematizat_."[1]

[Footnote 1: Disput. xv. "De causa formali substantiali," § x. No. 24.]

Moreover, if the animal nature of man was the result of evolution, so must that of woman have been. But the Catholic doctrine, according to Suarez, is that woman was, in the strictest and most literal sense of the words, made out of the rib of man.

"Nihilominus sententia Catholica est, verba illa Scripturae
esse ad literam intelligenda. AC PROINDE VERE, AC REALITER,
TULISSE DEUM COSTAM ADAE, ET, EX ILLA, CORPUS EVAE
FORMASSE."[1]

[Footnote 1: "Tractatus de Opere," Lib. III. "De hominis creatione," cap. ii. No. 3.]

Nor is there any escape in the supposition that some woman existed before Eve, after the fashion of the Lilith of the rabbis; since Suarez qualifies that notion, along with some other Judaic imaginations, as simply "damnabilis."[1]

[Footnote 1: Ibid. Lib. III. cap. iv. Nos. 8 and 9.]

After the perusal of the "Tractatus de Opere" it is, in fact, impossible to admit that Suarez held any opinion respecting the origin of species, except such as is consistent with the strictest and most literal interpretation of the words of Genesis. For Suarez, it is Catholic doctrine, that the world was made in six natural days. On the first of these days the _materia prima_ was made out of nothing, to receive afterwards those "substantial forms" which moulded it into the universe of things; on the third day, the ancestors of all living plants suddenly came into being, full-grown, perfect, and possessed of all the properties which now distinguish them; while, on the fifth and sixth days, the ancestors of all existing animals were similarly caused to exist in their complete and perfect state, by the infusion of their appropriate material substantial forms into the matter which had already been created. Finally on the sixth day, the _anima rationalis_--that rational and immortal substantial form which is peculiar to man--was created out of nothing, and "breathed into" a mass of matter which, till then, was mere dust of the earth, and so man arose. But the species man was represented by a solitary male individual, until the Creator took out one of his ribs and fashioned it into a female.

This is the view of the "Genesis of Species," held by Suarez to be the only one consistent with Catholic faith: it is because he holds this view to be Catholic that he does not hesitate to declare St. Augustin unsound, and St. Thomas Aquinas guilty of weakness, when the one swerved from this view and the other tolerated the deviation. And, until responsible Catholic authority--say, for example, the Archbishop of Westminster--formally declares that Suarez was wrong, and that Catholic priests are free to teach their flocks that the world was _not_ made in six natural days, and that plants and animals were _not_ created in their perfect and complete state, but have been evolved by natural processes through long ages from certain germs in which they were potentially contained, I, for one, shall feel bound to believe that the doctrines of Suarez are the only ones which are sanctioned by Infallible Authority, as represented by the Holy Father and the Catholic Church.

I need hardly add that they are as absolutely denied and repudiated by Scientific Authority, as represented by Reason and Fact. The question whether the earth and the immediate progenitors of its present living population were made in six natural days or not, is no longer one upon which two opinions can be held.

The fact that it did not so come into being stands upon as sound a basis as any fact of history whatever. It is not true that existing plants and animals came into being within three days of the creation of the earth out of nothing, for it is certain that innumerable generations of other plants and animals lived upon the earth before its present population. And when, Sunday after Sunday, men who profess to be our instructors in righteousness read out the statement, "In six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is," in innumerable churches, they are either propagating what they may easily know, and, therefore, are bound to know, to be falsities; or, if they use the words in some non-natural sense, they fall below the moral standard of the much-abused Jesuit.

Thus far the contradiction between Catholic verity and Scientific verity is complete and absolute, quite independently of the truth or falsehood of the doctrine of evolution. But, for those who hold the doctrine of evolution, all the Catholic verities about the creation of living beings must be no less false. For them, the assertion that the progenitors of all existing plants were made on the third day, of animals on the fifth and sixth days, in the forms they now present, is simply false. Nor can they admit that man was made suddenly out of the dust of the earth; while it would be an insult to ask an evolutionist whether he credits the preposterous fable respecting the fabrication of woman to which Suarez pins his faith. If Suarez has rightly stated Catholic doctrine, then is evolution utter heresy. And such I believe it to be. In addition to the truth of the doctrine of evolution, indeed, one of its greatest merits in my eyes, is the fact that it occupies a position of complete and irreconcilable antagonism to that vigorous and consistent enemy of the highest intellectual, moral, and social life of mankind--the Catholic Church. No doubt, Mr. Mivart, like other putters of new wine into old bottles, is actuated by motives which are worthy of respect, and even of sympathy; but his attempt has met with the fate which the Scripture prophesies for all such.

Catholic theology, like all theologies which are based upon the assumption of the truth of the account of the origin of things given in the Book of Genesis, being utterly irreconcilable with the doctrine of evolution, the student of science, who is satisfied that the evidence upon which the doctrine of evolution rests, is incomparably stronger and better than that upon which the supposed authority of the Book of Genesis rests, will not trouble himself further with these theologies, but will confine his attention to such arguments against the view he holds as are based upon purely scientific data--and by scientific data I do not merely mean the truths of physical, mathematical, or logical science, but those of moral and metaphysical science. For, by science, I understand all knowledge which rests upon evidence and reasoning of a like character to that which claims our assent to ordinary scientific propositions. And if any one is able to make good the assertion that his theology rests upon valid evidence and sound reasoning, then it appears to me that such theology will take its place as a part of science.

The present antagonism between theology and science does not arise from any assumption by the men of science that all theology must necessarily be excluded from science; but simply because they are unable to allow that reason and morality have two weights and two measures; and that the belief in a proposition, because authority tells you it is true, or because you wish to believe it, which is a high crime and misdemeanour when the subject matter of reasoning is of one kind, becomes under the _alias_ of "faith" the greatest of all virtues, when the subject matter of reasoning is of another kind.

The Bishop of Brechin said well the other day:--"Liberality in religion--I do not mean tender and generous allowances for the mistakes of others--is only unfaithfulness to truth."[1] And, with the same qualification, I venture to paraphrase the Bishop's dictum: "Ecclesiasticism in science is only unfaithfulness to truth."

[Footnote 1: Charge at the Diocesan Synod of Brechin. _Scotsman_, Sept. 14, 1871.]

Elijah's great question, "Will you serve God or Baal? Choose ye," is uttered audibly enough in the ears of every one of us as we come to manhood. Let every man who tries to answer it seriously, ask himself whether he can be satisfied with the Baal of authority, and with all the good things his worshippers are promised in this world and the next. If he can, let him, if he be so inclined, amuse himself with such scientific implements as authority tells him are safe and will not cut his fingers; but let him not imagine he is, or can be, both a true son of the Church and a loyal soldier of science.

And, on the other hand, if the blind acceptance of authority appears to him in its true colours, as mere private judgment _in excelsis_, and if he have the courage to stand alone, face to face with the abyss of the Eternal and Unknowable, let him be content, once for all, not only to renounce the good things promised by "Infallibility," but even to bear the bad things which it prophesies; content to follow reason and fact in singleness and honesty of purpose, wherever they may lead, in the sure faith that a hell of honest men will, to him, be more endurable than a paradise full of angelic shams.

Mr. Mivart asserts that "without a belief in a personal God, there is no religion worthy of the name." This is a matter of opinion. But it may be asserted, with less reason to fear contradiction, that the worship of a personal God, who, on Mr. Mivart's hypothesis, must have used language studiously calculated to deceive His creatures and worshippers, is "no religion worthy of the name." "Incredibile est, Deum illis verbis ad populum fuisse locutum quibus deciperetur," is a verdict in which, for once, Jesuit casuistry concurs with the healthy moral sense of all mankind.

Having happily got quit of the theological aspect of evolution, the supporter of that great truth who turns to the scientific objections which are brought against it by recent criticism, finds, to his relief, that the work before him is greatly lightened by the spontaneous retreat of the enemy from nine-tenths of the territory which he occupied ten years ago. Even the Quarterly Reviewer not only abstains from venturing to deny that evolution has taken place, but he openly admits that Mr. Darwin has forced on men's minds "a recognition of the probability, if not more, of evolution, and of the certainty of the action of natural selection" (p. 49).

I do not quite see, myself, how, if the action of natural selection is _certain_, the occurrence of evolution is only _probable_; inasmuch as the development of a new species by natural selection is, so far as it goes, evolution. However, it is not worth while to quarrel with the precise terms of a sentence which shows that the high watermark of intelligence among those most respectable of Britons, the readers of the _Quarterly Review_, has now reached such a level that the next tide may lift them easily and pleasantly on the once-dreaded shore of evolution. Nor, having got there, do they seem likely to stop, until they have reached the inmost heart of that great region, and accepted the ape ancestry of, at any rate, the body of man. For the Reviewer admits that Mr. Darwin can be said to have established:

"That if the various kinds of lower animals have been evolved
one from the other by a process of natural generation or
evolution, then it becomes highly probable, _à priori_, that
man's body has been similarly evolved; but this, in such a
case, becomes equally probable from the admitted fact that he
is an animal at all" (p. 65).

From the principles laid down in the last sentence, it would follow that if man were constructed upon a plan as different from that of any other animal as that of a sea-urchin is from that of a whale, it would be "equally probable" that he had been developed from some other animal as it is now, when we know that for every bone, muscle, tooth, and even pattern of tooth, in man, there is a corresponding bone, muscle, tooth, and pattern of tooth, in an ape. And this shows one of two things--either that the Quarterly Reviewer's notions of probability are peculiar to himself; or, that he has such an overpowering faith in the truth of evolution, that no extent of structural break between one animal and another is sufficient to destroy his conviction that evolution has taken place.

But this by the way. The importance of the admission that there is nothing in man's physical structure to interfere with his having been evolved from an ape, is not lessened because it is grudgingly made and inconsistently qualified. And instead of jubilating over the extent of the enemy's retreat, it will be more worth while to lay siege to his last stronghold--the position that there is a distinction in kind between the mental faculties of man and those of brutes; and that, in consequence of this distinction in kind, no gradual progress from the mental faculties of the one to those of the other can have taken place.

The Quarterly Reviewer entrenches himself within formidable-looking psychological outworks, and there is no getting at him without attacking them one by one.

He begins by laying down the following proposition: "'Sensation' is not 'thought,' and no amount of the former would constitute the most rudimentary condition of the latter, though sensations supply the conditions for the existence of 'thought' or 'knowledge'" (p. 67).

This proposition is true, or not, according to the sense in which the word "thought" is employed. Thought is not uncommonly used in a sense co-extensive with consciousness, and, especially, with those states of consciousness we call memory. If I recall the impression made by a colour or an odour, and distinctly remember blueness or muskiness, I may say with perfect propriety that I "think of" blue or musk; and, so long as the thought lasts, it is simply a faint reproduction of the state of consciousness to which I gave the name in question, when it first became known to me as a sensation.

Now, if that faint reproduction of a sensation, which we call the memory of it, is properly termed a thought, it seems to me to be a somewhat forced, proceeding to draw a hard and fast line of demarcation between thoughts and sensations. If sensations are not rudimentary thoughts, it may be said that some thoughts are rudimentary sensations. No amount of sound constitutes an echo, but for all that no one would pretend that an echo is something of totally different nature from a sound. Again, nothing can be looser, or more inaccurate, than the assertion that "sensations supply the conditions for the existence of thought or knowledge." If this implies that sensations supply the conditions for the existence of our memory of sensations or of our thoughts about sensations, it is a truism which it is hardly worth while to state so solemnly. If it implies that sensations supply anything else, it is obviously erroneous. And if it means, as the context would seem to show it does, that sensations are the subject-matter of all thought or knowledge, then it is no less contrary to fact, inasmuch as our emotions, which constitute a large part of the subject-matter of thought or of knowledge, are not sensations.

More eccentric still is the Quarterly Reviewer's next piece of psychology.

"Altogether, we may clearly distinguish at least six kinds of
action to which the nervous system ministers:--

"I. That in which impressions received result in appropriate
movements without the intervention of sensation or thought, as
in the cases of injury above given.--This is the reflex action
of the nervous system.

"II. That in which stimuli from without result in sensations
through the agency of which their due effects are wrought
out--Sensation.

"III. That in which impressions received result in
sensations which give rise to the observation of sensible
objects.--Sensible perception.

"IV. That in which sensations and perceptions continue to
coalesce, agglutinate, and combine in more or less complex
aggregations, according to the laws of the association of
sensible perceptions.--Association.

"The above four groups contain only indeliberate operations,
consisting, as they do at the best, but of mere _presentative_
sensible ideas in no way implying any reflective or
_representative_ faculty. Such actions minister to and form
_Instinct_. Besides these, we may distinguish two other kinds
of mental action, namely:--

"V. That in which sensations and sensible perceptions are
reflected on by thought, and recognized as our own, and
we ourselves recognized by ourselves as affected and
perceiving.--Self-consciousness.

"VI. That in which we reflect upon our sensations or
perceptions, and ask what they are, and why they are.--Reason.

"These two latter kinds of action are deliberate operations,
performed, as they are, by means of representative ideas
implying the use of a _reflective representative_ faculty.
Such actions distinguish the _intellect_ or rational faculty.
Now, we assert that possession in perfection of all the first
four _(presentative)_ kinds of action by no means implies
the possession of the last two _(representative)_ kinds.
All persons, we think, must admit the truth of the following
proposition:--

"Two faculties are distinct, not in degree but _in kind_,
if we may possess the one in perfection without that fact
implying that we possess the other also. Still more will
this be the case if the two faculties tend to increase in
an inverse ratio. Yet this is the distinction between the
_instinctive_ and the _intellectual_ parts of man's nature.

"As to animals, we fully admit that they may possess all the
first four groups of actions--that they may have, so to speak,
mental images of sensible objects combined in all degrees of
complexity, as governed by the laws of association. We deny to
them, on the other hand, the possession of the last two
kinds of mental action. We deny them, that is, the power of
reflecting on their own existence, or of inquiring into the
nature of objects and their causes. We deny that they know
that they know or know themselves in knowing. In other words,
we deny them _reason_. The possession of the presentative
faculty, as above explained, in no way implies that of the
reflective faculty; nor does any amount of direct operation
imply the power of asking the reflective question before
mentioned, as to 'what' and 'why.'" _(Loc. cit_. pp. 67, 68.)

Sundry points are worthy of notice in this remarkable account of the intellectual powers. In the first place the Reviewer ignores emotion and volition, though they are no inconsiderable "kinds of action to which the nervous system ministers," and memory has a place in his classification only by implication. Secondly, we are told that the second "kind of action to which the nervous system ministers" is "that in which stimuli from without result in sensations through the agency of which their due effects are wrought out.--Sensation." Does this really mean that, in the writer's opinion, "sensation" is the "agent" by which the "due effect" of the stimulus, which gives rise to sensation, is "wrought out"? Suppose somebody runs a pin into me. The "due effect" of that particular stimulus will probably be threefold; namely, a sensation of pain, a start, and an interjectional expletive. Does the Quarterly Reviewer really think that the "sensation" is the "agent" by which the other two phenomena are wrought out?

But these matters are of little moment to anyone but the Reviewer and those persons who may incautiously take their physiology, or psychology, from him. The really interesting point is this, that when he fully admits that animals "may possess all the first four groups of actions," he grants all that is necessary for the purposes of the evolutionist. For he hereby admits that in animals "impressions received result in sensations which give rise to the observation of sensible objects," and that they have what he calls "sensible perception." Nor was it possible to help the admission; for we have as much reason to ascribe to animals, as we have to attribute to our fellow-men, the power, not only of perceiving external objects as external, and thus practically recognizing the difference between the self and the not-self; but that of distinguishing between like and unlike, and between simultaneous and successive things. When a gamekeeper goes out coursing with a greyhound in leash, and a hare crosses the field of vision, he becomes the subject of those states of consciousness we call visual sensation, and that is all he receives from without. Sensation, as such, tells him nothing whatever about the cause of these states of consciousness; but the thinking faculty instantly goes to work upon the raw material of sensation furnished to it through the eye, and gives rise to a train of thoughts. First comes the thought that there is an object at a certain distance; then arises another thought--the perception of the likeness between the states of consciousness awakened by this object to those presented by memory, as, on some former occasion, called up by a hare; this is succeeded by another thought of the nature of an emotion--namely, the desire to possess the hare; then follows a longer or shorter train of other thoughts, which end in a volition and an act--the loosing of the greyhound from the leash. These several thoughts are the concomitants of a process which goes on in the nervous system of the man. Unless the nerve-elements of the retina, of the optic nerve, of the brain, of the spinal chord, and of the nerves of the arms went through certain physical changes in due order and correlation, the various states of consciousness which have been enumerated would not make their appearance. So that in this, as in all other intellectual operations, we have to distinguish two sets of successive changes--one in the physical basis of consciousness, and the other in consciousness itself; one set which may, and doubtless will, in course of time, be followed through all their complexities by the anatomist and the physicist, and one of which only the man himself can have immediate knowledge.

As it is very necessary to keep up a clear distinction between these two processes, let the one be called _neurosis_, and the other _psychosis_. When the gamekeeper was first trained to his work, every step in the process of neurosis was accompanied by a corresponding step in that of psychosis, or nearly so. He was conscious of seeing something, conscious of making sure it was a hare, conscious of desiring to catch it, and therefore to loose the greyhound at the right time, conscious of the acts by which he let the dog out of the leash. But with practice, though the various steps of the neurosis remain--for otherwise the impression on the retina would not result in the loosing of the dog--the great majority of the steps of the psychosis vanish, and the loosing of the dog follows unconsciously, or as we say, without thinking about it, upon the sight of the hare. No one will deny that the series of acts which originally intervened between the sensation and the letting go of the dog were, in the strictest sense, intellectual and rational operations. Do they cease to be so when the man ceases to be conscious of them? That depends upon what is the essence and what the accident of those operations, which, taken together, constitute ratiocination.

Now ratiocination is resolvable into predication, and predication consists in marking, in some way, the existence, the co-existence, the succession, the likeness and unlikeness, of things or their ideas. Whatever does this, reasons; and if a machine produces the effects of reason, I see no more ground for denying to it the reasoning power, because it is unconscious, than I see for refusing to Mr. Babbage's engine the title of a calculating machine on the same grounds.

Thus it seems to me that a gamekeeper reasons, whether he is conscious or unconscious, whether his reasoning is carried on by neurosis alone, or whether it involves more or less psychosis. And if this is true of the gamekeeper, it is also true of the greyhound. The essential resemblances in all points of structure and function, so far as they can be studied, between the nervous system of the man and that of the dog, leave no reasonable doubt that the processes which go on in the one are just like those which take place in the other. In the dog, there can be no doubt that the nervous matter which lies between the retina and the muscles undergoes a series of changes, precisely analogous to those which, in the man, give rise to sensation, a train of thought, and volition.

Whether this neurosis is accompanied by such psychosis as ours, it is impossible to say; but those who deny that the nervous changes, which, in the dog, correspond with those which underlie thought in a man, are accompanied by consciousness, are equally bound to maintain that those nervous changes in the dog, which correspond with those which underlie sensation in a man, are also unaccompanied by consciousness. In other words, if there is no ground for believing that a dog thinks, neither is there any for believing that he feels.

As is well known, Descartes boldly faced this dilemma, and maintained that all animals were mere machines and entirely devoid of consciousness. But he did not deny, nor can anyone deny, that in this case they are reasoning machines, capable of performing all those operations which are performed by the nervous system of man when he reasons. For even supposing that in man, and in man only, psychosis is superadded to neurosis--the neurosis which is common to both man and animal gives their reasoning processes a fundamental unity. But Descartes's position is open to very serious objections, if the evidence that animals feel is insufficient to prove that they really do so. What is the value of the evidence which leads one to believe that one's fellow-man feels? The only evidence in this argument of analogy, is the similarity of his structure and of his actions to one's own. And if that is good enough to prove that one's fellow-man feels, surely it is good enough to prove that an ape feels. For the differences of structure and function between men and apes are utterly insufficient to warrant the assumption, that while men have those states of consciousness we call sensations, apes have nothing of the kind. Moreover, we have as good evidence that apes are capable of emotion and volition as we have that men other than ourselves are. But if apes possess three out of the four kinds of states of consciousness which we discover in ourselves, what possible reason is there for denying them the fourth? If they are capable of sensation, emotion, and volition, why are they to be denied thought (in the sense of predication)?

No answer has ever been given to these questions. And as the law of continuity is as much opposed, as is the common sense of mankind, to the notion that all animals are unconscious machines, it may safely be assumed that no sufficient answer ever will be given to them.

There is every reason to believe that consciousness is a function of nervous matter, when, that nervous matter has attained a certain degree of organization, just as we know the other "actions to which the nervous system ministers," such as reflex action and the like, to be. As I have ventured to state my view of the matter elsewhere, "our thoughts are the expression of molecular changes in that matter of life which is the source of our other vital phenomena."

Mr. Wallace objects to this statement in the following terms:--

"Not having been able to find any clue in Professor Huxley's
writings to the steps by which he passes from those vital
phenomena, which consist only, in their last analysis, of
movements by particles of matter, to those other phenomena
which we term thought, sensation, or consciousness; but,
knowing that so positive an expression of opinion from him
will have great weight with many persons, I shall endeavour
to show, with as much brevity as is compatible with clearness,
that this theory is not only incapable of proof, but is also,
as it appears to me, inconsistent with accurate conceptions of
molecular physics."

With all respect for Mr. Wallace, it appears to me that his remarks are entirely beside the question. I really know nothing whatever, and never hope to know anything, of the steps by which the passage from molecular movement to states of consciousness is effected; and I entirely agree with the sense of the passage which he quotes from Professor Tyndall, apparently imagining that it is in opposition to the view I hold.

All that I have to say is, that, in my belief, consciousness and molecular action are capable of being expressed by one another, just as heat and mechanical action are capable of being expressed in terms of one another. Whether we shall ever be able to express consciousness in foot-pounds, or not, is more than I will venture to say; but that there is evidence of the existence of some correlation between mechanical motion and consciousness, is as plain as anything can be. Suppose the poles of an electric battery to be connected by a platinum wire. A certain intensity of the current gives rise in the mind of a bystander to that state of consciousness we call a "dull red light"--a little greater intensity to another which we call a "bright red light;" increase the intensity, and the light becomes white; and, finally, it dazzles, and a new state of consciousness arises, which we term pain. Given the same wire and the same nervous apparatus, and the amount of electric force required to give rise to these several states of consciousness will be the same, however often the experiment is repeated. And as the electric force, the light-waves, and the nerve-vibrations caused by the impact of the light-waves on the retina, are all expressions of the molecular changes which are taking place in the elements of the battery; so consciousness is, in the same sense, an expression of the molecular changes which take place in that nervous matter, which is the organ of consciousness.

And, since this, and any number of similar examples that may be required, prove that one form of consciousness, at any rate, is, in the strictest sense, the expression of molecular change, it really is not worth while to pursue the inquiry, whether a fact so easily established is consistent with any particular system of molecular physics or not.