Chapter XVI: Part 16

Despite the imperfection of the geological record, which has been urged as a serious objection to the theory of descent with modification, sensible, intelligent, educated men no longer doubt that species have all changed, and that they have changed in the way required, for they have changed slowly and in a graduated manner. This is clearly seen in the fossil remains from consecutive formations being invariably much more closely allied to each other than are those from widely-separated formations. It is true geological research does not yield those infinitely fine gradations between past and present species which the theory of Natural Selection requires, but when it is remembered that only a small portion of the world has been geologically explored; that only organic beings of certain classes, at least in any great number, can be preserved in a fossil condition; that many species when once formed never undergo any further change, but become extinct without leaving any modified descendants; that dominant and widely-ranging species vary the most and the most frequently, and that varieties are often at first only local, it is not at all surprising that the discovery of intermediate links to any considerable extent should not have been made. Local varieties, as is well known, will not diffuse themselves into other and distant localities until they have become very much modified and improved, and when they have thus diffused themselves, and are discovered in a geological formation, they will appear as if suddenly created there, and will simply be ranked as new species. Besides, formations have often been intermittent in their accumulation, and their duration has probably been shorter than the average duration of specific forms. And as successive formations in most cases are separated from each other by blank intervals of time of considerable length, and as fossiliferous formations thick enough to withstand future degradation can as a general rule be accumulated only where much sediment is laid down in the subsiding bed of the ocean, it follows that during the alternate periods of elevation and of stationary level the record will generally be blank or devoid of fossil remains. During these latter periods there will doubtless be more variability in the forms of life, and during the periods of subsidence a greater amount of extinction. Now, as geology plainly declares that each land has undergone great physical changes, we have a right to expect that organic beings have varied under nature in the same manner as they have varied under domestication, and such have scientific study and research found to be the case. And if there has been any variability under nature, such a fact would seem unaccountable unless Natural Selection, or the Survival of the Fittest, did not come into play. Upon the view that variations have occurred in nature and have been preserved and accumulated by Natural Selection, and not in the ordinary view of independent creation, we can understand why the specific characters, or those by which the species of the same genus differ from each other, should be more variable than the generic characters in which they all agree. Inexplicable as is the occasional appearance of stripes on the shoulders and legs of the different equine species and their hybrids on the theory of creation, yet how simply is the fact explained if we believe that they are all descended from a striped progenitor just as the different domestic breeds of pigeons are descended from the blue and barred rock-pigeons. Why, for example, should the color of a flower be more likely to vary in any one species of a genus, if the other species, supposed to have been created independently, have differently-colored flowers, than if all the species of the genus have the same colored flowers? On the theory that species are only well-marked varieties, of which the characters have become in a high degree permanent, the fact is intelligible, for they have already varied in certain characters since they branched off from a common progenitor, and by these characters they have come to be specifically distinct from each other. Therefore, these same characters would be more likely again to vary than the generic characters which have been inherited without change for an enormous period of time.

Upon the theory of Natural Selection, or the Survival of the Fittest, with its contingencies of extinction and divergence of character, we can see how it is that all past and present organic beings can be arranged within a few classes, in groups subordinate to groups, and with the extinct groups often falling in between the recent groups. We can see how it is that the mutual affinities of the forms within each class are so complex and diversified, and only adaptive characters, though of superior importance to the beings, are of scarcely any significance in classification, while those derived from rudimentary parts, though of no recognized service, are often of high classificatory value, and only embryological characters are frequently the most valuable of all. The real affinities of all organisms, in contradistinction to their adaptive likenesses, are due to inheritance or community of descent. Hence, a natural system of classification is a genealogical arrangement, with the acquired grades of difference, denoted by varieties, species, genera, families, etc., and their lines of descent have to be discovered by the most permanent characters, whatever they may be and how little of vital importance they may possess.

That species are immutable productions, which was until quite recently the current belief by laymen and naturalists, was almost unavoidable so long as the world was considered to be of short duration. But now that some idea has been acquired of the time that has elapsed since the beginning of earth-life, we are too apt to assume, without proof, that the geologic record is so complete, that it would have afforded us some plain evidence of the mutation of species, if they had undergone mutation. But the principal cause of our unwillingness to admit that one species has given birth to other and distinct species, is that we are always slow in admitting any great change of which we do not discern the intermediate steps. Just such a difficulty was felt by many geologists when Lyell first insisted that long lines of inland cliffs had been produced, and great valleys excavated, by the agencies which are still at work in the earth. No effort of mind can adequately grasp the meaning of even ten million of years, nor add up and perceive the full effects of the many slight variations to which species have been subjected during an almost infinite number of generations. The day, however, is not distant, when mankind will have become just as thoroughly convinced that species have been modified during a long course of descent, mainly through the Natural Selection of innumerous successive, slight and favorable variations as they are that the attraction of gravitation is an important element in the maintenance of the harmony that exists among the planetary spheres. That the law of the attraction of gravity, which is perhaps the greatest discovery ever made by man, is subversive of natural and revealed religion, which was at one time maintained by a no more distinguished person than Leibnitz, is now no longer objected to, even though its discoverer was unable to explain what is the essence of the principle he had discovered. No nobler conception of Deity could be entertained than that which attributes to Him the creation of a few original forms capable of self-development into other and needful forms, or the origination _de novo_ of these simple forms from inorganic nature. It places a higher estimate upon His Omnipotence than the belief that He required a fresh act of creation to supply the voids caused by the action of His laws. That science is as yet unable to throw any light on the far higher problem of the essence or origin of life, should constitute no valid objection to the theory of descent.

When all beings are looked upon not as special creations, but as the lineal descendants of some beings that existed long before the first bed of ancient Siluria was deposited, they seem to become ennobled. Judging from the past, we think it safe to conclude that no existing species will transmit its unaltered likeness to a distant futurity. Few, very few living species will transmit progeny of any kind, for the manner in which all organisms are grouped shows that the majority of species in each genus, and all the species in many genera, have left no descendants, but have become utterly extinct. It will only be the common and widely-spread species, belonging to the larger and dominant groups within each class, that will ultimately prevail and procreate new and dominant species. Since all the living forms of life are the lineal descendants of forms that lived long anterior to the Silurian epoch, it is reasonably certain that the ordinary succession by generation has never once been broken, and that no cataclysmic disaster has laid waste the entire world. Therefore, we may look into the future with some confidence of an equally secure and inappreciably enduring earth-life. And as Natural Selection operates solely by and for the good of each being, all corporeal and mental endowments will tend to progress toward perfection.

When we contemplate a tangled bank, with innumerable plants of diverse kinds, and many-voiced birds singing in concert, or waging destruction on manifold insects that are flitting about, or the long, slimy worm that has come up from its underground retreat, we are lost in wonder and admiration, and can only reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different from each other, and so strangely and intricately dependent on each other, have all been evolved by laws that act all around us. These are the laws of Growth with Reproduction; Inheritance, which is almost implied by reproduction; Variability from the action, direct and indirect, of the conditions of life, and from use and disuse; a Ratio of Increase so high as to lead to a Struggle for Existence, and as a consequence to Natural Selection, or Survival of the Fittest, entailing thereby Divergence of Character and the Extinction of less-improved forms. And thus, from the war of nature, and from famine and death, have arisen the higher mammalia, in which man, the _summa summarum_ of life, is included. He occupies the summit, toward which the efforts of millions of buried ages seem to have been tending. There is a grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, originally breathed, by the operation of the natural laws, into one or a few forms of life, and that, while the earth, in obedience to the fixed principle of gravitation, has gone cycling on, endless forms, most beautiful and most wonderful, have been, and are being, evolved from so simple a beginning.

Mammoth, Woolly Rhinoceros, Musk-Sheep and Irish Stag in Background.]

While thus it has been shown that life has been progressive, successive forms of life being the result of modification through descent, those faring the best in the Struggle for Existence surviving, by reason of some advantage, physical or otherwise, gained over their competitors, yet little, bearing specially upon man, has been expressed in this chapter. After he had acquired those intellectual and moral faculties which largely distinguish him from the lower animals in a state of nature, he would have been but little liable to have his bodily structure modified through Natural Selection or any other means, for man is enabled, through his mental faculties, “to keep with an unchanged body in harmony with the changing universe.” He has a most wonderful power of adapting his habits to altered conditions of life. Tools, weapons and various devices are invented by him for the procurement of food and bodily defence. And when he migrates into a colder climate, he uses clothes, builds sheds and makes fire, and by its aid cooks food that would otherwise be indigestible. The lower animals, however, must have their bodily structure modified in order to survive under greatly changed conditions. They must be rendered stronger, or acquire more effective teeth or claws, or both, if they would successfully defend themselves from new enemies, or they must be reduced in proportions, so as to escape detection and danger. When they remove into colder climates they must become clothed in thicker fur, or have their constitutions altered, for failure to be thus modified must ultimately result in their ceasing to exist. But in the case of man’s intellectual and moral faculties, as has been shown by Wallace, it is widely different. These faculties are quite variable, and there is reason to believe that the variations tend to be inherited. Therefore, if they were formerly of high importance to palæolithic man and his ape-like progenitors, they would have been perfected or advanced through Natural Selection. But of the high importance of the intellectual faculties there can be no question, for man owes to them in a great measure his preëminent position in the world. It can be seen that, in the rudest state of society, the individuals who were the most sagacious, and who were the most skilful in the invention of weapons or traps, and who were the best able to defend themselves, would rear the greatest number of offspring, and that the tribes which included the largest number of men possessed of such superior endowments would increase in number and eventually supplant the other tribes. Numbers depend primarily on the means of subsistence, and this on the physical nature of the country, but in a much higher degree upon the arts therein practised. As a tribe increases and is victorious, it is often still further increased by the absorption of other tribes, and after a time the tribes which are thus absorbed into another tribe assume, as has been remarked by Mr. Maine in his “Ancient Law,” that they are the co-descendants of the same ancestors. Stature and strength in the men of a tribe are also of importance in its success, and these are dependent in part upon the character and the quantity of food that can be obtained. Men of the Bronze Period in Europe were supplanted by a larger-handed and more powerful race, but their success was probably due in a much higher degree to their superiority in the arts. All that is known by savages, as inferred from their traditions and from old monuments, shows that from the most remote times successful tribes have supplanted others. Relics of extinct tribes have been found on the wild plains of America and on the isolated islands in the Pacific Ocean. Civilized nations are everywhere at the present time supplanting barbarous peoples, excepting where climate opposes a fatal barrier, and they thus succeed in a great measure, though not exclusively, through the arts, which are the products of the intellect. With mankind, then, it is highly probable that the intellectual faculties have been gradually perfected through Natural Selection. Undoubtedly it would have been interesting to have traced the development of each separate faculty from the state in which it exists in the lower animals to that in which it exists in man, but this would have been a task of no easy accomplishment. As soon, however, as the progenitors of man became social, and this probably occurred at a very early period, the advancement of the intellectual faculties would have been aided and modified in an important manner, for if one man in a tribe, more sagacious than his fellows, had invented a new snare or a weapon, or other means of attack or defence, the plainest self-interest, with no great help of reasoning power, would have prompted the other members to have imitated him, and thus all would have been profited. Habitual practice of each new art must likewise in some slight degree strengthen the intellect. If the new invention were an important one, the tribe would increase in numbers, spread and supplant other tribes, and thus rendered stronger numerically there would be a better chance of the birth of other superior and inventive members. Should these last be so fortunate as to leave children to inherit their mental superiority, the chance of the birth of still more ingenious members would be somewhat better, and in a very small tribe would be decidedly better.

That primeval man, or his ape-like progenitors, should have become social, they must have acquired the same instinctive feelings which impel other animals to live in a body, and they doubtless exhibited the same general disposition. When separated from their companions, for whom they would have felt some degree of love, they would have experienced a feeling of uneasiness. They would have warned each other of danger, and have given mutual aid in attack or defence. All this implies some degree of sympathy, fidelity and courage. Such social qualities, whose paramount importance to the lower animals is undisputed, were doubtless acquired by the progenitors of men in a similar manner, namely, through Natural Selection, aided by inherited habit. In the never-ceasing wars of savages, fidelity and courage are all-important, and certainly when two tribes of primeval man, living in the same country, came into competition, the one that contained the greatest number of courageous, sympathetic and faithful members, who were ever ready to warn each other of danger, and to assist and defend each other, would without doubt succeed the best and conquer the other. The advantage which disciplined soldiers have over undisciplined hordes follows mainly from the confidence which each soldier has in his comrades. Obedience is of the highest importance, for any form of government is better than none. Selfish and contentious people will not cohere, and without coherence nothing can be effected. Thus, a tribe possessing these qualities in an eminent degree would spread and be victorious over other tribes. But, in the course of events, or all past history is a myth, this successful tribe would in its turn be overcome by some other more highly-endowed tribe; and thus would the social and moral qualities tend slowly to advance and be diffused throughout the world.

Praise and the blame of our fellow-men are much more powerful stimuli to the development of the social qualities. These virtues are primarily due to the instinct of sympathy, and this instinct, like all other social instincts, was doubtlessly acquired through Natural Selection. How early man’s progenitors, in the course of their development, became capable of feeling and being impelled by the praise or blame of their fellow-men, we are unable to say. Even dogs appreciate encouragement, praise and blame, and it would be strange if such could not be predicated of beings higher in the scale. The wildest savages feel the sentiment of glory. This is clearly shown by their preservation of the trophies of their bravery, by their habit of excessive boasting, and even by the extreme care they take of their personal appearance and adornments. Unless, however, they regarded the opinion of their comrades, such habits would be without meaning and senseless. How far the savage experiences remorse, is doubtful. He certainly feels shame and contrition for the breach of some of the lesser rules of his tribe. It is true that remorse is a deeply-hidden feeling, but it is hardly credible that a being who will sacrifice his life rather than betray his tribe, or give himself up as a prisoner rather than violate his parole, would not feel remorse, though he might, if he failed in a duty which he held sacred, hide it from view.

Primeval man must have been, at a very remote time, influenced by the praise and blame of his fellows. That the members of the same tribe would approve of conduct that appeared for the general good, and reprobate such as seemed to carry with it evil, there can be no question. To do good unto others, or to do unto others as you would that they should do unto you, is the foundation-stone of morality. It is, therefore, hardly possible to place too high an estimate upon the importance of the love of praise and fear of blame during rude, barbaric times, for a man, who was not impelled by any profound instinctive feeling to sacrifice his life for the good of others, but who was raised to such a noble action by a sense of glory, would by his example excite a similar wish for glory in the bosoms of other men, and would thereby engender and strengthen by exercise the laudable feeling of admiration. With increased experience and reason, those more remote consequences of his actions, such as temperance, chastity, etc., which during his very early times were utterly disregarded, would come to be highly esteemed or even held sacred. And ultimately there would have been developed from the social instincts a highly-complex sentiment which, largely guided by the approbation of his fellow-men, and ruled by reason, self-interest, and latterly by deep religious feelings, confirmed by teaching and habit, would constitute his moral sense or conscience. Although a high standard of morality gives but little if any advantage to each individual man and his children over the other men of the same tribe, yet it must be borne in mind that it is an advancement in the standard of morality and an increase in the number of well-endowed men that certainly give a telling advantage to a tribe over another, for the tribe that includes many members who, from possessing in an eminent degree the spirit of patriotism, fidelity, obedience, courage and sympathy, and who were always prepared to give aid to each other, and to sacrifice themselves for the common weal, would be victorious over most other tribes. And this would be Natural Selection. Tribes at all times throughout the world have supplanted other tribes. Now, as morality is one element in their success, the standard of morality and the number of well-endowed men will thus everywhere tend to rise and increase.

Very difficult it is to form any judgment why one particular tribe and not another has been successful in the Struggle for Existence and has risen in the scale of civilization. Many savages are still in the same condition of degradation as when first discovered. The greatest part of mankind has never evinced the slightest desire that their civil institutions should be improved. Progress is not, as we are apt to consider, the normal rule in human society. Many concurrent favorable conditions, far too complex to be followed out, seem to determine human progress. A cool climate, it has been remarked, by leading to industry and the various arts, has been indispensable thereto, but if the climate has been too severe, as in the Arctic regions, there is a check to continual progress. Pressed by hard necessity, the Esquimaux have succeeded in many ingenious inventions, but they can never attain, for the reason already assigned, to any very great success. Nomadic habits, whether along the shores of the sea, or over wide plains, or through dense tropical forests, have in all cases proved detrimental. Perhaps, the possession of some property, a fixed abode, and the union of many families under a leader or chief, are indispensable requisites for civilization, as such habits almost necessitate the cultivation of the ground. From some such accident as the falling of the seeds of a fruit-tree on a heap of refuse and producing an unusually fine variety may probably have resulted the first steps in cultivation, for if the fruit were profitable and good for food, it would be a very dull intellect that could not readily perceive, especially among a people that had given up a roving habit of life, the advantage which would accrue from the planting of some more trees of a similar kind. They would undoubtedly be led to cultivation for themselves by a simple observation of the plan by which nature contrives in keeping up a continuation of her many kinds of plants. Instead of dropping the seeds upon the ground as nature is prone to do, and trusting to their burial by accident or otherwise, seeing the advantage to be gained by burying them out of the reach of noxious influences, whether of climate or animal life, they would soon learn to take the matter of planting under their own watchful care rather than leave it to the seemingly thoughtless provision of nature. But the problem of the first advance of palæolithic man toward civilization, is at present much too difficult to be solved, for it involves the consideration of certain elements which we know too little about, and their disentanglement from others whose value is of recognized significance in the domain of biological science.

While it has been shown how it has been possible for primeval man to have acquired a moral sense or conscience, yet it must not be forgotten that the lower animals, at least such as have come under the civilizing influence of man, have also come into possession of the same highly complex sentiment which has been of such inestimable service to man for his progressive advancement. Other faculties, such as the powers of imagination, wonder, curiosity, an undefined sense of beauty, a tendency to imitation, and the love of excitement or novelty, have also been of immense importance in this direction, for they could not fail to have led to the most capricious changes of customs and fashions. Caprice, it has been rather oddly claimed by a recent writer, is “one of the most remarkable and typical differences between savages and brutes.” It is not only possible to perceive how it is that man is capricious, but the lower animals, as has been previously shown, are capricious in their affections, aversions and sense of beauty. And there is good reason to suspect that they love novelty for its own sake. Self-consciousness, individuality, abstraction, general ideas, etc., which have been held by several recent writers as making the sole and complete distinction between man and the brutes, seem useless subjects for discussion, since hardly any two authors agree in their definitions of these high faculties. In man, such faculties could not have been fully developed until his mental powers had advanced to a high state of perfection, and this implies the use of a highly-developed language. No one supposes that one of the lower animals reflects whence he comes or whither he goes, or what is death or what is life, but can one feel sure that an old dog with an excellent memory, and some power of imagination as shown by his dreams, never reflects on his past pleasures in the chase? And this would be a form of self-consciousness. On the contrary, as Büchner ably remarks, how little can the hard-worked wife of an Australian savage who scarcely uses any abstract words and whose ability to count does not extend beyond four, exert her self-consciousness, or reflect on the origin, nature and aim of her own existence. That animals retain their mental individuality is unquestioned, for when any voice awakens a train of old associations in the mind of some favorite dog, as in the case of my dog Frisky, already referred to, he must have retained his mental individuality, although every atom of his brain had probably undergone change more than once during the five or six years he lived in my family. Animals have some ideas of numbers. The crow has been known to count as far as the number six, and a dog I once had knew as well as I did when Saturday came. The sense of beauty, which has been declared peculiar to man, is innate in birds. Certain bright colors and certain sounds, when in harmony, excite in them pleasure as they do in man. The taste for the beautiful, at least so far as female beauty is concerned, is not of a special nature in the human mind, for it differs widely in the different races of man, and is not quite the same even in the different nations of the same race. If we are to judge from the hideous ornaments and the equally hideous music admired by most savages, it might be urged that their æsthetic faculty was less highly developed than it is in some species of birds. No animal, it is obvious, would be capable of admiring the nocturnal heaven, a beautiful landscape, or refined music. And this should not be wondered at, for such high tastes, dependent as they are upon culture and complex associations, are not even enjoyed by barbarous or by uneducated persons.

Seeing that man in a state of nature has no preëminence above the lower animals so far as his mental and moral qualities are concerned, and in many instances ranks far below the so-called brute, let us examine fora short time his religious nature. No evidence exists to show that man was aboriginally endowed with the ennobling belief in the existence of an Omnipotent God. On the contrary, ample evidence, not from hasty travellers, but from men who have long resided with savages, can be adduced to show that numerous races have existed, and still exist, who have no idea of one or more gods, and who have no words in their languages to express such an idea. If under the term religion is included the belief in unseen or spiritual agencies, the case is entirely different, for this belief seems to be almost universal with the less civilized races. Nor is it difficult to understand how it originated. With the development of the imagination, wonder and curiosity, and of a moderate power of reasoning, man would naturally have craved to understand what was going on around him, and even have vaguely speculated on his own existence. According to McLennan man must, in his efforts to arrive at some explanation of the phenomena of life, feign for himself. Judging from the universality of this life, the same author remarks that “the simplest hypothesis, and the first to occur to men, seems to have been that natural phenomena are ascribable to the presence in animals, plants and things, and in the forces of nature, of such spirits prompting to action as men are conscious they themselves possess.” Probably, as has been clearly shown by Tyler, dreams may have first given rise to the notion of spirits. Savages do not readily discriminate between subjective and objective phenomena. When a savage dreams, the figures which appear in his vision are believed to have come from a distance and to stand over him, or the soul of the dreamer goes out on a journey and returns with a remembrance of what has been seen. That tendency in savages to imagine that natural objects and agencies are animated by living or spiritual beings may be illustrated by a little fact which I have frequently noticed. Standing on the corner of a street, waiting for a closed snow-sweeper, which was driven by electricity, to pass, my attention was directed to a young horse that was geared to a hansom. The horse was at rest, and its driver, evidently awaiting some one, sat upon the box. Upon the appearance of the sweeper the horse reared, turned his face directly toward the object of his fear, pawed the pavement in the most impatient manner possible, and then looked wistfully and pleadingly at his master, as though imploring protection from some fearful and gigantic monster. Another sweeper passed while I was still in waiting, and the poor animal went through the same trying and fearful ordeal as before. He must, I think, have reasoned in a rapid and unconscious manner, that movement without any apparent cause indicated the presence of some strange living agent, which was about to do him some serious physical harm. Belief in spiritual agencies would thus easily pass into a belief in the existence of one or more gods, for savages would naturally ascribe to spirits the same passions, the same line of vengeance or simple form of justice, and the same affections which they themselves experienced.

Religious devotion is a highly complex feeling. Love, complete submission to an exalted and mysterious superior, a strong sense of dependence, fear, reverence, gratitude, hope for the future and other elements enter into its composition. No being could experience so complex an emotion unless his intellectual and moral faculties had attained a moderately high level. Some approach to this high state of mind is visible in the profound love of a dog for his master, for it is associated with complete submission, some fear, reverence, gratitude and perhaps other feelings. A dog’s behavior towards his master, after a long absence, is widely different from that which he shows towards his fellows, for his transports of joy in the latter case are less intense, and his every action savors of a mere sense of equality. But upon his master, as Prof. Braubach goes so far as to maintain, he looks as on a god.

These high mental faculties, which first led man to believe in unseen spiritual agencies, and subsequently in fetishism, polytheism and monotheism, would infallibly lead him, as long as his reasoning powers remained at a very low level, to various strange superstitions and customs, many of which, such as the sacrifice of human beings to a blood-loving god and the trial of innocent persons by the ordeal of poison or fire, are too terrible to contemplate. It is well, however, to reflect occasionally on these superstitions, for they show us what an infinite debt of gratitude we owe to improved reason, science and accumulated knowledge. How much better is the life of civilized man than that of the savage, for as Lubbock has well remarked, “it is not too much to say that the horrible dread of unknown evil hangs like a thick cloud over savage life, and embitters every pleasure.”

From the opinions advanced, it is evident that the belief in God has been the ultimate outcome of belief in unseen spiritual agencies. There has been a gradual leading up through fetishism and polytheism to monotheism. If religion implies belief in unseen agencies, as well as belief in a personal agency in the universe strong enough to influence conduct in any degree, then it is obvious that there has been a progressive advancement in religious thought, each succeeding form of religion by its superior advantages over its predecessor tending to supplant it wherever and whenever its beneficent influences are felt. It is true that fetishism and polytheism still prevail among rude, uncultured peoples, as well as the worship of false deities and prophets, but with the spread of the civilizing and elevating influence of Christianity these religions in the fitness of time will disappear. Christianity, from its foundation in Judaism, has throughout been a religion of sacrifice and sorrow. It has been a religion of blood and tears, and yet one of profoundest happiness to its votaries. While fakirs hang on hooks, and pagans cut themselves and even their children, for the sake of propitiating diabolical deities, yet Christianity, which has its roots in Judaism, has no need for such practices. It is _par excellence_ the religion of sorrow, because it reaches to truer and deeper levels of our spiritual nature, and therefore has capabilities both of sorrow and joy which are presumably non-existent except in civilized man. They are the sorrows and joys which arise from the fully-developed consciousness of sin against a God of Love, as distinguished from propitiation of malignant spirits. These joys and sorrows are wholly spiritual, not merely physical. “Thou desirest no sacrifice.” God’s only sacrifice at the hands of sinful man is a troubled spirit.

Estimated by the influence which He has exerted on mankind, there can be no question, even from a secular point of view, that Christ is much the greatest man who has ever lived. That the revolution which His teachings have effected in human life is immeasurable and unparalleled by any other movement in history is unquestioned. Though most nearly approached by the religion of the Jews, of which it is a development, so that it may be regarded as of a piece with it, it is evident that this whole system of religion is so immeasurably in advance of all others that it may be truthfully said, if it had not been for the Jews, the human race would have had no religion worthy of serious consideration. Had it not been for this religion man’s spiritual side would not have been developed in civilized life. And although there are numberless individuals who are all unconscious of its development in themselves, yet these have been influenced to an enormous extent by the religious atmosphere by which they are surrounded.

Not only is Christianity so immeasurably in advance of all other religions, but it is no less of every other system of thought that has ever been promulgated in regard to what is moral and spiritual. Neither philosophy, science nor poetry has ever produced results in thought, conduct or beauty in any degree comparable with it. What has science or philosophy done for the thought of mankind compared with what has been done by the single doctrine, “God is love?” The Story of the Cross, from its commencement in prophetic aspiration to its culmination in the Gospel, is preëminently the most magnificent presentation in literature. Only to a man wholly destitute of religious perception can Christianity fail to appear the greatest exhibition of the beautiful, the sublime, and of all else that appeals to our spiritual nature, which has ever been known upon the earth. It is not only adapted to men of the highest culture, but the most remarkable thing about it is its perfect adaptation to all sorts and conditions of men. Its problems, historical and philosophical, open up to you worlds of material, over which you may spend your life with the same interminable interest as the student meets in the fields of natural science.

Whatever our theory of the origin of man, there can be no doubt that we all feel that his intellectual part is higher than the animal; and that the moral is higher than the intellectual, whatever our theory of either may be; and that the spiritual is higher than the moral, whatever our theory of religion may be. It is what is understood by his moral, and still more by his spiritual qualities, that make up what is called his character, and, astonishing to say, it is character that tells in the long run. Morality and spirituality are two different things, for a man may be highly moral in conduct without being in any degree spiritual in nature, and the reverse, though to a less extent. Objectively, the same distinction subsists between morals and religion. Intellectual pleasures are more satisfying and enduring than sensual, or even sensuous; and spiritual, to those who have experienced them, than intellectual, an objective fact, abundantly testified to by those who have had experience, which seems to indicate that the spiritual nature of man is the highest part of man--the culminating point of his being. That there will always be materialists and spiritualists, as Renan says, is probably true, inasmuch as it will always be observable on the one hand that there is no thought without brain, while, on the other hand, the instincts of man will always aspire to higher beliefs. If religion is true, and life is a state of probation, this is just what ought to be. It is not probable that the materialistic position, which is discredited even by philosophy, is due simply to custom and a want of imagination. Else why the inextinguishable instincts which we have thus shown to exist?

Things as They Will Exist in a Future Earth-Life.]

Evolution, not only of the earth, but of its organic machinery, by natural causes, is now no longer doubted. That this has taken place by degrees is equally unquestioned. Now, if there is a Deity, the fact is certainly of the nature of a first principle, and it must be first of all first principles. No one can dispute this, nor can any one dispute the necessary conclusion that, if there be a Deity, he is knowable, if knowable at all, by intuition and not by reason. From its very nature, as a little thought is sufficient to show, reason is utterly incapable of adjudicating on the subject, for it is a process of inferring from the known to the unknown. It would be against reason itself to suppose that Deity, even if He exists, can be known by reason. He must be known, if knowable at all, by intuition. If there is a Deity, then it seems to be in some indefinite degree more probable that He should impart a Revelation than that He should not have done so. As a mere matter of evidence, a sudden revelation might be much more convincing than a gradual one, but it would be quite out of analogy with causation in nature. Besides, a gradual one might be given easily, and of demonstrative value, as by making prophecies of historical events, scientific discoveries and other things so clear as to be unmistakable. But a demonstrative revelation has not been made, and there may well be good reasons why it should not have been made. If there are such reasons, as, for example, our state of probation, we can well see “that the gradual unfolding of a plan of revelation, from earliest dawn of history to the end of the world, is much preferable to a sudden manifestation sufficiently late in the world’s history to be historically attested for all subsequent time.” Gradual evolution, as has been said before, is in analogy with God’s other work. If Revelation has been of a progressive character, then it follows that it must have been so not only historically, but intellectually, morally and spiritually, for in such sequence could it be always adapted to the advancing conditions of the human race.

Thus it will be seen that all through the ages some mighty influence has been at work, directly or indirectly, in preparing this earth by slow and gradual changes for a steadily progressive succession of vegetable and animal life. That life best fitted to meet new and changing conditions of environment being preserved by a process of natural selection. And from a few primordial types, far simpler than the lowest of existing structureless moners, or from some living protoplasmic mass, elaborated by some form of energy acting upon inorganic nature, there have been evolved in the millions of years of earth-life our existing flora and fauna. Man, the pinnacle of animal life, has come up through the life that preceded him, and bears in the history of his development from the ovum to the adult state the line of his descent. Not only has his physical nature been evolved through the action of natural laws impressed upon living matter by Deity, but that subtle principle, termed mind, which has attained such a wonderful growth in his civilized condition, is but the outcome of the mind of a long line of life antecedent to his appearance on the globe. His moral nature was similarly acquired, and most probably in the manner already explained. Palæolithic man, like the Australian of to-day, was, as has been shown, but little superior in intelligence to some of the animals with whom he was contemporaneous. He lived the life of the mere animal, and as an animal could be said to have had no preëminence above a beast. Like the latter, he was a living, breathing frame, or body of life; a _living_, but not an _everliving_, soul. In time, as conditions became favorable, he passed _into_ the moral stage of his being, but not without increased intellectuality, and would thus have continued, but going on and adding to his mental and moral possessions, had not Deity, in the fitness of time, prepared the way through Christ, whereby his corruptible nature should be made incorruptible and immortal. Unless man is “born of the spirit” he cannot inherit the kingdom of God. He must be “changed into spirit,” put on incorruptibility and immortality of body, or he will be physically incapable of retaining the honor, glory and power of the kingdom forever, or even during Christ’s reign of a thousand years upon earth.

That there is a distinction between _a living soul_ and a _spiritual body_ cannot be questioned. Speaking about _body_, the apostle Paul says, “there is _a natural body_, and there is _a spiritual body_, but he does not content himself with simply declaring this truth, but goes further and proves it by quoting the language of Moses, saying, “for so it is written, the first man Adam was made into _a living soul_;” and then adding, “the last Adam _into a spirit_ giving life.” And in another place, speaking of the latter, he says of Him, “now the Lord is the spirit. And we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror, the glory of the Lord, are changed into His image from glory into glory, as by _the Lord the Spirit_.” Therefore, the proof of the apostle’s proposition, that there is a _natural body_ as distinct from a _spiritual body_, lies in the testimony that “Adam was made into _a living soul_,” showing that he considered a natural, or animal body, and a living soul, as one and the same thing. If he did not, then there was no proof in the quotation of what he affirmed. Mortality, then, is life manifested through a corruptible body, and immortality is life manifested through an incorruptible body. Hence, the necessity laid down in the saying of the apostle, “this corruptible body must put on incorruption, and this mortal put on immortality,” before death can be “swallowed up in victory,”--a doctrine of “life and incorruptibility” that was new to the Greeks and Romans, and brought to light only through the gospel of the kingdom and name of Jesus Christ. To them it was foolishness, and to many at the present day incredible, because they do not understand the glad tidings of the age to come. God could have created all things upon a spiritual or incorruptible basis at once, but in that case the globe would have been filled with men and women equal to the angels in nature, power and intellect, and hence would have been without a history, and its population characterless. And this would not have been according to His plan, for in it the animal must precede the spiritual just as surely as the acorn must precede the oak. The Bible has to do with things and not with imaginations; with bodies and not phantasms; with _living souls_ of every species; with _corporeal_ beings of other worlds, and with incorruptible and undying men, but is as silent as the grave about such _souls_ as men pretend to cure. For the sons of Adam to become sons of God, they must be the subjects of an adoption, which is attainable only by a divinely appointed means. It must be by a process of selection. “Since by a man came death, by a man also came a resurrection of dead persons. For as in the Adam they all die, so also in the Christ shall they all be made alive. But every one in his order. Christ the first fruits; afterward _they that are Christ’s_ at His coming.” Here it is obvious that the apostle is not writing of all the individuals of the human race, but only such that become the subject of _a pardon of life_. It is true that all men do die, but it is not true that they are all the subject of pardon. Those who are pardoned are “the many,” who are sentenced to live forever. The sentence to pardon of life is through Jesus Christ who in pouring out His blood upon the cross, was made a sacrifice for sin. “He was delivered for our offences, and raised again for our justification,” that is, for the pardon of those _who believe the gospel_. As it is written, “he that believeth the gospel, and is baptized, shall be saved.” Hence, “_the obedience of faith_” is made the condition of righteousness, and this obedience implies the existence of a “_law of faith_,” as attested by that of Moses, which is “_the law of works_.” Having believed the gospel and been baptized, such a person is required to “walk worthy of the vocation,” or calling, “wherewith he has been called,” that by so doing he may be “accounted worthy” of being “born of spirit,” that he may become “spirit,” or a spiritual body, and so enter the kingdom of God, crowned with “glory, honor, incorruptibility and life.” From all the above, it must be obvious to the unbiassed mind, that all will not arise to newness of life, “for as many of you, as have been _baptized into Christ_ have put on Christ, and if ye be Christ’s, _then_ are ye the seed of Abraham, and _heirs_ according to the promise.” When they have been thus baptized, then they have received the spirit of adoption, or have been elected into God’s family, and then they can address God as their Father who is in heaven.

Thus adopted into God’s family through faith in Jesus Christ, it must not be supposed that they have attained to that perfect condition of knowing all that is to be known. New glories will continually open up to their admiring vision, and new facts be revealed through the eternity of futurity. Man will carry his earth-acquired knowledge into the other world, and little by little will he add to his fund. Those who have made the best of their time in their probationary existence, will rank as much above their fellows in the heaven-life as they did in the earth-life, and like the others will reach up to higher acquirements. There will be no equalization of talents, capacities and possessions, but each will be satisfied with his own, and all will endeavor to be as like unto Christ as the conditions of their heavenly environment will permit. There will be grades of ability and character in the new life, but all of the very highest standard when measured by what prevails in the earth-life. This is the teaching of the Scriptures. “_There is_ one glory of the sun, and another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for _one_ star differeth from _another_ star in glory. So also _is_ the resurrection of the dead.”

Now as to the part that animals and plants shall figure in the new existence. Revelation, as has been seen, was given to man. This does not imply that the lower forms of life were not made “partakers of the divine nature.” When man was placed upon this earth, or rather when in the sequence of events, which was brought about by the prescribed scheme of Divinity, he appeared upon the earth, he was given the control of all the creatures of God’s hands, to rule them as his judgment seemed best. They were a necessary part of the plan of creation. God gave the man directions concerning them, and what they are, and we refer to the domesticated species especially, they have thus been made through man’s wise, intelligent and thoughtful selection. This has been the instrument through which God has worked in building up a history and a character for the humbler works of His hands. That they shall pass into the future life with him, at least such as have shown their fitness to endure, there can be no doubt in the mind of any one who pauses a few brief moments in the rush and turmoil of everyday life and considers the matter with all due seriousness. All existence, as we have elsewhere claimed, is a unit. All life, like all love, is divine. There can nothing exist that does not contain some sort of development of soul. There is no escape from this assertion. Instead of isolating ourselves then from the humbler creatures of God’s workmanship, let us recognize them as our kin and include them in the grand scheme of redemption, and as partakers with us in the future state of Divine Love and in higher and endlessly higher development and progress.

MAN’S PREËMINENCE.

There is a popular tradition that somewhere in the Scriptures we are taught that of all living denizens of the earth, man alone possesses a spirit, and that he alone survives in spirit after the death of the material body. Were this the truth, no room would exist for argument to those who profess belief in a literal rendering of the Scriptures, and who base their faith upon that literal belief. However much such a statement might seem to controvert all ideas of benevolence, justice and common-sense, such believers would feel bound to accept it on trust, and to wait a future time for its full comprehension.

Even the possession of reason is denied by many persons to animals, their several actions being ascribed to the power of instinct, and it is therefore not the least bit strange that all but a comparatively few should believe that when an animal dies, its life-principle dies too. The animating power, they claim, is annihilated, while the body is resolved into its constituent elements so as to take form in other bodies.