CREATION BY EVOLUTION
language, to a power of forming general ideas, to greater uprightness of body and mind; and it is very important to realise that a steady advance in brain development, on a line different from that of other mammals, is discernible in the very first monkeyish animals. Man stands apart and is in important ways unique, but he was not an abruptly created novelty. That is not the way in which evolution works. Man, at his best, is a flower on a shoot that has very deep roots. What the evolutionist discloses is man’s solidarity, his kinship, with the rest of creation. And the encouragement we find in this disclosure is twofold. In the first place, though we inherit some coarse strands from pre-human pedigree, it is an ascent, not a descent that we see behind us. In the second place, the evolutionist world is congruent with religious interpretation. It is a world in which the religious man can breathe freely. To take one example: there are great trends discernible in organic evolution, and the greatest of these are toward health and beauty: toward the love of mates, parental care, and family affection; toward self-subordination and kin-sympathy; toward clear-headedness and healthy-mindedness; and the momentum of these trends is with us at our best. And evolution, with these great trends, is going on: Who shall set it limits?
REFERENCES
- Clodd, Edward. Story of Creation.
- Conn, H. W. Method of Creation. 1900.
- Conn, H. W. Method of Evolution.
- Geddes, Patrick, and Thomson, J. Arthur. Evolution. Home University Library. 1911. Geology. Home University Library. 1926.
- Haeckel, Ernst. Natural History of Creation. 1870.
- Jordan, D. S., and Kellogg, V. L. Evolution and Animal Life. 1907.
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