{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_30126/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_30126","id":"gutenberg_30126","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30126","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Category: Teaching & Education","Evolution","Religion and science"],"text":"Transcriber's note:\n\n   Text enclosed between underscores was in italics in the original\n   (_italics_).\n\n   Text enclosed between equal sings was in bold face in the original\n   (=bold=).\n\n   A list of changes made to the text is at the end of the e-book.\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE CHURCH\nTHE SCHOOLS\nand\nEVOLUTION\n\nby\n\nJ. E. CONANT, D.D.\n\nBible Teacher and Evangelist\n\nAuthor of _Why the Pastor Failed_, _Is it Scholarly to Be\nOrthodox?_ _Is Atonement by Substitution Reasonable?_\n_Divine Dynamite_, etc.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nChicago\nThe Bible Institute Colportage Ass'n\n826 North La Salle Street\n\nCopyright, 1922\nby\nJ. E. Conant\n\n\n\n\nFOREWORD\n\n\nThe following pages have grown out of a paper, following the same outline\nmore briefly, which was read before the Pastors' Conference of the San\nJuaquin Valley Baptist Association, the largest association in the Northern\nCalifornia Baptist Convention. At the close of the reading a request for\nits publication was enthusiastically and unanimously voted.\n\nThe author has since divided the paper into two chapters; in the first\nchapter has added to and classified the quotations concerning evolution,\nhas enlarged the remarks on the influence of evolution on Scripture\ndoctrine, and has both enlarged upon and entirely rearranged the matter of\nthe second chapter, in an attempt to make it both more obvious and more\nconclusive to the reader than it was felt to be to the hearers.\n\nThe term \"Church\" in the following pages is intended to cover that\nfellowship, of every name, which includes all who have been really born\nagain. When organized church fellowship is referred to, the whole\nevangelical Protestant fellowship in general is meant, as distinguished\nfrom Roman Catholic, Greek church, or any other non-evangelical faith,\nalthough true Christians are to be found within every fellowship. The term\n\"Schools,\" in its larger meaning, includes all institutions of learning\nmaintained at private, denominational, or public expense; more\nspecifically, those dominated by the present evolutionary philosophy are\nmeant. With notable exceptions in a few schools that refuse to be so\ndominated, the whole educational system in general, especially in the\nNorthern States, has practically capitulated to the evolutionists, and the\nschools that have so surrendered are particularly in mind in the following\ndiscussion.\n\nIt is but a humble effort to point out what is obviously the only possible\nsolution for the present distressing and destructive controversy between\nthe Church and the Schools, but the author fondly hopes that it will prove\nto be a real, even though small, contribution toward the ending of that\ncontroversy.\n\nIt is sent out with the prayer that He who is Truth incarnate may lead\nthose in both the Church and the Schools who really want to know the truth\nat all cost to a common attitude toward Himself, to a common, because truly\nscientific, method of investigating truth in both the natural and the\nspiritual realms, and therefore to a common goal which will unite them\nagainst all those forces that seek to capture both the Church and the\nSchools for the enemy.\n\n                                                              J. E. Conant.\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\n  CHAPTER I\n  THE PRESENT CONTROVERSY--THE CAUSE\n\n                                                                   Page\n\n  I. =The Theory of Evolution is Unproven=                           11\n    1. The Testimony =for= Evolution                                 12\n    2. The Testimony =Against= Evolution\n      a. In the Biological Realm; (i) The Doctrine of Natural\n         Selection; (ii) The Doctrine of Acquired Characters;\n         (iii) The Biogenetic \"Law\"                                  14\n      b. In the Geological Realm                                     19\n      c. The Whole Theory in General                                 20\n\n  II. =The Logic of Evolution is Destructive=                        23\n    1. Evolution and =Inspiration=                                   23\n    2. Evolution and the =Fall of Man=                               26\n    3. Evolution and the =Nature of Sin=                             29\n    4. Evolution and the =Nature of Christ=                          32\n    5. Evolution and the =Atonement=                                 34\n    6. Evolution and the =New Birth=                                 35\n    7. Evolution and the =Holiness of God=                           40\n\n\n  CHAPTER II\n  THE PRESENT CONTROVERSY--THE CURE\n\n  I. =Truth Must be Classified Scientifically=                       46\n    1. The =Realms of Truth= Must be Classified                      46\n    2. The =Faculties of Investigation= Must be Distinguished        47\n    3. The =Different Kinds of Truth= Must be Separated              52\n    4. The =Primacy of Primary Truth= Must be Maintained             52\n\n  II. =Truth Must be Investigated Scientifically=                    55\n    1. =Faith= Must be Given Precedence Over =Reason=                55\n      a. The Method of the Rationalist                               56\n      b. The Method of the Believer                                  61\n    2. The =Spiritual Realm= Must be Given Primacy Over the\n        =Natural=                                                    68\n      a. By Surrendering the Heart to God                            70\n      b. By Interpreting Natural Truth in the Light of the Bible     76\n\n\n\n\nThe Church, the Schools and Evolution\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nThe Present Controversy--the Cause\n\n\nIt must be so self-evident as to be axiomatic that there are two distinct\nrealms in God's universe. One is the realm that contains the Creator, and\nthe other that which contains His creation. Of course, if we are\npantheists, we will not admit that classification; but those who believe\nand accept the Word of God are not pantheists.\n\nIt is inevitable, therefore, that the facts, the verities, the truths of\nthe universe should be classified according to their realms; those having\nto do with the Person and relationships of the Creator being separable into\none realm, and those having to do with His creation into another.\n\nThat this classification is universally recognized, is a matter of common\nknowledge. That class of truth which has to do with God we call\nsupernatural, or spiritual, truth, and that which relates to His creation\nwe call natural, or scientific, truth.\n\nIt is precisely because of this classification that there are two separate\ninstitutions in the world, each of which is working in one of these realms.\nThe =Church= accepts it as her function to receive and propagate spiritual\ntruth, as God has revealed Himself in His character; while the =Schools=\naccept it as their function to study and teach scientific truth, as God has\nrevealed Himself in His works. This is the entire logic of the existence in\nthe world of these two separate institutions, both of which are engaged in\nthe investigation and propagation of truth.\n\nBut although the Church and the Schools are entirely separate institutions,\nand although they are engaged, one in the spread of spiritual truth and the\nother in the diffusion of scientific truth, yet =truth is an eternal\nunity=. This must be so, in the nature of things, for all truth proceeds\nfrom and reveals the one and only God Who is its Source and of Whom it is\nthe consistent and perfect expression.\n\nConflict between these two realms of truth is, therefore, eternally\nimpossible. Men talk of a conflict between science and the Bible, but no\nsuch conflict exists. If there is any contradiction, it is not between the\nstatements of Scripture and the facts of science, but between the false\ninterpretations of Scripture and the immature conclusions of science.\nHerbert Spencer was right when he said:\n\n    It is incredible that there should be two orders\n    of truth in absolute and everlasting opposition.\n\nNot until God begins to contradict Himself will these two realms of truth\never be in conflict with each other.\n\nThe Church and the Schools, then, can never be in conflict until some\nabnormal condition creeps into the one or the other; for, although working\nin different realms of truth, each is yet receiving revelations of the one\nGod who can never be in conflict with Himself.\n\nWhen these two institutions are in normal condition, each will not only not\ndestroy the work of the other, but each will make every possible\ncontribution to the success of the other, and antagonism between them will\nbe impossible. When conflict occurs, therefore, it is because the teachers\nin one realm or in both have not arrived at the truth in their respective\nrealms.\n\nAnd so when the Church denies the =facts=--not the unproven theories,\nnotice, but the clearly demonstrated =facts=--of science, something is\nwrong with the Church. And when the Schools put forth =theories= that\nundermine the very foundations of the Church and her work, there is\nsomething wrong with the Schools.\n\nNow it is no secret that the Church and the Schools, broadly speaking, are\nin serious conflict with each other today. Where lies the cause? If the\nChurch is denying and fighting the demonstrated =facts= of science, then\nthe Church is clearly at fault and ought to get right at once.\n\nBut this is not so, for the conflict is altogether over unproven theories,\nand has nothing to do with demonstrated scientific facts. And so this takes\nus at once and completely out of the realm of science and lands us in that\nof speculative philosophy--a fact that shows how unreasonable and even\nfoolish the conflict is. For the thing that has set the Church and the\nSchools into battle array against each other is that speculative guess\nconcerning origins called the =Theory of Evolution=. This lies at the heart\nof the opposition that each of these great institutions feels toward the\nother.\n\nIt is true that a certain amount of the trouble arises from\nmisunderstanding, because the term \"evolution\" is used in so many loose,\nillogical, and unscientific ways; but back of all misuse of the term there\nis a fundamental cause on which this antagonism rests, and that cause is\nfound in the nature of the theory and its effects on those who consistently\nbelieve it.\n\nThe technical meaning of the term may be said to be a structural change in\nthe direction of development into higher forms of existence, brought about\nby internal force without external aid.\n\nThere is also a scientific classification of the subject, into sub-organic,\norganic, and super-organic evolution. Sub-organic evolution applies to the\ndevelopment of non-living matter; organic, to the development of vegetable\nand animal life; and super-organic, to the development of intellectual,\nmoral, and spiritual life. But while the subject is thus classified for\nconvenience, it is all one doctrine, and is meant to describe one process\nof development from the non-living realm to the spiritual.\n\nThere is also one theory which is called causal, and another which is\ncalled modal, evolution. According to the former, evolution is the first\ncause of all life, which, of course, excludes God as the First Cause; and\naccording to the latter, evolution is the mode, or method, used by God in\ncreation.\n\nNow, the Church has vital reasons for fighting this philosophical guess.\nOne reason is, that it is entirely unsupported by =facts=, and is therefore\naltogether unproven. But if this were the only reason, the Church could be\nconvicted of the supreme folly of her entire history, for turning aside to\nfight an unproven guess. A more vital reason is that the theory does not\nstop with the natural realm, but goes right on up into the realm of\nspiritual truth, and assumes to pronounce on the most vital spiritual\nrealities in such a way that the logic of the theory, if consistently\naccepted, utterly destroys both the foundations of the Church and the\ncontent of the Gospel. Indeed, evolution has been proclaimed to the world\nas the ally of a philosophy which boasts of its capacity to drive\nChristianity out of existence.\n\nFor the Church, therefore, to fail to fight a theory that strikes at her\nvery vitals would be to become a traitor to the Lord who bought her and\nsent her into the world to preach His gospel. And so she is compelled to\nchoose between submitting to an unproven and destructive theory, which has\nnever saved =any= one who has believed it, and preaching the gospel of\nGod's grace, which has infallibly saved =every= one who has believed it.\nThe true Church is fighting the theory of evolution in order that the\nmessage she is commissioned to preach may not be rendered of no effect\nby a non-belligerent attitude toward it being mistaken for approval of it.\n\nNot only the fact that the theory is entirely unproven, but also and more\nparticularly the nature of its influence on faith in the Bible compels the\nChurch to reckon with it. We will go into these two reasons for\nantagonizing this speculative guess.\n\n\nI. =The Theory of Evolution is Unproven.=\n\nThe reason we reflect on this for a few moments lies in what has already\nbeen said. If evolution is a fact, then for the Church to refuse it and\nfight against it would be to fight against God, which ought to bring her to\nswift judgment for her mad folly. But if it is only an unproven theory,\nthen she is justified if she has good reasons for fighting its propagation.\nWe will therefore note what the scientists themselves have to say regarding\nthe theory.\n\n1. Testimony =for= Evolution.\n\nThere are teachers of science who do not hesitate to assure us that the\ndoctrine of evolution is now no longer a theory but an assured fact. A few\nrepresentative quotations from that class will suffice.\n\nDr. P. C. Mitchell says, in a late edition of the \"Encyclopedia\nBritannica\":\n\n    The vast bulk of botanical and biological work on living\n    and extinct forms published during the last quarter of the\n    nineteenth century increased almost beyond all expectation\n    the evidence for the =fact= of evolution.\n\nProf. S. C. Schmucker, of the West Chester, Pennsylvania, State Normal\nSchool, in his book, \"The Meaning of Evolution,\" says:\n\n    Among students of animals and plants there is no longer any\n    question as to the =truth= of evolution. That the animals of\n    the present are the altered animals of the past, that the\n    plants of today are the modified plants of yesterday, that\n    civilized man of today is the savage of yesterday and the\n    tree dweller of the day before, is no longer debatable to\n    the mass of biologists.\n\nProfessor Fish, then of Denison University, Granville, Ohio, not long ago\ndictated to his class, of which the writer's daughter was a member, the\nfollowing statement:\n\n    Organic evolution is the key to all biological thinking of\n    today. It is not a =theory= but a =fact=, because the main\n    facts are true. Man is the off-spring of the lower animals,\n    and the ancestry can be traced back to the simplest forms\n    of animals known. All medical research takes that fact into\n    account.\n\nProf. S. W. Williston, department of paleontology, University of Chicago,\nsays:\n\n    I know of no biologist, whether of high or low degree,\n    master or tyro, who ventures to suggest a doubt as to the\n    fundamental truths of organic evolution.\n\nProf. William Patten, department of biology and zoology, Dartmouth College,\nsays:\n\n    Evolution is the accepted doctrine of the natural sciences\n    to the extent that it has long ceased to be a subject of\n    debate in standard scientific journals or in organized\n    conferences of men of science.\n\nProf. Charles B. Davenport, department of experimental evolution, Carnegie\nInstitute, Washington, D. C., says:\n\n    I do not know of a single modern scientific\n    man who does not believe in evolution.\n\nAnd Prof. Frank R. Lillie, department of embryology, University of Chicago,\nsays:\n\n    I feel pretty impatient over the statements of certain\n    religious teachers that evolution has collapsed.\n\nThese statements are sufficiently representative to indicate the attitude\ntoward the theory of evolution of a great section of the scientific world\ntoday, including many science teachers in schools founded and endowed by\nthe Church for the giving of Christian education.\n\nBut it is not true that the theory is universally accepted or even\nscientifically proved to be a fact. Let a few scientists of at least equal\neminence with those quoted above bear their testimony.\n\n2. Testimony =Against= Evolution.\n\nBut before we quote this testimony it may be well to pause a moment for a\nlittle information that may make it more intelligible to us.\n\nThe so-called proofs of evolution are derived from both the biological and\nthe geological realms of natural science.\n\n=a.= We will consider, first, the so-called proofs taken from the\n=biological= realm.\n\nDarwin's theory was arrived at from data taken from the biological realm,\nand consists of two doctrines. One is the doctrine of =natural selection=,\nwhich was his own personal contribution to the discussion, and the other is\nthat of =the inheritance of acquired characters=, which he borrowed from\nLamarck. The former is the doctrine meant when pure Darwinism is referred\nto.\n\n(i). The Doctrine of Natural Selection.\n\nDarwin himself said:\n\n    We cannot prove that a single species has changed,\n\nand, also,\n\n    Many of the objections to the hypothesis of evolution are so\n    serious I can hardly reflect on them without being\n    staggered.\n\nDr. N. S. Shaler, department of geology, Harvard, says:\n\n    It begins to be evident that the Darwinian hypothesis is\n    still essentially unverified.... It is not yet proven that\n    a single species of the two or three million now inhabiting\n    the earth had been established solely or mainly by the\n    operation of natural selection.\n\nProfessor Fleischmann, of Erlangen, has said:\n\n    The Darwinian theory of descent has in the realms of nature\n    not a single fact to confirm it. It is not the result of\n    scientific research, but purely the product of the\n    imagination.\n\nAnd John Burroughs, although an evolutionist up to his recent death, said\nof Darwin, in the August, 1920, \"Atlantic Monthly\":\n\n    He has already been as completely shorn of his selection\n    doctrines as Samson was shorn of his locks.\n\nIf these statements from scientific men mean anything at all, they mean, at\nleast, that pure Darwinism is altogether unproven, if not that it is dead.\n\n(ii). The Doctrine of Acquired Characters.\n\nSpencer made this doctrine the fundamental one in his evolutionary\nphilosophy. Its importance was so vital to him that he said:\n\n    Close contemplation of the facts impresses me more strongly\n    than ever with the two alternatives--either there has been\n    inheritance of acquired characters, or there has been no\n    evolution.\n\nIt is of great interest, therefore, to note what competent scientists have\nsaid about this doctrine.\n\nDr. Thomas Hunt Morgan, department of science, Columbia University, says:\n\n    Today the theory has few followers among trained\n    investigators, but it still has a popular vogue that is\n    wide-spread and vociferous.\n\nAlfred Russell Wallace, in his \"Autobiography,\" said:\n\n    All the available evidence is opposed to the doctrine of\n    acquired characters.\n\nProf. William Bateson, in his 1914 Presidential Address before the British\nAssociation for the Advancement of Science, said:\n\n    We have done with the notion that Darwin came latterly to\n    favor, that large differences can arise by the accumulation\n    of small differences.\n\nHe also remarks that the new knowledge of heredity shows that whatever\nevolution there is occurs by loss of factors and not by gain, and that in\nthis way the progress of science is\n\n    destroying much that till lately passed for gospel.\n\nAnd commenting on these remarks of Bateson, Prof. S. C. Holmes, of the\nUniversity of California, says they are\n\n    an illustration of the bankruptcy of the present\n    evolutionary theory.\n\nThen Prof. George McCready Price, department of geology, Pacific Union\nCollege, Helena, California, has said very recently:\n\n    It has long since been definitely settled that acquired\n    characters are not transmitted in heredity.\n\nAnd in another place he exclaims:\n\n    If cells did not maintain their ancestral character in a\n    very remarkable way, what would be the use of grafting a\n    good kind of fruit on to a stock of poorer quality? The very\n    permanency of the graft thus produced is proof of the\n    persistency with which the cells reproduce only \"after their\n    kind.\"\n\nThen in speaking of Mendel's discoveries in the realm of heredity, and\nwhich have now become scientifically demonstrated laws, he says that\n\n    the whole foundation of biological evolution has been\n    completely undermined by these new discoveries.\n\nAnd he sums up the conclusions to which present-day scientists are coming,\nin the words:\n\n    The principles of heredity, as now understood, have brought\n    us back to that great truth which is given in the first\n    chapter of our Bible, that each form of plant or animal was\n    designed by the Creator to reproduce only \"after its kind.\"\n\nThe one who accepts this testimony, therefore, is compelled to conclude\nthat the doctrine of acquired characters is also dead.\n\n(iii). The Biogenetic \"Law.\"\n\nIn addition to the two forms of the theory above noted, Haeckel added\nemphasis to these so-called biological proofs by putting forth a doctrine\nthat came to be called the biogenetic \"law,\" even though it was nothing but\na hypothesis. It was called the recapitulation theory, because it was\nimagined that the developing human embryo recapitulates or passes through\nsuccessive stages of the more mature forms of some of the lower animals.\n\nConcerning this theory Dr. A. Weber, University of Geneva, Switzerland,\nsaid in the \"Scientific American Monthly\" for February, 1921:\n\n    The critical comments of such men as O. Hertwig, Kiebel, and\n    Vialleton, indeed, have practically torn to shreds the\n    aforesaid fundamental biogenetic law. Its almost universal\n    abandonment has left considerably at a loss those\n    investigators who sought in the structures of organisms the\n    key to their remote origins or to their relationships.\n\nSo it would seem that if this form of the theory is utterly destitute of\nproof, the whole biological foundation of the theory is gone.\n\nIt is perfectly in harmony with scientific testimony, therefore, that\nProfessor Price says concerning this phase of the theory:\n\n    The science of twenty or thirty years ago was in high glee at\n    the thought of having almost proved the theory of biological\n    evolution. Today, for every careful, candid inquirer, these\n    hopes are crushed; and with weary, reluctant sadness does\n    modern biology now confess that the Church has probably been\n    right all the time.\n\nIf these men have borne faithful testimony to the situation as it now\nexists in the biological realm, the only conclusion possible is that the\nborrowed portion of Darwin's theory has also utterly collapsed.\n\nIt is passing strange, in view of these facts, that competent and scholarly\nmen of science should still cling to a theory so utterly discredited by\neminent scientists. Is it because they are determined to believe in\nevolution in spite of such evidence to the contrary, or is it because there\nis still left a foundation for the doctrine lying back of all this which\nhas not yet been disturbed, even though \"the biological clues have all run\nout,\" as Professor Price says they have?\n\nThe supposed evidence of geology, with its theories of uniformity and\nsuccessive ages, forms precisely such a foundation.\n\n=b.= We will consider, therefore, in the next place, the so-called proofs\ntaken from the =geological= realm.\n\nDr. T. H. Morgan, who was quoted above as against the theory of the\ninheritance of acquired characters, rests his faith in the theory of\nevolution on a geological foundation. He says:\n\n    The direct evidence furnished by fossil remains is by all\n    odds the strongest evidence we have in favor of organic\n    evolution.\n\nHas present-day science anything to say about this? In spite of the\ncollapse of the supposed biological proofs, are there any tangible and\nscientifically established proofs in the geological realm?\n\nProfessor Price, who, as noted above, is a geologist, and therefore speaks\naccording to first-hand knowledge, shows that fossil remains are deposited\nover many thousands of square miles in widely separated sections of the\nearth, not only in the opposite order from that required to prove the\ntheory of evolution, but in a great variety of orders, demonstrating, as he\nsays, that they cannot be arranged off into ages, but that they simply\nindicate different forms of life that existed side by side. He then\nexclaims:\n\n    =How much of the earth's crust would we have to find= in this\n    upside down order of the fossils, before we would be\n    convinced that there must be something hopelessly wrong with\n    the theory of Successive Ages which drives otherwise\n    competent observers to throw away their common sense and\n    cling desperately to a fantastic theory in the very teeth of\n    such facts?\n\nThen he tells us that\n\n    the theory of Successive Ages, with the forms of life\n    appearing on earth in a precise and invariable order, is dead\n    for all coming time for every man who has had a chance to\n    examine the evidence and has enough training in logic and\n    scientific methods to know when a thing is really proved.\n\nAnd he concludes that the work of strict inductive science has destroyed\nthis \"fantastic scheme\" forever,\n\n    and thus =leaves the way open= to say that life must have\n    originated by just such a literal creation as is recorded in\n    the first chapters of the Bible.\n\nIf these statements have any meaning at all, they can mean only that the\ngeological foundation for the theory of evolution has also collapsed.\n\n=c.= It remains for us to listen to the testimony of a few more men of\nscience concerning the =whole theory= of evolution in general.\n\nProfessor Virchow, the greatest German authority on physiology, and once a\nstrong advocate of the theory, has said:\n\n    It is all nonsense. It cannot be proved by science that man\n    descends from the ape or from any other animal. Since the\n    announcement of the theory, all real scientific knowledge has\n    proceeded in the opposite direction.\n\nProfessor Tyndall, in an article in the \"Fortnightly Review,\" said:\n\n    There ought to be a clear distinction made between science in\n    a state of hypothesis and science in a state of fact. And\n    inasmuch as it is still in its hypothetical stage, the ban of\n    exclusion ought to fall upon the theory of evolution. I agree\n    with Virchow that the proofs of it are still wanting, that\n    the failures have been lamentable, and that the doctrine has\n    been utterly discredited.\n\nProf. L. S. Beal, physiologist and professor of anatomy in King's College,\nLondon, says:\n\n    The idea of any relation having been established between the\n    non-living and the living by a gradual advance from lifeless\n    matter to the lowest forms of life, and so onward to the\n    higher and more complex, has not the slightest evidence from\n    the facts of any section of living nature of which anything\n    is known.\n\nProfessor Zoeckler, of the University of Greifswald, says:\n\n    The claim that the hypothesis of descent is scientifically\n    secured must most decidedly be denied.\n\nDeCyon, the Russian scientist, says:\n\n    Evolution is pure assumption.\n\nProf. George McCready Price says:\n\n    In almost every one of the separate sciences the arguments\n    upon which the theory of evolution gained its popularity a\n    generation or so ago are now known by the various specialists\n    to have been blunders, or mistakes, or hasty conclusions of\n    one kind or another.\n\nAnd Sir J. William Dawson says:\n\n    \"The evolution doctrine itself is one of the strangest\n    phenomena of humanity.\" It is \"a system destitute of any\n    shadow of proof, and supported merely by vague analogies and\n    figures of speech, and by the arbitrary and artificial\n    coherence of its parts.\" And he concludes that it is\n    \"surpassingly strange\" that such a theory should find\n    adherents.\n\nTo this list might be added such names as those of Professor Henslow,\nformer President of the British Association; Prof. C. C. Everett, of\nHarvard; Dr. E. Dennert; Dr. Goette; Prof. Edward Hoppe, the \"Hamburg\nSavant\"; Professor Paulson, of Berlin; Professor Rutemeyer, of Basel; and\nProf. Max Wundt, of Leipsic.\n\nAfter all this contrary testimony on the part of such unquestioned\nauthorities, we are forced to conclude not only that the testimony for\nevolution is far from unanimous, but also that the theory is altogether\nunproven, and that it is therefore utterly unscientific to teach it as a\nfact, especially when those who do so furnish us with no direct evidence\nwhatever.\n\nSo long, therefore, as there is an unbridged gulf in the sub-organic realm\nbetween nothing and matter, in the organic realm between the non-living and\nthe living, and in the super-organic realm between animals and man, the\nChurch cannot be blamed for being scientific enough to refuse to accept\nsuch an unproven and discredited theory, at least until a few =facts= are\nforthcoming. Until then we must conclude that all the proofs the scientists\ncan furnish rest altogether on inferences and assumptions.\n\nWhen evolutionists can produce =matter= from nothing or increase =energy=\nby any natural means known to man, or bring forth the =living= from the\nnon-living, or bring into existence even one new and distinct =species=,\nthen they will be in a position to compel the Church to listen to proofs;\nbut until then the Church is forced to reject evolution.\n\nThe most serious aspect of the controversy, however, lies in the second\nobjection mentioned above.\n\n\n=II. The Logic of Evolution Is Destructive.=\n\nIt is destructive of all the fundamental doctrines the Church was sent into\nthe world to preach.\n\n1. It destroys the doctrine of the =inspiration of the Bible=, by denying\nits inerrancy and infallible and final authority.\n\nOver and again in the early verses of Genesis we are told that God created\nthe various species to reproduce =after their kind=. But evolution says\nthat this is not true, for as a matter of fact, the various species have\ncontinuously evolved from one to another all the way to man.\n\nTo a mind that is working normally, these two propositions are mutually\nexclusive. And so those who retain their intellectual integrity and\nconsistency, and who therefore cannot accept two contradictory propositions\nat the same time, are compelled to =make a choice= between them.\n\nHuxley saw this when he said:\n\n    The doctrine of evolution is directly antagonistic to that of\n    creation. Evolution, if consistently accepted, makes it\n    impossible to believe the Bible.\n\nWhen Professor Schmucker; therefore, speaks of the creation story as\n\n    the poetical account of Genesis;\n\nwhen Dr. S. B. Meeser, of Crozer Theological Seminary, describes the\nScriptures as\n\n    the survivals of the fittest of those communion experiences\n    which men, who have lived intensely in the moral interest,\n    have had with God;\n\nwhen Dr. H. C. Vedder, of the same seminary, says the Scriptures\n\n    \"grew in ... accuracy\" as they were written;\n\nwhen Dr. W. H. P. Faunce, President of Brown University, can say:\n\n    Mr. Gladstone's last book is called \"The Impregnable Rock of\n    Holy Scripture.\" The very title shows a conception of the\n    Bible at the farthest removed from the present Biblical\n    scholarship, to which the Bible is a growth, not a rock;\n\nwhen Dr. Ernest D. Burton, of the University of Chicago, says:\n\n    Some among us have been constrained to admit that the books\n    [of the Bible] are not infallible in history or in matters of\n    science, and not wholly consistent and therefore not\n    ultimately and as a whole inerrant in the field of morals and\n    religion;\n\nand when Dr. Shailer Mathews, of the same University, urges us to think the\ngospel\n\n    in terms of evolution,\n\nand then shows us what that means to him when he says:\n\n    For in the New Testament there are conceptions which the\n    modern world under the dominance of science [at the heart of\n    which lies the evolutionary philosophy] finds it impossible\n    to understand, much less to believe;\n\nthese men are simply demonstrating the fact that they still retain their\nintellectual integrity and consistency, and that they are therefore\nentirely unable to accept the doctrine of evolution and believe in an\ninerrant Bible at the same time. That is, the logic of the doctrine of\nevolution destroys for them the faith that, in its original manuscripts,\nthe Bible as it came from God to man was \"truth unmixed with error,\" with\nthe resulting confidence that He who gave it has preserved it to us by His\nprovidence essentially as it was given.\n\nThis means that these men and all who agree with them have rejected that\nWord which is forever settled in heaven, in order to accept a hypothesis\nwhich is never settled on earth; that they have given up the Book which has\nstood unchanged through the centuries against every conceivable form of\nassault, and taken in its place a set of scientific speculations that have\neither to be revised or discarded for new speculations every few years;\nthat they have turned from an inspired, inerrant and authoritative\nrevelation of God, and turned to an unproven theory which makes the Bible a\nhuman document, of supreme value, so they say, as unfolding the religious\nevolution of the race, but full of errors because of the human element in\nit.\n\nThe result of this is the so-called \"scientific\" or \"historical\" method of\ninterpreting the Bible, which means, to quote Dr. Meeser, that while the\nScriptures\n\n    have the wisdom of experts in religion, [yet] \"authority\" is\n    scarcely the term to describe their value, and may, when\n    applied to them, obscure their real character.\n\n\"But why make all this ado about it,\" say the evolutionists; \"it is all\nsimply a question of interpretation.\"\n\nThat is absolutely right. It is the interpretation of the evolutionists set\nin opposition to that of the Holy Spirit; and the true Church, compelled to\nmake a choice, takes that of the Holy Spirit.\n\n2. The logic of evolution destroys the doctrine of the =fall of man= and\nits result in total depravity.\n\nAfter an address somewhat along these lines in one of the largest normal\nschools in the world, the science professor said to the writer, \"Yes, but\nyou know there is evolution and =evolution=.\"\n\nThat is indeed true. We are all aware of the fact that there are various\nkinds, shapes, and colors of evolution, from theistic to atheistic; but the\nfact still remains that =every= theory is =still evolution=, and that =any=\ntheory of evolution whatsoever, if it means anything at all, means steady\n=progress= from lower to higher. Progress is certainly the one thought that\nis vital to any definition of evolution, and progress =downward= is\nexcluded by the very meaning of the word, and so evolution under =any=\ntheory can mean nothing but progress =upward=.\n\nBut the Word of God says that man has gone =down= from a condition of\npurity and innocence into a condition of such sinful enmity against God,\nthat he is not only not subject to the law of God, but is utterly incapable\nof bringing himself into subjection to it. And the experience of every\nChristian gives sorrowful but certain evidence to that fact.\n\nThis condition the Bible describes as being =dead= in sin. And since death\nis not death at all until it is total, man, therefore, being dead, is\ntotally dead--and this is total depravity.\n\nThis means that the only progress possible to man in his natural state is\n=progress in corruption=. For total depravity, which is total spiritual\ndeath, does not mean that the last limit of corruption has been reached,\nbut that while death is total, corruption may have just begun.\n\nThe reality of the natural man's spiritual death is abundantly illustrated\nin human history. After man fell into sin, and died, he was given fullest\nopportunity to recover himself and to demonstrate thereby that he was still\nspiritually alive. But the corruption of spiritual death worked until man\nwas so far down in the filth of his moral putrefaction that the only way\nGod could save the race from extinction was to save the one family that had\naccepted spiritual life from Him, and blot the rest of the race out in the\nflood.\n\nThen, starting out again under more favorable circumstances than before,\nman went from bad to worse until, in one great universal brotherhood, he\nrose up and defied God at the Tower of Babel, and God had to smash the\nbrotherhood into fragments by the confusion of languages.\n\nTime after time God tried man and found his progress downward always, no\nmatter how favorable the circumstances that surrounded him, until finally\nhe came to earth Himself in the Person of His Son. This brought both the\nreality and the completeness of man's spiritual death to a demonstration\nthat can never be refuted, for at the cross man displayed, to its eternal\nuncovering, the awful corruption of that spiritual condition that could not\ntolerate in its presence incarnate purity and holiness, even though he had\nto become the murderer of God manifest in the flesh to get away from it.\n\nEven in his worship man's progress is steadily downward. Beginning with\nGod, he progresses downward until he is worshipping birds, then beasts, and\nthen creeping things.\n\nBut evolution says that man is =coming up= from primitive conditions into\nfuller life. And so the evolutionist cannot tolerate such doctrines as\nthese which the Word of God sets forth. To a consistent evolutionist, man\nis not spiritually dead, for that would make progress out of the question.\nAnd if progress upward is denied--if the only progress possible to the\nnatural man is progress in corruption, then the whole doctrine of evolution\nis gone.\n\nThis is why it becomes necessary for Canon E. W. Barnes, of Westminster\nAbbey, when he accepts evolution, to reject the Bible. He says:\n\n    The inevitable acceptance of evolution means giving up belief\n    in the fall and in all the theology built upon it by the\n    theologians from St. Paul onward. Man was not made perfect\n    and then marred; his evolution is still proceeding.\n\nSo here again it is utterly impossible for the consistent evolutionist to\naccept the Bible doctrine of the fall of man.\n\n3. The logic of evolution destroys the doctrine of =sin=.\n\nThe Bible makes man's fall deliberate and wilful, and his continued\nattitude of sinful enmity against God, in spite of all God's offered power\nto change it into love, one of excuseless lawlessness and rebellion.\n\nThis makes man entirely responsible for his sin and accountable to God for\neverything sin does in his life. And so the Bible says:\n\n    Every one shall give account of himself to God.\n\nAnd those who go out of this life in the unconfessed and therefore\nunforgiven sin of rejecting God's mercy in Christ shall \"go away into\neverlasting punishment,\" where there will be \"weeping and gnashing of\nteeth.\"\n\nBut to the evolutionary philosophy, sin cannot be \"exceeding sinful,\" for\nit is either inherent in the process of evolution, or, at worst, but an\nunfortunate slip in the working out of that process, if, indeed, it is not\neven a mark of budding virtue.\n\nJohn Fiske says:\n\n    Theology has much to say about original sin. This original\n    sin is neither more nor less than the brute inheritance that\n    every man carries with him.\n\nRev. Dwight Bradley, a Cleveland, Ohio, pastor, says:\n\n    There is no escape for intelligent people today from the\n    acceptance of the law of evolution.... It follows that what\n    we call evil [sin] is the remains of a lower form of life....\n    We are in the midst of the slow process of ridding ourselves\n    of our animal inheritance.\n\nAnd Dr. Shailer Mathews follows the evolutionary philosophy to its logical\nand necessary end when he says:\n\n    But for men who think of God as dynamically imminent in an\n    infinite universe, who think of man's relation to Him as\n    determined not by statutory but by cosmic law, who regard sin\n    and righteousness alike as the working out of the fundamental\n    forces of life itself, the conception of God as King and of\n    man as condemned or acquitted subject is but a figure of\n    speech.\n\nSuch a doctrine as this absolutely and forever destroys man's\nresponsibility for sin. For if sin is what Dr. Mathews suggests it\nis,--\"the working out of the fundamental forces of life itself,\"--then it\nis inherent in man's natural constitution as a process of his evolution.\nAnd if this is so, man is in no way responsible for his sin.\n\nThis altogether removes man's accountability to God, for he cannot be\nbrought to account for that which is the working out of the fundamental\nforces of life itself, and which is therefore inevitable in the very\nworkings of his nature. And even if sin is an unfortunate slip in the\nprocess of evolution, man cannot be held accountable for an accident.\n\nThis doctrine also puts a high premium on the whole beastly, selfish,\nlustful, murderous history of the race, for it makes sin a ladder up which\nman is climbing to his high destiny.\n\nPunishment for sin is therefore absolutely out of the question. For if man\nis not responsible for his sin, and if God punishes him for it, as the\nBible says He will, even by the law of cause and effect, that would make\nGod an infinite tyrant and an unspeakable fiend. And so if God is not a\nmonster, and if evolution is true, there is no punishment for sin, and the\nBible lies.\n\nThinking men see that this is the inevitable logic of the doctrine of\nevolution. Sir J. William Dawson, speaking of the evolutionary doctrines as\nspeculations, says:\n\n    They seek to revolutionize the religious beliefs of the\n    world, and if accepted would destroy much of the existing\n    theology and philosophy.... With one class of minds they\n    constitute a sort of religion.... With another and perhaps\n    larger class, they are accepted as affording a welcome\n    deliverance from all scruples of conscience and fears of a\n    hereafter.\n\nThe theory of evolution cannot be consistently held and the statements of\nthe Bible concerning sin and its consequences be accepted at the same time.\nAnd so the evolutionist will come, sooner or later, to refuse any meaning\nto Scripture statements concerning sin, as did Dr. W. N. Clarke, when he\nsaid:\n\n    We have no historical narrative of the beginning of sin, and\n    theology receives from the Scriptures no record of that\n    beginning.\n\nThat is, the perfectly plain and easily understood statements of Scripture\nconcerning the beginning of sin are altogether unhistorical and utterly\nunworthy of credence to the man who looks at the Bible from the\n\"scientific\" or \"historical\" standpoint, which is the evolutionist's method\nof handling the Word of God. To accept evolution, therefore, is to\ndiscredit the Bible.\n\n4. The logic of evolution destroys the doctrines of the =Deity= and the\n=virgin birth= of the Lord Jesus Christ.\n\nThe Bible makes Christ the Seed of the woman, not of the man, as all other\nhuman beings are; it makes His conception to have been that of the Holy\nSpirit; it declares His virgin birth in language that cannot be\nmisunderstood; it makes Him the Son of God, not the son of Joseph.\n\nIt also makes Him God tabernacling in the flesh; it makes Him the Second\nPerson of the Triune =God=; it declares in so many words that He =is= God.\n\nBut evolution cannot accept such a doctrine, and so the evolutionist\njuggles the Scripture statements of His Deity and denies His virgin birth,\nmaking Him a Jewish bastard, born out of wedlock, and stained forever with\nthe shame of His mother's immorality.\n\nDr. A. C. McGiffert says of Christ, that He is\n\n    no more divine than we are, or than nature is.\n\nA magazine article on \"The Cosmic Coming of the Christ\" says:\n\n    First the little scum on the warm, stagnant water, then the\n    little colonies of cells, the organisms, the green moss and\n    lichen, the beauty of vegetation, the movement of shell fish,\n    sponges, jelly fish, worms, crabs, trilobites, centipedes,\n    insects, fish, frogs, lizards, dinosaurs, reptile birds,\n    birds, kangaroos, mastodons, deer, apes, primitive man, cave\n    man, man of the stone age, of earliest history, Abraham's\n    migration, the Exodus, the development of the Jewish\n    religious life and the climax in that purest of maidens, Mary\n    of Nazareth. The hour had come for the dawn of a new day, and\n    the light of that new day was the birth of Jesus. The eternal\n    purpose of the ages was now to be made clear, and the long,\n    long aeons of creation explained.\n\nIt is no wonder that after quoting these words the \"Sunday School Times\"\nexclaims:\n\n    In other words, without moss we could not have had Mary;\n    without an ape we could not have had Abraham; and--shocking\n    blasphemy--without a centipede we could not have had Christ!\n    Praise God, we may turn from this to the words of God; \"For\n    it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the\n    discernment of the discerning I will bring to naught.\"\n\nAnd so here once more the consistent evolutionist is compelled to reject\nthe Bible by denying the doctrines of the Deity and the virgin birth of\nChrist.\n\n5. The logic of evolution destroys the doctrine of =atonement by\nsubstitution=.\n\nThe Bible says:\n\n    Without the shedding of blood there is no remission [of sin].\n\n    Him who knew no sin He hath made to be sin for us.\n\n    The Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all.\n\n    Who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree.\n\n    We \"were redeemed ... with the precious blood of Christ.\"\n\n    We are \"justified by His blood.\"\n\n    The blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin.\n\nThese and many other statements make Christ's death one of atonement by\nsubstitution for our sins.\n\nBut evolution cannot tolerate such a doctrine. To the evolutionist this is\na \"doctrine of the shambles,\" a \"slaughter house religion,\" a \"gospel of\ngore.\" Christ's death is rather a revelation of the evolutionist's\nconception of divine love, and an example of sacrificial service set before\nstruggling man to help him climb. Let those who believe in the\nevolutionist's \"historical\" method of interpreting Scripture speak for\nthemselves.\n\nDr. Gerald Birney Smith, of the University of Chicago, says:\n\n    To insist dogmatically, as an _\u00e0 priori_ principle, that\n    \"without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sin,\"\n    is both foolish and futile in an age that has abandoned the\n    conception of bloody sacrifice and which is loudly demanding\n    the abolition of capital punishment.\n\nDr. Walter Rauschenbusch said:\n\n    What the death of Jesus now does for us, the death of the\n    prophets did for him.\n\nDr. H. C. Vedder says:\n\n    Jesus never taught and never authorized anybody to teach in\n    his name that he suffered in our stead and bore the penalty\n    of our sins;\n\nand also:\n\n    The \"one crowning absurdity of theology\" is \"that the penalty\n    of an evil deed can be vicariously borne by another while he\n    goes scot free,\"\n\nwhich he describes in another place as\n\n    taking an immunity bath in the \"fountain filled with blood.\"\n\nAnd Dr. J. H. Coffin, of Earlham College, Earlham, Indiana, says:\n\n    The sacrificial life of Jesus is the essential factor in His\n    atonement. His principles and example are the way of the\n    individual and society to God.\n\nSuch statements make it perfectly evident that those who accept evolution\nutterly reject God's provision for salvation through the shed blood of\nChrist as an atonement by substitution for our sins.\n\n6. The logic of evolution destroys the doctrine of =regeneration=.\n\nThe Bible describes man as dead to God and running away from Him; as having\na nature so full of corruption that \"From the sole of the foot even unto\nthe head there is no soundness in it, but wounds, and bruises, and\nputrifying sores\"; and as having a character in the grip of such enmity\nagainst God that by nature he \"loves darkness rather than light.\"\n\nThis indicates that man is =past improvement= in his natural state, for no\nimprovement is possible in the dead.\n\nThe Bible therefore speaks, not of the improvement, but of the burial, of\nthe old life, and of resurrection, by the power of a new nature, to newness\nof life.\n\nHear what it says:\n\n    We were buried with Christ by baptism into death, that like\n    as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the\n    Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.\n\nThere is a large section of the Church that understand this passage to\nrefer to immersion in water in confession of faith in Christ. Not that they\nbelieve that immersion has anything to do with saving us, for they do not,\nbut that it is the divinely appointed symbol or picture of the salvation\nthat has already become a reality in the life.\n\nTo an immersionist, therefore, when a believer is buried with Christ in\nsymbol in his baptism, and raised again in symbol of resurrection, he\nconfesses, among other things, that by his first birth he is so completely\ndead that there is nothing left to do with him but to bury him, and his\nwillingness to be buried in the grave of Christ has been met by God with\nthe gift of the risen and incorruptible life which is in His Son, and by\nwhich he is now enabled to walk in newness of life.\n\nAnd so an immersionist cannot be a consistent evolutionist. For when an\nevolutionist is immersed, he is either perpetrating a meaningless travesty\non immersion, or else he is denying the whole doctrine of evolution. For\nimmersion certainly does not picture a step in the progress of the living,\nbut rather the burial of the totally dead. Immersing churches that have\ngone over to the evolutionary position should therefore be consistent and\nnail up their baptistries.\n\nBut another large portion of the Church believe that the above passage does\nnot refer to immersion in water, but rather to the statement:\n\n    For by one Spirit have we all been baptized into one body.\n\nThey regard it as referring to the inward, spiritual union with Christ\nwhich takes place in the new birth, rather than to an outward act. For in\nthe moment of regeneration, every believer is baptized by the Holy Spirit\ninto the Body of Christ.\n\nBut even so, the word \"buried\" still stands in the first passage above, and\na burial has to do with the dead, not with the living. Being \"buried,\"\ntherefore, when the Holy Spirit baptizes us into Christ, it is \"into\ndeath,\" not into an enlarging life, because we are so completely dead that\nthe baptizing Spirit sets the \"old man\" forever aside as utterly\nunimprovable, in order that He may make us \"partakers of the divine nature\"\nby which we become a \"new creation\" in Christ.\n\nAll this, however, is utterly intolerable to the consistent evolutionist.\nFor if man is dead and therefore unimprovable, that makes progress upward\nimpossible, and, if that is impossible, the whole doctrine of evolution is\nat an end.\n\nAnd so the evolutionist assumes the presence of life, and conceives the\nrace to be progressing upward out of crude forms and unethical conceptions\ntoward God. It is perfectly consistent, therefore, that he should seek to\nstir man's noble aspirations and should present high ideals for him to\nstrive after. For it is not life man needs, they say, it is simply\nconversion to higher ideals and aspirations in life.\n\nHence Dr. E. D. Burton is in perfect harmony with this evolutionary\nconception when he says:\n\n    Jesus was a teacher of great principles, which it is\n    incumbent upon us to apply to the multitudinous phases and\n    experiences of life, and the embodiment of an ideal, which it\n    is ours to endeavor, as best we can, to achieve.\n\nDr. Herbert L. Willett, of the University of Chicago, was also in harmony\nwith all this when he said in an address heard by the writer:\n\n    It is the task of the Church to interpret to the world the\n    ideals of Jesus for men to strive after.\n\nAnd Dr. J. H. Coffin also voiced the evolutionary position when, in\nspeaking of conversion, he said:\n\n    It is conversion =to= something, namely, the =principles= of\n    Jesus.\n\nNow when the logic of this conception is followed out, it turns evangelism\ninto religious education. And so it is easy to see why the advocates of\nevolution are stressing religious education with increasing insistence. For\nit is through the methods of religious education, according to Dr. Burton,\nthat the lost are being\n\n    led to adopt the principles of Jesus and to accept his\n    leadership quietly and gradually.\n\nThis makes regeneration simply an added impulse in the direction in which\nmen are imagined already to be going. It also has the effect of altogether\nreversing the emphasis in the work of the Church with the lost. According\nto Dr. Burton, it transfers it\n\n    from the salvation of the individual, with emphasis upon\n    rescue from future woe, to the creation of a human society\n    dominated by the spirit of Jesus.\n\nAnd Dr. Gerald Birney Smith, speaking of present-day missionary methods,\nsays:\n\n    Humanly determined programs are being substituted for\n    dogmatic decrees in the work of the churches. This is genuine\n    democracy. The missionary enterprise is rapidly being\n    conceived as a democratic social program rather than as the\n    rescue of a few individuals from the divine wrath....\n    Education is coming to be a primary means of accomplishing\n    the missionary task.\n\nSuch a mission to the lost would be altogether unthinkable if men were\nbelieved to be spiritually dead. For dead men are helpless to adopt\nprinciples and strive after ideals. Dead men do not need education, they\nneed life.\n\nAny one of average intelligence can see at a glance that these two programs\nof salvation are headed in opposite directions. By one we strive after an\nideal; by the other we quit all striving and surrender to a Person. One is\nsalvation by a human resolution to press toward the pattern set before us\nby the \"Flower of the Race\"; the other is salvation by a divine rescue from\nthat natural hatred of purity and holiness which made possible the murder\nof the Son of God. By one program we adopt the principles and follow the\nspirit of the life of Christ; by the other we trust in the merits of the\nshed blood and substitutionary death of Christ.\n\nThese two programs are mutually exclusive. Thus the evolutionary philosophy\nutterly destroys the doctrine of the new birth.\n\n7. The logic of evolution destroys the doctrine of the =holiness of God=,\nfor it makes God the =author of sin=.\n\nLe Conte says:\n\n    If evolution be true, and especially if man be indeed a\n    product of evolution, then what we call evil is not a unique\n    phenomenon confined to man and the result of an accident [the\n    fall], but must be a great fact pervading all nature and a\n    part of its very constitution.\n\nNo thinking man can get away from that conclusion. For if evolution in any\nform is a fact, then the thing the Bible calls sin was either somehow\nembedded, by a competent and responsible Creator, in man's very\nconstitution as a necessary process of his evolution, or else it slipped\ninto the race through the bungling and unwatchful incompetence of an\nimpotent Creator. Thus in either case God becomes the author of sin!\n\nThis puts evolution almost, if not altogether, on the ground of blasphemy!\nGod responsible for the unspeakable woe and the unmeasured suffering of\nman? God the author of that inherent force in man's nature which has filled\nthe earth with hatred, violence, bloodshed, and death? Let him think so who\ncan!\n\nAfter these doctrines of the Word are set beside the evolutionary\nphilosophy, and after it begins to dawn on the thinking mind how utterly\nirreconcilable they are, the absolute impossibility of a consistent\nevolutionist believing in an inspired, inerrant, and infallible Bible\nbecomes well nigh an axiom. It is no wonder that Dr. W. B. Riley exclaims:\n\n    What thinking man fails to see the infinity of space between\n    Modernism and Orthodoxy, or to apprehend the fact that daily\n    they are drawing farther apart! Time holds no promise of even\n    a patched-up peace.\n\nLord Kelvin was astonished at the preachers and teachers who are trying to\napply the doctrine of evolution to the fundamentals of the faith. He said:\n\n    I marvel at the undue haste with which teachers in our\n    Universities and preachers in our pulpits are restating the\n    truth in the terms of evolution, while evolution itself\n    remains an unproven hypothesis in the laboratories of\n    science.\n\nAnd well might he marvel. And well might the Church become aroused and\nalarmed as the logical workings of these false doctrines produce more and\nmore fearful results within her ranks. The whole Church is being moved away\nfrom the foundations of the faith, and this false philosophy is at the\nbottom of it all.\n\nThe group announcements of the Sunday services of the Los Angeles liberal\nchurches show where all consistent evolutionists are headed. Standing at\nthe head of these announcements are these words, the capital letters being\ntheirs:\n\n    We found our faith on the thought of EVOLUTION rather than\n    Special Creation; on revelation through NORMAL HUMAN\n    EXPERIENCE rather than the supernatural; on salvation through\n    GROWTH rather than a miraculous rebirth.\n\nAnd when it comes to the awful harvest that is being gathered from our\nchurches for the forces of spiritual destruction through our colleges and\nuniversities, William Jennings Bryan has had some information given to him\nthat will give us a hint of what is going on. He says:\n\n    Having had opportunity to make a personal investigation, I\n    feel it my duty to warn the lovers of the Bible of the\n    insidious attacks which are being made upon every vital part\n    of the Word of God. A father tells me of a daughter educated\n    at Wellesley who calmly informs him that no one believes in\n    the Bible now; a teacher in Columbia University begins his\n    lessons in geology by asking students to lay aside all that\n    they have learned in Sunday-school; a professor of the\n    University of Wisconsin tells his class that the Bible is a\n    collection of myths; a professor of philosophy at Ann Arbor\n    occupies a Sunday evening explaining to an audience that\n    Christianity is a state of mind and that there are only two\n    books in the Bible with any literary merit; another professor\n    in the same institution informs students that he once taught\n    a Sunday-school class and was active in the Young Men's\n    Christian Association, but that no thinking man can believe\n    in God or the Bible; a woman teacher in a public school in\n    Indiana rebukes a boy for answering that Adam was the first\n    man, explaining to him and the class that the \"tree man\" was\n    the first man; a young man in South Carolina traces his\n    atheism back to two teachers in a Christian college; a senior\n    in an Illinois high school writes that he became skeptical\n    during his sophomore year but has been brought back by\n    influences outside of school while others of his class are\n    agnostics; a professor in Yale has the reputation of making\n    atheists of all who come under his influence--this\n    information was given by a boy whose brother has come under\n    the influence of this teacher; a professor in Bryn Mawr\n    combats Christianity for a session and then puts to his class\n    the question whether or not there is a God, and is happy to\n    find that a majority of the class vote that there is no God;\n    a professor in a Christian college writes a book in which the\n    virgin birth of Christ is disputed; one professor declares\n    that life is merely a by-product and will ultimately be\n    produced in the laboratory; another says that the ingredients\n    necessary to create life have already been brought together\n    and that life will be developed from these ingredients,\n    adding, however, that it will require a million years to do\n    it. These are a few of the illustrations furnished by\n    informants whom I have reason to believe.\n\nThese facts certainly furnish sufficient reason why the Church cannot\ncompromise with the evolutionary philosophy. To do so would be to head\nherself toward destruction. She must stand uncompromised and unflinching\nagainst that unproven and discredited theory, the acceptance of which\ndestroys faith in that infallible and inerrant Word on which she was\nfounded, and on whose \"thus saith the Lord\" she must rest her message to a\nlost world. =There is no middle ground. To compromise would be to commit\nsuicide.= If the Church and the Schools are ever to come into harmony, it\ncannot be because the Church gives up an infallible Book and accepts a\ndiscredited theory in its place, and so it must be because the Schools give\nup this unscientific, because unproven, theory and get back to faith in the\ninerrant Word of God.\n\nThat this is the only basis on which the Church and the Schools can ever\ncome into harmony is strenuously denied by the evolutionists in both\nSchools and Church. But their denial is meaningless when it is remembered\nthat they are working night and day to capture the Church, as they have\nalready almost done with the Schools, before we wake up to what is going\non. But it can never be done. The true Church will never surrender to those\nwho would remove her foundations and wreck her message.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nThe Present Controversy--the Cure\n\n\nIn the previous pages we went back to the cause of the present controversy\nbetween the Church and the Schools. We found that the unproven and\ndiscredited theory of evolution lies at the bottom of it. We also concluded\nthat no compromise that permits entrance to this theory in any form is\npossible, for the truth which is at once both the life and the message of\nthe Church, and the theory of evolution, are mutually exclusive.\n\nIn this chapter we will seek to find the cure for this distressing\ncontroversy. That there is a cure is beyond all possible question. And if\nit is not found and applied, the controversy cannot fail to intensify until\nit may force a re-alignment in the Church--a thing a great company of the\nmost earnest in the Church are fighting to prevent.\n\nNow the only possible basis on which both the Church and the Schools can\ntake their stand, if this controversy is to be settled without final\ndisunion in the Church, was laid down by Christ in that scientific formula:\n\n    If any man willeth to do His will, he shall know of the\n    teaching, whether it be of God, or whether I speak from\n    Myself.\n\nTo follow this formula in our search for common ground is to be utterly\nscientific, for it is the laboratory method of experiment. The true Church\nhas always believed and received the Bible as the inerrant Word of God, not\nbecause, in blind credulity, she has followed some irrational and\nunscientific impulse, but precisely because she has been =scientific\nenough= to work by this formula and carry the laboratory test to its =final\nanalysis=. And for the Schools to follow this same formula with scientific\naccuracy would be for them to arrive at the same place at which the true\nChurch has arrived. For when the Church and the Schools start out in search\nof truth and do not arrive together, it is either because they did not\nstart together, or because one or both of them did not proceed all the way\nwith scientific exactness. Truth is an eternal unity, and conclusions\nregarding it that are mutually exclusive and therefore the cause of\ncontroversy prove to a demonstration that somebody's methods of\ninvestigation were unscientific.\n\nIf we really intend to be scientific, therefore, when we start out to\ninvestigate truth of any sort and in any realm, the first thing we will do\nwill be to classify. We can neither start nor proceed together unless we\ndo. Indeed, if we are to be scientific enough to follow the formula laid\ndown by Christ, we will be compelled to classify before we can even begin\nour investigation.\n\nTherefore--\n\n\nI. =Truth Must Be Classified Scientifically.=\n\n1. The =Realms of Truth= Must Be Classified.\n\nThe first thing the true scientist does is to classify truth into realms.\nThis we have already done by classifying the realm in which God reveals His\nmoral character to the hearts of all moral beings as the =spiritual= realm,\nand that in which He reveals His creative power to the minds of all\nintelligent beings as the =natural= realm.\n\nIf we do not distinguish these realms to start with, we invite confusion;\nand if we should reach right conclusions without this classification, it\nwould be due to accident, rather than to scientific accuracy.\n\nBut that this classification is universally recognized is proved by the\nfact that the moment science reaches the line where the natural ends and\nthe spiritual begins, it pursues its investigations no farther, on the\nground that it has neither the implements nor the capacities with which to\ninvestigate in that realm. This proves as conclusively as anything could\nthat the distinction between these two realms is so sharp, as well as so\nself-evident, that science is compelled to accept it and act accordingly.\n\n2. The =Faculties of Investigation= Must be Distinguished.\n\nThe scientific man will next distinguish the faculties with which the\ninvestigating is to be done, according to the respective realms. That this\nclassification is required by the fundamental difference in the nature of\nthe truths in these two realms is so self-evident that it ought to be\naxiomatic to all who think with any degree of scientific accuracy. For in\nthe nature of things, =natural= truth requires investigation by\n=intellectual= faculties, and =spiritual= truth by =spiritual= faculties.\nIndeed, this distinction is fully recognized when science halts its pursuit\nof truth at the boundary line of the spiritual realm.\n\nYet, although this classification is theoretically recognized by science,\nand although it is absolutely demanded if we are to proceed scientifically\nin our researches in the spiritual realm, it is little less than amazing\nhow many there are who utterly fail to distinguish these faculties when\nthey start out to investigate spiritual truth. Indeed, this is the first\nplace where the Church and the Schools part company. For the whole attitude\nof our Schools today, including most of the institutions founded and\nfostered by the Church, seems to be one that entirely misses the scientific\nnecessity of distinguishing between these essentially different faculties\nwhen working in these two utterly divergent realms of truth. And so it\ncomes to pass that while the Church is using one sort of faculties, the\nSchools are using another kind on the same class of truth.\n\nIt needs scarcely to be argued that the =intellect=, with its capacity to\n=reason=, is the proper faculty of apprehension in the scientific realm.\nBut it is equally true that the =heart=, with its capacity to =believe=, is\nthe one faculty of apprehension in the spiritual realm. That is, the\ninquirer reasons his way to knowledge in the natural realm, and believes\nhis way to knowledge in the spiritual realm. He uses his mind in order to\nunderstand what God has done in His creation, and he exercises faith in\norder to come into the knowledge of what He is in His character. In natural\nthings he believes because he understands, and in spiritual things he\nunderstands because he believes.\n\nIn drawing this contrast between mind and heart, however, it is fully\nrecognized that the term \"heart,\" in much if not all of Scripture, stands\nfor the whole personality, including intellect, emotion and will. But it is\nalso a fact that this term stands for that certain =attitude= of the whole\npersonality toward God through His Word in which one believes and receives\nHis Word without question, even though it may not be understood, rather\nthan insisting on understanding it in order to believe it.\n\nPaul says by inspiration in First Corinthians 1:17 to 2:16 that =mental=\ncapacity, even of the highest excellence, when exercised by itself, is\nutterly incapable of apprehending spiritual truth in any degree whatever.\nAnd Christ says that it is with the =heart= that man believes unto\nrighteousness. This defines that attitude of the whole personality which\naccepts the Word of God on faith without necessarily understanding it, and\nwhich gives evidence of acceptance by such a whole-hearted surrender to it\nas will eventuate in a life of righteousness.\n\nThen in other Scriptures we find that a life of righteousness, according to\nthe divine standard, is based on right relations with God in Christ through\nfaith in His shed blood, through whose incoming and indwelling life, in\nresponse to such a faith, the one who receives it will normally live in\nright relations with his fellow men. That is, it is a righteousness that is\nobtained by =believing=, not attained by =working=. It is received, not\nachieved.\n\nThe use of the term \"heart,\" therefore, in Scripture, means that certain\nattitude of the whole personality toward God through His Word which the\nexercise of the intellect apart from, and unfounded on, faith makes\nimpossible.\n\nIt is precisely this distinction in faculties that Christ's formula\nrequires. For it was =spiritual= truth, not natural, of which He spoke when\nHe said, \"=If= any man wills to do, he shall =know=.\" To work by this\nformula requires the exercise of faith. For faith is that attitude of the\nheart toward the doing of God's will which is evidenced in =willing to do=\nthat will, no matter what it costs nor where it leads. This is the first\nstep of faith. For faith is both an attitude and an act, the genuineness of\nwhich is proven by an activity. That is, it is an attitude of willingness\ntoward the will of God, an act of surrender to the will of God, eventuating\nin an activity in continuing in the will of God. Therefore complete\nsurrender of the heart and life to God's will as revealed in the Word,\ntrusting the outcome to Him, is where faith begins.\n\nAnd so let no man imagine that he has any real faith either in God or His\nWord who has not begun by willing to do, that he may enter upon the doing\nof, the will of God. Indeed, this is not simply the place where faith\nbegins, it is also the only place where the presence of faith can be\ndemonstrated. For this is the only possible way of distinguishing that\nintellectual attitude which simply assents to the truthfulness of the Word,\nfrom that genuine heart faith which actively reckons the Word to be true by\nsurrendering the life to its requirements. This formula of Christ's,\ntherefore, not only requires that the spiritual and natural faculties be\ndistinguished, but it is the one scientific test by which they =can= be\ndistinguished.\n\nThen there is Paul's classification of these faculties just referred to. It\nis passing strange that so many even in our denominational schools have\nmissed it. He devotes a whole section of First Corinthians, from 1:17 to\n2:16, as noted above, to a scientific statement of the natural and total\nincapacity of the intellect to discern spiritual truth. Consider it a\nlittle more in detail. He says that natural human wisdom, \"_sophia_,\" which\nAristotle defines as \"mental excellence in its highest and fullest sense,\"\nis utterly incapable of operating in the realm of spiritual investigation.\nFor after \"the world by mental excellence knew not God, it pleased God by\nthe foolishness (to the natural mental capacities) of the thing preached to\nsave those that =believe=.\" Not those that =understand=, for \"the natural\nman receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God (that is, spiritual\nthings), for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know (or\nunderstand) them, for they are =spiritually= discerned (or understood).\"\nThe essential difference between natural and spiritual faculties, as well\nas the utter incapacity of the natural faculties in the spiritual realm,\nare so clearly brought out in this passage that it is impossible to miss\nit.\n\nBy this it is not at all meant, however, that mental training and\nintellectual capacity have no place in certain branches of Bible study.\nEvery believer in the Book welcomes the keenest minds and the most expert\nscholarship in that branch of Bible study, for example, which seeks, by the\ninvestigation of the manuscripts and the variant readings, to arrive at the\nvery words that were written by the inspired writers; or, for example, in\nthat other branch of study which seeks to discover the history and origins\nof the various books of the Bible. But it =is= meant that when men seek to\nknow the =spiritual truths= of the Bible, they are utterly unscientific if\nthey fail to use that faculty in their investigation which the Textbook\nitself prescribes.\n\nTo sum it up, faith opens the way for God to quicken into activity a\nspiritual capacity through which =He= educates a man in spiritual things\nentirely independently of the schools.\n\nThe man who really intends to be scientific, then, will approach the Bible\nin that attitude of =faith= which will lead him to =will to do God's will=\nas the Bible reveals it. He will then be where he can =believe= his way to\nan understanding of spiritual truth.\n\n3. The =Different Kinds of Truth= Must Be Separated.\n\nAnother classification which the scientific man makes is to distinguish\nbetween the two kinds of truth in each respective realm, and to separate\nthat kind which may be demonstrated to the =experience= from that which\nmust be taken on =hearsay=. That is, in the natural realm, in the\ndepartment of chemistry, for example, the laws of chemical action can be\nput to the laboratory test of experiment, while the history of the science\nof chemistry must always be taken on hearsay. And, in the spiritual realm,\nthose truths stated in the spiritual Textbook which have to do with our\nspiritual relations with God can be put to the laboratory test of the\nexperiment of faith, while all the rest must be taken on hearsay.\n\n4. The =Primacy of Primary Truth= Must Be Maintained.\n\nOne thing more which the scientific man does is to accord primacy to that\nrealm of truth which is primary in importance. In order to do this, the\nscientific spirit compels the one possessed by it to meet two requirements.\n\nRecognizing that truth is an eternal unity, he will first determine to deal\nwith the facts in any given realm in such a way as to preserve harmony at\nall times between them and all the known facts of all the other realms. For\nonly thus can he avoid destroying the unity of truth and heading himself\ntoward error and confusion.\n\nHe will then determine to maintain the primacy of primary truth by\n=interpreting in its light the facts of all other realms=. That is, he will\nmake that realm whose truths are of transcendent importance the norm, or\nstandard, by which to interpret the facts of other realms, withholding\ninterpretations until the facts of any other given realm can be interpreted\nin harmony with those primary truths which have been made forever secure by\nbeing scientifically verified.\n\nThese requirements would seem so axiomatic as to need no emphasis, and yet,\nstrange as it may seem, right here is another place where the Church and\nthe Schools part company. For the Church is according primacy to one realm\nof truth, and the Schools to another, making unity of final conclusions out\nof the question.\n\nIf we are to be possessed by the scientific spirit and proceed with\nscientific accuracy, however, we will be compelled, in the terms of our\npresent study, to accord that primacy to the =spiritual= realm over the\n=natural= which its transcendent importance demands. For by as much as\ntruth about =God= is of more eternal value to sinful man than truth about\nHis =creation=, and by as much as truth by which we are =saved= is of more\ntranscendent importance than truth by which we are =informed=, by just that\nmuch will the scientific spirit compel us to interpret every bit of\ninformation that comes to us from the natural realm in harmony with, and in\nthe light of, the truths of the spiritual realm, for by this method alone\ncan we maintain the primacy of the spiritual realm over the natural.\n\nThis means that the man who is truly scientific will never interpret\ndiscoveries in the natural realm in such a way as to deny or even throw\ndoubt upon those fundamental truths in the spiritual realm which have been\nforever secured by scientific demonstration. In other words, he will not\nseek to bring the Bible into harmony with man's interpretation of\nscientific facts, but he will seek to bring every scientific discovery into\nharmony with the Bible, withholding final conclusions from all discoveries\nthat will not so harmonize until he has light enough so they will.\n\nWe have now reached the point where we can sum up all the requirements\nwhich the really scientific man will meet in order that he may be able to\nproceed with scientific accuracy in his researches in the realms of truth.\nHe will separate the natural and the spiritual realms of truth from each\nother. He will investigate natural truth with the intellect and spiritual\ntruth with faith. He will distinguish truth that can be demonstrated to the\nexperience from that which must be accepted on testimony alone. And he will\naccord primacy to the spiritual realm over the natural.\n\nIt only remains to be said that the man who will not meet these\nrequirements is a total stranger to the scientific spirit. \"The Standard\nDictionary\" says that science is \"knowledge gained and verified by exact\nobservation and correct thinking,\" and the man who will not meet\nrequirements that are absolutely necessary for exact observation and\ncorrect thinking in the gaining and verifying of knowledge does not have\nthe first qualification of the scientific investigator. For he is really\nnot open to truth at all, and is therefore in no position to maintain\neither the unity between the realms of truth or the primacy of primary\ntruth, and exact observation and correct thinking are out of the question\nunder such conditions. He cannot verify anything with scientific accuracy\nwhen he will not even classify the different realms of truth and the\nfaculties of investigation, or give the realms their respective places in\nthe sphere of truth. And so it is futile for one who refuses to do this to\ntalk about being in harmony with the scientific spirit.\n\nWhen an investigator meets these requirements, on the other hand, he is\nthen ready to meet the next demand made upon the scientific inquirer, which\nis--\n\n\nII. =Truth Must Be Investigated Scientifically.=\n\nAccepting the self-evident accuracy of the classification we have just\noutlined, we will now give attention to what the scientific spirit will\nrequire of us at those two places where the Church and the Schools have\nparted company. For if we can get together here, we can both proceed and\narrive together in our investigation of truth, and that will end the\ncontroversy.\n\n1. =Faith= Must Be Given Precedence over =Reason=.\n\nLet us see what it will mean to give precedence to faith over reason when\nwe are working in the realm of spiritual truth.\n\nIt will mean that =believing= will precede =reasoning= in our approach to\nthe Word of God, and this defines the vital distinction between the true\nChristian and the rationalist.\n\n=a.= The Method of the Rationalist.\n\nFaith and rationalism are mutually exclusive in the spiritual realm.\nRationalizing and doubting are first cousins when the Word of God is\ninvolved.\n\nSatan was the first rationalist on earth, and Eve fell when she accepted\nhis reasonings about the Word of God in the place of simple faith in that\nWord. For Satan raised a question about the Word,--\"Yea, hath God\nsaid?\"--and thereby opened the way for incipient doubt, and then he\nreasoned Eve into accepting a \"common sense\" interpretation of what God had\nsaid, which proved to be an outright denial of His Word. And look at the\nconsequences--indescribably terrible--of rationalizing about God's Word\ninstead of believing it!\n\nBut rationalism did not stop there, for ever since that day all men without\nexception have been natural-born rationalists. For it is perfectly natural\nto all men to =rationalize= about God's Word, but it takes a miracle of\nDivine power to make any one willing to =believe= it.\n\nThese two attitudes toward Scripture are forever irreconcilable. In the\nnature of things, they can never be harmonized. The believer in the Word\nand the rationalist take two utterly divergent paths that cannot possibly\nreach the same goal.\n\nThe program of the rationalist is to arrive at an understanding of\nspiritual truth over the pathway of reasoning that is apart from faith.\nThat of the believer is to arrive at it over the pathway of reasoning that\nis founded on faith.\n\nThe program of the rationalist is to harmonize the Word of God with his\nconclusions. That of the believer is to harmonize his conclusions with the\nWord. The program of the rationalist is to become a critic of the Word and\nsit in judgment on it. That of the believer is to let the Word become his\ncritic and sit in judgment on him.\n\nThese are certainly reasons enough why the believer and the rationalist can\nnever travel together. For the believer is walking by God's estimate of\nhim, while the rationalist is walking by his estimate of God, and these\npaths go in opposite directions.\n\nIf you sit in judgment on some portion of God's Word and determine that it\nis reasonable, and that since it commends itself to your judgment it is\ntherefore acceptable and you will believe it, =that= is not faith in the\n=Word= but in =your own reason=. You have surrendered your =intellect= to\nyour own conclusions but your =heart= is far from God. Faith in the Word is\nsurrender to it without passing judgment on it.\n\nAnd yet surrendering one's mind to one's own conclusions about God is\nprecisely the thing that passes for faith in God on the part of those who\nhave lost their old-fashioned, evangelical faith while they were in the\nSchools, and yet come out with what they describe as a more intelligent and\nrational faith in God and the Bible. In their desperate attempt to survive\nthe wreck of their orthodox faith, they have =reasoned= their way to\nconclusions about God that harmonized with what they were taught in the\nSchools; but the God they arrived at was the god of rationalism and not the\nGod of Revelation.\n\nThey will say to the orthodox man, \"You and I go by different pathways, but\nwe both arrive at the same God.\" But this is eternally impossible! For\nthere is only one pathway leading to the true God, and that is not followed\nby =reasoning= one's way out of a shattered faith, but first by =believing=\none's way out of darkness into light, and then by believing steadily on in\nthat divinely imparted faith which always shatters the reasonings and\nconclusions of the rationalists.\n\nTo be a believer in the Word puts rationalism out of business, for no one\ncan reason himself into the acceptance of truth he already believes. And on\nthe other hand, to be a rationalist regarding the Word puts faith out of\nbusiness, for faith is the acceptance of the bare Word of God without\nfurther evidence, and the rationalizer is compelled to reject that attitude\ntoward the Word so that he may have the way left open to reason his way to\nwhat he is willing to accept as evidence. This is why so many of those\nstudents who sit in the classes of the rationalists in our colleges and\nseminaries lose their faith. Rationalism makes Scriptural faith impossible.\nRationalizing and believing, when the Bible is in question, are mutually\nexclusive.\n\nThe reason for this is not that the facts of Scripture contradict each\nother, and certainly not that these facts are one thing to faith and\nanother thing to reason. The antagonism does not arise over the =facts= of\nthe Word but over the =interpretation= of them. The rationalist, accepting\nno interpretation except that furnished by his own puny and incompetent\nreason unillumined by faith, reaches conclusions absolutely contradicted by\nthose arrived at by the man of faith. The fact is, he could not hope to\narrive anywhere else. For how can finite man relate and interpret the few\nand scattered facts he discovers in the realm of infinite truth? How can a\nman by searching find out God?\n\n\"By whose interpretation, yours or mine?\" is a favorite question which the\nrationalist asks the believer when the meaning of some Scripture passage is\nin question. By =no one's= interpretation except the =Holy Spirit's=! He\nalone can interpret the Bible, for He alone knows what He meant by what He\nwrote. And even the Holy Spirit is able to interpret the Bible to =no one=\nbut the =believer=. For the rationalist, the unbeliever, rejects faith, and\nthereby completely closes \"the eyes of the heart\" to the illumination of\nthe Spirit; while the faith of the believer is the very thing that opens\nthe heart to an understanding of the Word. Spiritual apprehension begins\nonly at the point where faith begins.\n\nThis is why it is that when the rationalist tries his hand at\ninterpretation he is sure, sooner or later, to bring perfectly harmonious\nfacts into confusion and contradiction.\n\nTake, for example, the facts regarding the development of the human embryo.\nThe rationalist notes that as it develops it bears a striking resemblance,\nsuccessively, to the more mature forms of some of the lower animals, in an\nimagined orderly progress from lower to higher. That this resemblance is a\nfact no one disputes. There is no controversy over the fact. But when the\nrationalist attempts to explain this fact, he interprets it to mean that\nman is the product of evolution, rather than a special creation, as the\nBible says he is, and thus he thrusts such confusion and contradiction\nbefore us that we are compelled to make a choice between his interpretation\nand the statements of the Bible. The controversy that results is caused\naltogether by the rationalist thrusting himself into that place that\nbelongs to the Holy Spirit alone. \"=He= shall lead you into all the truth,\"\nsaid Christ, and it is presumptuous in the extreme to seek to do the Holy\nSpirit's work for Him.\n\nWe are forewarned of the methods of the modern rationalist in his approach\nto the Bible by what Christ said to the Jews who were finding fault with\nwhat He taught:\n\n    \"For had ye believed Moses,\" He said, \"ye would have believed\n    Me; for he wrote of Me. But if ye believe not his writings,\n    how shall ye believe My words?\"\n\nThis is precisely the pathway modern rationalism has followed. It began by\ndiscrediting what Moses wrote, and it has now gone to the length of denying\nfinal authority to what Christ said.\n\nRationalism is both irreverent and destructive when it seeks to do anything\nwith the Word of God. For that Book is to be handled as =no= other book is.\nBehind the historical, and the literary, and the textual, and the\nphilosophical criticism must be a spiritual discernment, born of faith\nalone, which both dominates and regulates all the rest. For just as a blind\nman may turn the eyes of his head to the sun and see no physical light, so\nthe rationalist may turn the eyes of his mind to the Bible and see no\nspiritual truth. It takes the eyes of the heart to see spiritual truth, and\nthey can function only through faith.\n\n=b.= The Method of the Believer.\n\nIn order clearly to understand the method of faith, we need right here to\nguard against another extreme. By the contrasts we have drawn in the last\nfew pages, it is not at all meant that there is no place in the exercise of\nfaith for the exercise also of the intellect at the same time and toward\nthe same object. For, in the nature of things, the intellect =must= be\nexercised in a mental apprehension of that which is to be believed before\nthe way is even open for faith to begin.\n\nNeither is it meant that reasoning is so out of harmony with and\ndestructive of faith that its exercise in connection with faith is\nimpossible. For faith is not blind credulity; it is not jumping in the\ndark; it is not an irrational impulse; it is not swallowing something with\nthe eyes shut. It is rather an open-eyed stepping out on to the spiritual\nfoundations of the universe. But notice--it is stepping out on to\n=spiritual= foundations.\n\nIt =is= meant, however, by the contrasts above, that the moment an\nintellectual apprehension of what is to be believed, followed by a\nconclusion to accept or reject it according to whether it is reasonable or\nnot--the moment such an attitude is =substituted= for the heart acceptance\nof the bare Word of God, even though it may be beyond understanding and\nreason, that moment the normal exercise of mind and reason has degenerated\ninto a rationalism that makes faith impossible.\n\nNotice an emphasis above. Faith is stepping out upon =spiritual=\nfoundations. Then recall that to all except the man of presumption,\nfoundations must be seen before they will be stepped upon. The normal man\ndemands to see where he is going.\n\nNow spiritual foundations can be seen only by spiritual eyes. The natural\nvision cannot see past the natural realm. And spiritual realities will\nnever be stepped out upon until they are seen. For faith is not an abstract\nand aimless emotion. It requires an object that can be seen, and one that\ncan be trusted.\n\nIt is therefore the one main purpose of the Bible to set before men the one\nsaving Object of faith. This purpose lies behind the multiplied revelations\nof God all through the Old Testament, and the gathering together of all\nthose revelations into Christ in the New Testament in such fullness and\nfinality that He could say: \"He that hath seen me hath seen the Father.\"\n\nBut God and Christ must be seen before they can be trusted. Not\nintellectually or historically, but spiritually seen. And they can be seen\nonly by spiritual eyes. And spiritual vision is possible only through the\ndivine touch. And the divine touch is given only to those who consent; it\nis not forced on any one. And the attitude of consent is precisely the\nattitude set forth in Christ's formula: \"If any man wills to do, he shall\nknow.\"\n\nOnly by coming into this attitude can any man see God. \"The pure in\n=heart=,\" said Christ, \"shall see God.\" It is a heart attitude. And the\nmeaning of the purity of heart that opens the vision to God is brought out\nwhen Christ is asked the question, \"How is it that Thou wilt manifest\nThyself unto us and not unto the world?\" His answer is of the utmost\nsignificance. He says, \"If a man love Me, he will =keep My words=.\" Keeping\nHis words, willing to do His will--this is the attitude that opens the\nvision to Him. He and the Father can manifest themselves to and be seen by\nthose only who are in the attitude of consent toward the keeping of His\nwords. This is the only attitude that can bring the anointing of the eyes\nwith that eye-salve which opens them to spiritual vision.\n\nBut when the eyes, in response to this attitude of willingness toward the\nwill of God, are once opened to spiritual things, then God, in all the\nperfections of His divine character, is seen both in the Bible, the written\nWord, and in Christ, the living Word, and this two-fold revelation of Him\nis seen to be as perfect and flawless as the God who is thus revealed.\nThose who think they see imperfections either in the Bible or in Christ are\nspiritually blind. For when one thinks he sees flaws where there are only\ninfinite perfections, he advertises to all that he is attempting the\nimpossible task of examining spiritual realities with his natural vision,\nand is therefore passing judgment on what he has never seen.\n\nBut when the spiritual vision has once been opened, and God is really seen,\nin the Bible and in Christ, in all the perfections of His infinitely holy\nand loving character, the =reason= at once leads to the conclusion from the\nfacts seen that such a Being is to be trusted, and active faith thereby\nbecomes the outgrowth of =that= kind of reasoning. That is, the faith that\nbegins as an attitude of willingness toward the will of God, through which\nattitude the eyes are touched into a vision of the character of God, such a\nfaith comes into and continues in an active submission to that will through\nthe normal functioning of reason.\n\nThis shows the vital difference between reasoning and rationalizing, and\nthe relation of each to faith. The effect of reasoning on faith is\nconstructive, while that of rationalizing is destructive. And the heart of\nthe difference between the two traces back, in the last analysis, to those\ntwo kinds of vision. The rationalist, unyielding to the touch of God on his\nvision, sees only natural facts, and even then he sees them only partially\nand wholly out of relation to the spiritual revelation of God in the Bible\nand in Christ; and thinking that he sees discrepancies between the facts in\nthe natural realm and the statements of Scripture, his =reason= leads him\nto reject the Bible as infallible and inerrant, thereby making faith in the\nGod of the Bible utterly impossible. His reasoning powers are simply\nfunctioning normally when he concludes to reject the statements about the\nfacts that to him are entirely unseen which do not seem to agree with what\nhe sees. His trouble is not with his reasoning powers but with his vision.\nRefusing to see what he is passing judgment on, his method of inquiry is\nrationalizing.\n\nBut the believer, utterly yielded to God and therefore seeing Him through\nanointed eyes in both the written and the living Word, thus seeing the\ninfinite perfections of His character, is led by the normal functioning of\nthe =same reason= to accept and act on the bare Word of God without further\nevidence, because the evidence he sees is all the evidence he needs. It is\nperfectly reasonable, therefore, for Him to accept all that such an One\nsays in His Word, waiting for the partial and apparently contradictory\nknowledge in the natural realm to be corrected into harmony with the Bible.\nAnd his reasoning powers are simply functioning normally when he accepts\nthe Bible as infallible and inerrant, for this attitude is based on what he\nsees. The entire difference between the rationalist and the believer is a\nmatter of vision. The reasoning powers of each simply act in view of what\neach sees.\n\nThis is why reasoning is never out of harmony with faith, while\nrationalizing always is. For true reasoning in spiritual things is =based=\non an attitude of faith, while rationalizing rejects that attitude as an\nessential preliminary to correct conclusions, and therefore reasons either\nentirely apart from or in order to faith. Such an attitude as opens the\nvision does not precede the action of reason, and the conclusions cannot\nhelp being destructive of faith, for they are pronouncements on things\nutterly unseen and unknown, and which the Bible says are \"foolishness\" to\nthe man who sees only through his natural vision. But the attitude of\nwillingness toward the will of God so opens the vision to the whole\nspiritual realm that the real foolishness is seen to be even the least\nattempt to pronounce upon or repudiate that which is utterly unseen and\nunknown.\n\nThis is the fundamental reason why there is such divergence, even to the\npoint of mutual exclusion, between the different \"interpretations\" of\nScripture given forth by the believer and the rationalist. The rationalist,\nwith heart and vision closed to spiritual truth, can give no interpretation\nexcept that which seems reasonable in view of what he sees; while the\nbeliever, in the attitude of faith toward God, =sees= the interpretation of\nScripture through the illumination of the Holy Spirit.\n\nThe interpretation of the Word is the very work for which the Holy Spirit\nhas come into the world. That is not all of His work, but a very essential\npart of it. He is God's official Interpreter of His truth to the believer.\nNot to the rationalizer, but to the believer. And His work is so divinely\nperfect and absolutely final that all human attempts at interpretation,\nwhich are devoid of faith, are an insult to Him. He is the One who wrote\nthe Word, and so He knows the meaning, not only of what He said, but even\nof what He left unsaid, and therefore none but He can interpret either the\nwords or the silences of Scripture.\n\nFor example, when Melchizedek flashes, meteor-like, across the page of Old\nTestament history, and then disappears without a word as to beginning of\nlife or end of days, who but the Holy Spirit could interpret those silences\ninto spiritual meanings of unfathomable richness? Who but He who was\nresponsible for those omissions could interpret them into some of the\nrichest revelations of all Scripture concerning the eternal Priesthood of\nthe slain and risen Son of God? And if the Holy Spirit can thus seize upon\nthe very silences of Scripture in showing us the things of Christ, who will\ndeny Him the power to interpret to those who will receive it what He meant\nby what He wrote? And who but the rationalist and the unbeliever can ever\nrefuse to let Him reveal the perfect harmony between the facts of nature\nand the scientific references of Scripture?\n\nIt is the divine prerogative to =cause= us to understand the Book. When the\nrisen Christ appeared suddenly among the disciples, first frightened and\nthen scarcely believing for joy, He first convinced them that it was really\nHe to whom they had already given their hearts, thus quickening their\n=faith= into renewed activity, \"Then opened =He= their =mind= that they\nmight =understand= the Scriptures.\" First faith and then knowledge of the\ntruth; this is the scientific order.\n\nLuther saw this when he wrote to Spalatin:\n\n    Above all things it is quite true that one cannot search into\n    the Holy Scriptures by means of study, nor by means of the\n    intellect. Therefore begin with prayer that the Lord grant\n    unto you the true understanding of His Word.\n\nEven Spencer had a glimpse of this scientific principle toward the end of\nhis life. In his essay on \"Feeling Versus Intellect\" he showed that he had\nlost faith in his former estimate of the place of the intellect in the\nmoral realm when he said:\n\n    Everywhere the cry is educate--educate--educate! Everywhere\n    the belief is that by such culture as schools furnish,\n    children, and therefore adults, can be molded into the\n    desired shapes. It is assumed that when men are taught what\n    is right, they will do what is right--that a proposition\n    intellectually accepted becomes morally operative. And this\n    conviction, contradicted by everyday experience, is at\n    variance with an everyday axiom--the axiom that each faculty\n    is strengthened by the exercise of it--intellectual power by\n    intellectual action, and moral power by moral action.\n\nWhat can this mean but that Spencer saw, at least dimly, the radical\ndifference between the intellectual and the spiritual faculties?\n\nThe logic of all these facts and principles makes only one conclusion\npossible. When the man of scientific spirit approaches the Book which can\nreveal its truths to =faith alone=, he will not be unscientific enough to\nrefuse faith to its statements and use his =intellect= alone. For he will\nsee that the one who refuses the attitude of faith toward the Scriptures\nwill be \"ever learning and never able to come to a knowledge of the truth,\"\nwhile the one who accepts the Word in humble dependence on the Holy\nSpirit's interpretation of its meaning is on the one solitary highway by\nwhich a knowledge of the truth can be reached. When the Church and the\nSchools, therefore, agree on using this method of approach to the Word of\nGod, they will at least have started toward the same goal.\n\n2. The =Spiritual= Realm Must Be Given Primacy over the =Natural=.\n\nLet us now see what it will mean to accord primacy to the spiritual realm\nover the natural.\n\nThere is only one possible method of doing this, and that is to interpret\nin the light of spiritual truth all the facts of the natural realm.\n\nThe man of scientific mind will therefore see clearly that he will be\nutterly incapable of giving such an interpretation to natural facts until\nhe first =knows what spiritual truth is=, and this will mean the laboratory\nmethod of the experiment of faith.\n\nBut right here you may say that science has nothing to do with the\nspiritual realm; that scientific investigation stops the moment it reaches\nthat realm; and that therefore to demand the use of these scientific\nmethods in that realm is not only foolish but impossible.\n\nBut stop and think a minute. It is both foolish and futile to demand that\neither the =implements= or the =faculties= used in the scientific realm\nshall be brought over and used in the pursuit of spiritual truth. This is\nprecisely the thing we are seeking to show. But that does not mean for a\nmoment that the inquirer must therefore give up the =scientific attitude of\nmind= and cease to work according to the demands of the =scientific spirit=\nthe moment he begins inquiry in the spiritual realm. For that spirit is\nsimply an honest and accurate method of investigation, and because science\nis compelled to stop at the border of the spiritual realm is no reason why\nwe should cease being honest and accurate when we investigate in that\nrealm. It is perfectly true that the scientist, as such, has absolutely no\npronouncement to make concerning spiritual truth; but it is equally true\nthat the inquirer in the spiritual realm, if he does not pursue his\ninquiries by scientific methods and according to the demands of the\nscientific spirit, will have no pronouncement to make either. The man who\nintends, therefore, to be scientific enough in his spirit to give primary\ntruth its place of primacy by interpreting in its light the truths of other\nrealms, and who, with the instincts of the true scientist, recognizes\nspiritual truth as primary in its relation to the natural, will be actuated\nsufficiently by his scientific attitude to determine to know what spiritual\ntruth is, in order that he may be able to interpret natural truth in its\nlight.\n\nThis will bring him face to face with Christ's formula for entering upon\nthe knowledge of spiritual truth. Being honestly desirous of knowing what\nspiritual truth is, he will determine to do God's will in order that he may\nfind out.\n\n=a.= This Will Mean Surrendering the Heart to God.\n\nThis is the only thing it can mean. For spiritual truth is primarily heart\ntruth, not intellectual truth, and the only way to know heart truth is to\nsurrender the heart to that Holy Spirit of truth who \"searcheth the deep\nthings of God,\" and who was sent into the world to \"lead us into all the\ntruth.\"\n\nThe grammarian, the philologist, the historian, the naturalist, the\nphilosopher, therefore, have no service they can perform here. They cannot\ncarry their apparatus over into the spiritual realm and weigh and measure,\nestimate and judge, illumine and interpret spiritual truth for us. When we\nstand here we are on that holy ground where we must lay off our sandals of\nscientific paraphernalia and stand before God with open heart ready to hear\nwhat He has to say. The moment we get to this realm, the whole apparatus by\nwhich truth is received changes from reason to faith.\n\nBut do you see where this brings us? Straight back to Christ's formula!\nThis is precisely what His formula involves, for when a man wills to do\nGod's will, he takes the first step in faith.\n\nThen when a man comes into this attitude toward God's will, he will next\ninquire where he is to commence in the doing of that will, what the first\nstep is in the will of God.\n\nThe Textbook tells us that the first step is to \"repent and believe the\nGospel.\" That this is the first step is self-evident, because the heart\nmust be opened to Him who alone can give the knowledge of spiritual truth\nbefore that knowledge is possible, and repentance and faith are the opening\nof the heart to Him. For repentance is a coming into that attitude of heart\ntoward God in which the whole life is laid bare before Him exactly as it\nis, thereby opening the way for faith; and believing the Gospel is an\nentering upon that faith which accepts the Gospel--the Good News--of\nChrist's finished work of atonement for sin through His shed blood on the\ncross, and reckons pardon for sin and new life in Christ to be now ours\naccording to the Word of God. For faith, you remember, is both an attitude\nand an act; an attitude of surrender to God, and an act of receiving what\nGod has for us; and this is precisely what it means to repent and believe\nthe Gospel.\n\nThis means that the man of genuine scientific spirit will begin his pursuit\nof spiritual truth by sincere \"repentance toward God\" and \"faith toward our\nLord Jesus Christ\" for salvation through His shed blood, which, according\nto the Textbook, are the first steps in willing to do the will of God,\nfollowed by a moment-by-moment dependence on Christ, Who is now his life,\nto reveal truth to him as he continues, by faith, in the attitude of an\nopen heart. This is the only possible way of ever knowing that truth which\nalone can make us free.\n\nIt is true that it is quite the fashion these days for every unbeliever,\nagnostic, modernist, and unitarian to quote those words of Christ \"Ye shall\nknow the truth, and the truth shall make you free\" in justification of the\nclaim that something which he is pleased to call truth has given him what\nhe fancies is freedom. But Scripture could not be more grossly perverted\nthan by such a wresting of its plain meaning. The whole statement reads:\n\n    Then said Jesus unto =those= Jews that =believed= on =Him=,\n    if =ye continue= in =My Word=, =then= are ye My disciples\n    indeed; and =ye= shall =know= the truth, and the truth shall\n    make you free.\n\nOnly the spiritually blind can fail to see the meaning of such a statement.\nIt plainly means that the first step toward freedom is =faith in Christ=,\nthe genuineness of which is evidenced by =continuance in His Word=; and\nthat it is only in this attitude of =faith= that it is possible to =know=\nthe truth that makes us free.\n\nThe truth is, therefore, that to be free one must believe on Christ. This\ndoes not mean to give intellectual assent to this or that fact about Him,\nbut utterly to commit the life to Him, sin and all, past, present, and\nfuture. For the Gospel tells us not so much what to believe as Whom to\nbelieve, and Paul tells us what faith in Christ means when he exclaims: \"I\nknow =Whom= I have believed,\" and then further unfolds what this involves\nby adding, \"and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have\n=committed unto Him= against that day.\"\n\nFaith is not simply giving mental assent to facts, it is primarily\nsurrendering to a Person. This is what it means to believe on Christ, and\nanything short of this will neither give us knowledge of the truth nor make\nus free.\n\nThen following this attitude toward Christ, the believer evidences his\nfaith by continuing in His Word, by which he comes into experiential\nknowledge of its truth and its meaning.\n\nThen coming to know the truth by experiencing it through faith, he is where\nthe Son of God Himself becomes his freedom. And there is no other freedom.\nIt is in the experience of =Himself=, not in an intellectual assent to\nfacts about Him, that He makes us free by becoming the =way= to God for us,\nthe =truth= about God to us, and the =life= of God in us.\n\nIt is therefore only he whom the Son sets free who is free indeed, for\nfreedom from the curse of sin by the experience of Christ as Saviour, and\nfreedom from the blindness of error by the experience of Christ as Truth\nincarnate, is the only freedom there is.\n\nWhen the Word says, therefore, \"Whatsoever is not of =faith= is =sin=,\" it\ncontemplates both the object of faith and the cause of forfeited freedom.\nFor the Holy Spirit came to convict men of =sin= because they =believe not\non Christ=. Unfaith in Christ is therefore the essence of sin. And sin is\nbondage, not freedom. Scripture describes the unbeliever in Christ as the\nbondslave of sin, held in chains of darkness and error. This is why it is\nimpossible either to know even natural truth in any adequate way, or to be\nable to untangle it from error, without becoming a believer on Christ as\nthe first step. So let no one who has not surrendered his heart to Christ\nin faith boast that he either knows the truth or is free.\n\nBut suppose a man should seek to know spiritual truth and yet refuse to\nsurrender his heart to Christ in faith, then what? It could only be because\nhe was so devoid of the scientific spirit that he did not want to =know the\ntruth= at =any cost=. And no man who is in this frame of mind can ever come\nto know the truth. Haeckel defines the scientific attitude of mind when he\nsays of the scientific inquirer that his\n\n    sole and only task is to seek to know the truth, and to teach\n    what he has discovered to be the truth, indifferent as\n    to ... consequences.\n\nThis means, in the terms of our present discussion, that in order to know\nspiritual truth, the man of scientific mind will be willing to work by\nChrist's formula no matter what it costs him, for that alone will give him\nthe knowledge of eternal things which will make it possible adequately to\ninterpret natural truth.\n\nBut suppose the inquirer doubts the possibility of entering into a\nscientific knowledge of spiritual truth by following this formula, what\nthen? It can only be because he is so unscholarly as to make the blunder in\nlogic of assuming as untrue or impossible that which =remains to be\nproved=.\n\nNo matter on which ground he refuses to surrender to Christ, therefore, no\ninquirer after spiritual truth can be either scientific or scholarly who\nmakes this refusal; for he thereby renders himself not only utterly\nincompetent to know spiritual truth, but also entirely unable to accord\nprimacy to the spiritual realm by interpreting natural truth in its light.\n\nSuppose a man should take this attitude of indifference or unbelief toward\nnatural truth. Suppose that after refusing to make the first experiment in\nthe study of chemistry he should attempt researches in a realm whose facts\nrequired interpretation in the light of the chemical laws he had refused to\nlearn in the laboratory. Then suppose he should dogmatically announce such\ninterpretations of his discoveries in that realm as were altogether out of\nharmony with the most fundamental laws in the chemical realm. And then\nsuppose that in order to maintain his unfounded and arbitrary\ninterpretations he should so twist the statements of the textbook on\nchemistry into harmony with his theories as to destroy their essential\nintegrity. He would win nothing but contempt from experienced chemists. He\nwould certainly find no place in the ranks of scientists.\n\nThis is precisely why evolutionists and rationalists, using this method\nexactly, can win no response from experienced Christians, and why they\nought to be outside the membership of our churches as long as they pursue\nthis method. Believers can not listen for one moment to such\ninterpretations of scientific facts by unbelievers as destroy the essential\ndoctrines of the Christian faith and deny the inerrancy and final authority\nof the Word of God. For unbelievers have not only not secured a scientific\nknowledge of what they are talking about, but they have not even acquired\nthe right to =pass an opinion= on the fundamental doctrines of the Bible.\nHow can they announce dogmatically so-called scientific interpretations of\nthe facts of nature which give the lie to the unmistakable doctrines of the\nspiritual Textbook whose truthfulness they have refused to put to the\nlaboratory test of experience, and yet at the same time claim to be\nactuated by the scientific spirit? Those who do such things know nothing\nabout the scientific spirit! Canon Dyson Hague was scientifically correct\nwhen he said that the rationalists are being opposed, not on the ground of\ntheir scholarship, but\n\n    because the biblical criticism of rationalists and\n    unbelievers can be neither expert nor scientific.\n\nThere is but one conclusion possible. The man who intends to accord primacy\nto the spiritual realm will first acquire a verified knowledge of spiritual\ntruth by the laboratory method of experience, according to the formula of\nthe Textbook. For when he does this he will then be qualified to take the\nnext step and make the primacy of spiritual truth an actual reality.\n\n=b.= This will Mean Interpreting Natural Truth in the Light of the Bible.\n\nWe have now arrived at that point where we can sum up the logic of the\nscientific method of the laboratory as it applies to the investigation of\nthe theory of evolution.\n\nThe man who is honest enough to want to know the truth at all cost, and\naccurate enough to insist on coming into a knowledge of the truth both by\nscientific methods and in the scientific order of primacy, will first\nacquire an adequate knowledge by experience, as we have already decided, of\nthose statements of the Bible that can be verified to the experience, and\nthen he will for the first time be qualified to arrive at an adequate\nestimate of the statements that cannot be so verified.\n\nThen recognizing that all the scientific references of the Bible, including\nthose relating to origins, are in that class that can not be verified to\nthe experience, he will decide to come to no conclusions concerning them\nexcept such as will maintain both the primacy of primary truth and the\nunity of all the realms of truth. He will do this because it is the only\nthing he can do and still maintain a truly scientific attitude of mind.\n\nThis will mean that he will interpret all the non-experimental statements\nof the Bible, including the scientific references, in harmony with and in\nthe light of those spiritual and experiential truths which he has already\nhad verified to him through his own personal relations with God through\nfaith in Christ. In other words, he will maintain the primacy of spiritual\ntruth by allowing no interpretation of scientific facts that will cast\neither denial or doubt on those fundamental doctrines which he now =knows=\nare true, because they have been =supernaturally verified= to him through\nthe laboratory test of faith.\n\nTake an illustration. Suppose an author on chemistry, who was also a\nhistorian, should include in his textbook a history of the science of\nchemistry. Now if a man puts his statements of chemical laws to an accurate\nlaboratory test and finds them true, he has the presumption established\nthat the history, which cannot be so tested, is also true.\n\nYes, that illustration breaks down, but only at the point of =human\nfallibility= and =imperfection=. If that author were omniscient and\ninfallible the illustration would be perfect.\n\nNow apply it to the Word. When a man, through the unfailing laboratory test\nof honest faith, finds that the statements that can be put to the test of\nexperience are infallible truth, he has not simply the presumption but also\nthe =absolute certainty= established that all its other statements are\ntrue, because the infallible and omniscient Author has given it to us as\nHis Word. It comes to us with a \"Thus saith the Lord\" ringing in our ears\nfrom beginning to end, and not with the multiplied repetitions of \"We may\nwell suppose\" of the scientific guessers.\n\nThe man of scientific mind, therefore, will accept all the non-experiential\nstatements of the Bible as infallible truth, including scientific and\nhistorical references and prophetic utterances. He will then accord the\nplace of primacy to all understood scientific references of the Bible over\nall discoveries in the natural realm. He will do this by interpreting the\nfew and fragmentary discoveries of finite and fallible man in the light of\nthe statements that come to us as the Word of an infallible God, concluding\nthat if there is any apparent inharmony, it lies in the partial discoveries\nor premature conclusions of scientists, rather than in any error of\nstatement in the Bible. In other words, he will interpret science in the\nlight of the Bible, and not the Bible in the light of science. And if at\nany time a harmonizing of scientific discoveries with the Bible seems\nimpossible, he will withhold final conclusions until he has further\nscientific light, realizing that when he knows enough science he will then\nbe able to understand the scientific references of the Bible, and the\napparent inharmony will vanish. Multiplied illustrations of this are so\nfamiliar that it is scarcely necessary to elaborate on it, as many will\noccur to the reader who is at all familiar with the essential harmony\nbetween the Bible and all real scientific knowledge, and with the fact that\na multitude of scientific discoveries have been made, only to find that the\nBible made reference to them in the most accurate scientific terms many\ncenturies before their discovery.\n\nA conclusion is now possible as to what attitude a man who has faith in an\ninerrant Bible will be compelled to take toward the theory of evolution.\nWhen he sees that the logic of evolution destroys every fundamental\nScripture doctrine which he has already had verified to him by the Holy\nSpirit; when he learns that evolution is not only entirely unproven but\neven discredited by many competent men of science; and when he turns to the\nBible and reads the statement repeated over and again that each species was\ncreated to reproduce only \"after his kind\"; he will be compelled to make a\nchoice between evolution and an inerrant Bible, and, believing the Bible,\nhe will reject evolution.\n\nThen when he recalls that to Eve, Satan advanced an unproven theory which\nassumed to interpret, but had the effect of denying, the Word of God, and\nthen reflects that the theory of evolution does precisely the same thing,\nhe will become suspicious that the \"father of lies\" is behind the whole\nevolutionary propaganda. Other theories that are unproven and discredited\nfall by their own weight. The persistence of this theory must be accounted\nfor on the ground that it can be used to destroy faith in the infallibility\nof the Bible.\n\nIt is quite true that there are many who say they believe the Bible and\naccept evolution also. But how those who are mentally sound and capable of\nlogical consistency can accept two mutually exclusive propositions at the\nsame time, it is impossible to understand. We will be compelled to let\nthose who say they accept both the Bible and evolution explain how they do\nit--if they can! But meantime, if we take pains to make careful inquiry of\nsuch people, we shall find that in =every case= where logical and\nconsistent thinking has any meaning whatever, a =choice= has been made\nbetween the Bible as an inerrant and infallible Book and the theory of\nevolution. It is quite possible for a man to hold the \"scientific\" or\n\"historical\" attitude toward the Bible, which makes it a human book marred\nby many errors, and believe in evolution at the same time; but the man who\nholds that attitude toward the Bible =does not believe it at all=! No one\ncan accept the theory of evolution and the doctrine of an inerrant Bible at\nthe same time.\n\nAnd yet the attempt is being very skilfully made by many leaders in the\nSchools today to camouflage this impossibility. A very recent article by\nDr. Shailer Mathews on \"Christ and Education\" is a typical illustration.\n\nIn the midst of the article Dr. Mathews frankly indicates his acceptance of\nevolution, because of which, he says, \"the meaning of religion was\nenlarged\" for him. Then he leaves the impression with the reader that the\nconclusions of modern science are to be taken without question, and also\nthat our faith in Christ and the Bible are to be brought into harmony with\nthese conclusions. That is, our faith must combine an acceptance of\nevolution with whatever attitude toward Christ and the Scriptures the\nevolutionary philosophy makes possible. This puts reason above Revelation\nand makes the scientific realm primary in its relation to the spiritual.\nThe reader can judge, in the light of our previous thinking, whether this\nprocedure is scientific or not.\n\nThen in speaking of the fact that the educated man as truly as the ignorant\nman needs the saving power of Christ, he says:\n\n    But he must be saved as an educated man and not as an\n    ignorant man. He cannot be forced to give up what he knows to\n    be real. If he be told that Christian loyalty involves the\n    abandonment of the assured results and methods of scientific\n    investigation, he will refuse such loyalty.\n\nThis implied charge is later on in the article made specific when he says\nthat some schools\n\n    \"are refusing to let their students know the results of\n    scientific investigation for fear lest such knowledge will\n    ruin certain theological beliefs for which the schools\n    stand\"--a method he describes as putting a premium upon\n    ignorance as a prerequisite for faith.\n\nThe reader knows as well as the writer that the whole attitude of the\nChristian Church, and therefore of true Christian education, challenges\nthose words and hurls them back at their author for proof. Both the implied\nand the direct accusations are utterly without foundation. Indeed, the\nthing Dr. Mathews charges is the one thing true Christian education does\n=not= do.\n\nWhen did the Church ever try to force a man, educated or ignorant, to give\nup what he knows to be facts in order to become a Christian? When was a man\never asked by Christian schools to choose between the assured results and\nmethods of scientific investigation and loyalty to Christ? When has that\ninstitution which, above all others, has fought ignorance and fostered true\nscientific investigation used a method that put a premium on ignorance as a\nprerequisite for faith?\n\nIt is not =facts= that the Church either fears or refuses to accept, but\nsuch an =interpretation= of them by evolutionists and rationalists as to\ndeny the scientific accuracy and therefore the inerrancy of the Word of\nGod. It is altogether beside the truth to intimate that the Church is\nfostering an education that has to withhold assured scientific facts for\nfear their knowledge would ruin faith in any theological beliefs whatever\n\"for which the schools stand.\" It is not the =knowledge= of scientific\nfacts that true Christian schools ever withhold, but such =theories= and\n=speculations= concerning their meaning as would destroy the schools as\nChristian institutions if the logic of them were followed to the end. And\nas for the Church ever abandoning the assured results and methods of\nscientific investigation, this is precisely the thing the Church is\n=fighting to maintain= against the efforts of evolutionists and\nrationalists. It is rather the =Schools= that have been abandoning\nscientific methods of investigation, thereby reaching \"assured results\"\nthat invalidate not only the doctrine of an inerrant Bible, but every other\nfundamental doctrine of the Scriptures. Indeed, this is the very reason why\nthe controversy between the Church and the Schools is now on, and Dr.\nMathews' article is typical of the attempts that are being made to make it\nappear that faith in evolution and the Bible can be combined--an attempt\ntoward which all believers in an infallible Book will always be\nirreconcilable.\n\nAnd this irreconcilable attitude is not without reason, but for the\nperfectly valid reason that the one who accepts evolution as a fact is\nutterly unscientific. For in the first place he accepts unproven\nassumptions and rationalistic speculations as demonstrated facts. And, in\nthe next place, he thereby forces human interpretations of scientific facts\nto contradict the divinely verified doctrines of the Bible, thus thrusting\nconfusion and contradiction between realms of truth which are in perfect\nharmony. And, still further, he interprets the Bible in the light(?) not\nsimply of science but even of a false science, and thus compels unproven\nhypotheses to deny the truthfulness of the scientific and historical\nreferences of the Bible, thereby forcing into primacy a realm of truth that\nis not primary. And all of this because he refuses to follow the formula of\nthe spiritual Textbook and put faith above reason and the Bible above\nscience in his approach to truth. How can a man follow such methods and yet\nimagine that he is scientific?\n\nOne more thing remains to be said before this argument is completed. We\nstarted out with an unproven, though self-evident premise. Turn back to the\nvery first paragraph in the book and you will find that the falsity of the\npantheistic theory was assumed but not proved. Its falsity was assumed on\ngrounds that have come to light as the argument has proceeded, and that\nmight easily be turned to account now as conclusive proofs. For example, to\nrefer to one of them, the self-evident distinction between the realm which\ncontains the Creator and that which contains His creation science proves to\nbe a real divergence in kind by being compelled to cease investigation with\nscientific apparatus the moment the boundary line of the spiritual realm is\nreached. And if there is as real a distinction between God and His\ncreation as this indicates, the doctrines of pantheism are impossible.\n\nBut the theory of evolution fosters a doctrine of the \"immanence of God\"\nwhich is nothing but a modern form of pantheism. For example, Prof. Josiah\nRoyce, of Harvard, has said:\n\n    God is the spirit animating nature, the universal force which\n    takes the myriad forms, heat, light, gravitation,\n    electricity, and the like.\n\nAnd Prof. George B. Foster said:\n\n    God is a symbol to designate the universe in its ideal\n    achieving capacity.\n\nThis is pantheism, pure and simple, for God and His created universe are\nnot distinguished from each other. And this blots out the distinction\nbetween the natural and the spiritual realms.\n\nRealizing, therefore, that no matter how perfect a course of reasoning may\nbe or how inevitable the conclusions resulting it all falls like a house of\ncards if the premise is false, it becomes necessary to determine whether\npantheism is false or true, in order that we may know whether we started\nwith a valid premise.\n\nIs pantheism true?\n\nOne thing we know is true. The Bible clearly and sharply distinguishes\nbetween God and His creation. No one who reads the Bible can dissent from\nthat statement. And pantheism absolutely denies that Bible distinction.\n\nIt therefore immediately resolves itself into a question as to whether the\nBible is true.\n\nThis brings us straight back to Christ's formula--\"If any man wills to do,\nhe shall know.\" He who accepts the challenge of this formula will come to\nknow, beyond all possibility of disproof, that neither pantheism,\nevolution, nor any other doctrine that denies or casts doubt on the\ninfallibility of the Bible is true. He will know it because it is\nsupernaturally verified to him in answer to his faith.\n\nThis formula is the divine challenge to every form of unbelief in an\ninerrant Bible. There never has been an hour since Pentecost when the\naggressive hurling of this challenge at defiant and destructive unbelief\nwas more needed. And the whole Christian Church, backed by the Word of God,\nis hurling this challenge back into the teeth of the whole evolutionary\ncamp today.\n\nEither be fair enough, be scientific enough, be honest enough, challenges\nthe Church, to act upon Christ's formula and gain for yourselves that\nsupernaturally verified knowledge which will make further faith in the\nevolutionary theory impossible, or else do not assume to pronounce any\nfurther on those truths of which you know nothing because you have been\nunwilling to take the means to find out what they are. Go and join the\nranks of the other unbelievers and Bible-rejectors, taking your doubt-born\ntheories with you as a reinforcement to their warfare against the Bible,\nand then the Church can fight you in the open and drive you to defeat with\nthe Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God. If you are determined\nto destroy faith in the inerrancy of the Bible, at least be fair enough to\ncome out from under the cover of \"Christian education,\" and stop assuming\nto interpret in the light of evolution--a light that is darkness--those\nsublime doctrines which are at once the foundation and the message of the\nChurch. Get out of the Christian schools, which were founded to strengthen,\nnot to destroy, the faith of young people from Christian homes, and give\nplace to those who believe the Book. Increasing hosts of Christian parents\nare too heart-broken over the invasion of their own homes by this\ndestroying wolf in sheep's clothing to tolerate this situation much longer.\nThey are asking, in the words of a Chicago newspaper editorial concerning\nthe destructive teachings of Prof. George B. Foster, in the Chicago\nUniversity Divinity School:\n\n    Is there no place to assail Christianity but a divinity\n    school? Is there no one to write infidel books except the\n    professors of Christian theology? Is a theological seminary\n    an appropriate place for a general massacre of Christian\n    doctrine?\n\nAnd then the sentiment that follows in the next sentence is shared\nincreasingly by multitudes in the Church in proportion as these destroyers\nbecome increasingly aggressive in their work of destruction. The editor\ncontinues:\n\n    Mr. Mangasarian delivers infidel lectures every Sunday in\n    Orchestra Hall and no one is shocked, but when the professed\n    defenders of Christianity jump on it and assassinate it, the\n    public--even the agnostic public, cannot but despise them.\n\nEither be scientific enough, cry believers to the evolutionists, to accept\nthe challenge of Christ's formula with all its implications, or be honest\nenough to cease destroying the faith in an inerrant Bible you have sworn to\ndefend but refuse to accept!\n\nThe Church is also hurling the challenge of Christ's formula at every other\nform of aggressive unbelief. No unbeliever, from destructive Higher Critic\nto agnostic and infidel, has the shadow of a right to make contrary\npronouncement on the inerrancy and infallible authority of the Bible, for\nhe has refused to put Christ's word to the test,--his unbelief proves\nit,--and he is therefore utterly incapacitated for passing any judgment\nwhatever on that Book which unfolds its meaning to faith alone.\n\nAnd as to the controversy between the Church and the Schools, the\nevolutionists must quit either evolution or the Christian schools, or the\ncontroversy can in no way be cured. For how can faith in an inerrant Bible\nand unbelief in its inerrancy abide in harmony in the same house? In the\nvery nature of things, two groups who hold such absolutely antagonistic\npositions must either part company or continue the controversy born of the\nantagonism. The true Church always has believed, and always will believe,\nin an inerrant Word of God, and she cannot harbor within her ranks any\ngroup of people, no matter by what name they go, who do not take their\nstand without equivocation on that same ground.\n\nIf reason for this intolerance is asked, it will appear in the light of\nsome questions asked by Dr. Joseph Parker. These questions are:\n\n    If the Bible is wrong in history, what guarantee is there\n    that it is right in morals?\n\n    If the Bible is not a reliable guide in facts, how do we know\n    that it is a trustworthy guide in doctrine?\n\nHowever he may have arrived at his conclusions, it is extremely\nsignificant, in the light of these questions, that Dr. E. D. Burton, being\nwilling to admit that the Bible is\n\n    not infallible in history or in matters of science,\n\nhas also concluded that it is\n\n    not wholly consistent and therefore not ultimately and as a\n    whole inerrant in the field of morals and religion.\n\nWhat reason more can the Church want to justify her for intolerance of a\ntheory that will do this to a man's faith? Is it not correct reasoning to\nconclude that if one man suffers such a collapse of faith after accepting\nevolution, others are likely to suffer the same thing? And when the Church\nobserves this collapse taking place in every quarter, and then discovers\nthat back of it lies the theory of evolution, is she not justified for\nbeing intolerant of that thing which is gnawing at the vitals of her faith?\nWhat can she say else than that the teachers of evolution, at least in the\nChristian schools, must either give up evolution and come back to faith in\nan infallible Bible, or part company with the Church?\n\nIt may be that one reason why the evolutionists are so loth to get out of\ncompany they do not belong in is because they fear that thereby they may\nlose their coveted reputation for scholarship. Prof. Howard W. Kellogg,\nformerly of Occidental College, hints as much when he says:\n\n    Science has again and again set aside as untrustworthy the\n    so-called discoveries of evolution, has compelled the great\n    German evolutionist, Haeckel, to confess that his drawings of\n    missing links were from imagination rather than from objects\n    found, has driven him from his university chair, and has\n    compelled him to admit that \"Most modern investigators of\n    science have come to the conclusion that the doctrine of\n    evolution, and particularly of Darwinism, is in error and\n    cannot be maintained,\"--and yet in spite of such admissions\n    from men recognized as authorities in their respective lines,\n    the doctrine of evolution appears to rule as absolutely in\n    the educational world as if it were not a moribund\n    hypothesis, already discarded by many, and to be discarded by\n    others when scientific evidence rather than reputation for\n    scholarship is allowed the deciding voice.\n\nBut whatever the actuating motive may be that has kept the evolutionists\nfrom giving up their unscholarly and unscientific theory, true believers in\nthe Word long to see them do what Henry Drummond, that brilliant scientist,\ndid before he died. On his deathbed he said to Sir William Dawson, as\nreported in this country in the writer's hearing by Dr. John Robertson\ndirectly from the lips of Dawson:\n\n    I am going away back to the Book to believe it and receive it\n    as I did at the first. I can live no longer on uncertainties.\n    I am going back to the faith of the Word of God.\n\nWhen both the Church and the Schools consistently and sincerely take this\nattitude toward the Bible, the controversy will be ended in the one way in\nwhich the Church longs to see it end.\n\n\n\n\n_Printed in the United States of America_\n\n\n\n\n=DIVINE DYNAMITE=\n\n=By J. E. CONANT, D.D.=\n\nA stirring address to the Church, pleading the need, the source, and the\noperation of power from on High, which she needs above the power of\neloquence, of music, of sociability, of organization, and of money.\n\n=A REPRESENTATIVE TESTIMONIAL=\n\n\"This order confirms my wire of even date, 'Please mail to-day fifty\n_Divine Dynamite_,' and best expresses what I think of the book since\nreading it.\"\n\n                                               F.D.S., _Davenport, Iowa_\n\n_Art Stock Covers, 20 cents, postpaid_\n\n------\n\n\"I have been sending this book around to people who, I thought, ought to\nread it.\"--_William Jennings Bryan_.\n\n\n\n\nThe Other Side of Evolution\n\n_Its Effects and Fallacy_\n\n=By Alexander Patterson, D.D.=\n\nWith an introduction by the late George Frederick Wright, the eminent\ngeologist of Oberlin.\n\n  =CONTENTS=                                                  page\n  Preface.      Claims and Influence of Evolution              vii\n  Introduction. The Meaning of Evolution                       xix\n  Chapter   I   Evolution Is an Unproved Theory                  5\n  Chapter  II   Evolution of the Universe and Earth             17\n  Chapter III   Evolution of Species                            26\n  Chapter  IV   Evolution of Man                                60\n  Chapter   V   Evolution Unscientific and Unphilosophical     112\n  Chapter  VI   Evolution and the Bible                        120\n  Chapter VII   Spiritual Effect of Evolution                  137\n\n_12mo, cloth binding, $1.06, postpaid_\n\n\n\n\n\"There is more happiness in bringing souls back to God than in three\npresidential nominations.\"--_William Jennings Bryan_\n\n=THE BIBLE AND ITS ENEMIES=\n\nBy WILLIAM JENNINGS BRYAN\n\nWritten that the people shall not be robbed of their faith in God.\n\"_For he that cometh to God must believe that He IS._\"--_Heb. 11:6._\n\nThere is a great stir in the camp of the =Atheist=, the =Agnostic=, the\n=Higher Critic= and particularly the =Evolutionist=, because of this modern\nDavid--America's Gladstone--William Jennings Bryan!\n\nThe heart of every true Christian rejoices because the enemies of our\ncountry and of our God and Saviour are so plainly pointed out by this bold\nand mighty champion of the Book.\n\n=Read--Distribute--Recommend= this attractive and compelling booklet.\n=Pastors, Educators, Students, Parents=--you cannot ignore this great\nmessage!\n\n_Art Stock Covers, 12mo, 25 cents, postpaid._\n\n\n\n\n=WHAT ABOUT EVOLUTION?=\n\nBy W. H. GRIFFITH THOMAS, D.D.\n\nSome thoughts on the relation of Evolution to the Bible and Christianity,\nby a former fellow of Oxford and Principal of Wycliffe College, Toronto.\n\n_A neatly printed pamphlet, 10 cents, postpaid_\n\n\n  =THE BIBLE INSTITUTE COLPORTAGE ASS'N=\n  826 North La Salle Street, Chicago\n\n\n\n\n      *      *      *      *      *\n\n\n\n\nTranscriber's note:\n\n  Page 11 The word \"none\" has been changed to \"no\" in \"none effect by\n          a non-belligerent\".\n\n  Page 32 Duplicate \"of\" removed from \"the doctrines of of the Deity\".\n\n  Page 88 Added a period to the end of the quote finishing with\n          \"... morals and religion\".\n\n  Page 91 The printer's name and adress were removed. They appear\n          at the end of the advertisments.","title":"The Church, the Schools and Evolution","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":23119}