In His Image Part 7

The language which I have quoted proves that Darwinism is directly antagonistic to Christianity, which boasts of its eleemosynary inst.i.tutions and of the care it bestows on the weak and the helpless.

Darwin, by putting man on a brute basis and ignoring spiritual values, attacks the very foundations of Christianity.

Those who accept Darwin's views are in the habit of saying that it need not lessen their reverence for G.o.d to believe that the Creator fas.h.i.+oned a germ of life and endowed it with power to develop into what we see to-day. It is true that a G.o.d who could make man as he is, could have made him by the long-drawn-out process suggested by Darwin. To do either would require infinite power, beyond the ability of man to comprehend.

But what is the _natural tendency_ of Darwin's doctrine?

Will man's att.i.tude toward Darwin's G.o.d be the same as it would be toward the G.o.d of Moses? Will the believer in Darwin's G.o.d be as conscious of G.o.d's presence in his daily life? Will he be as sensitive to G.o.d's will and as anxious to find out what G.o.d wants him to do?

Will the believer in Darwin's G.o.d be as fervent in prayer and as open to the reception of divine suggestions?

I shall later trace the influence of Darwinism on world peace when the doctrine is espoused by one bold enough to carry it to its logical conclusion, but I must now point out its natural and logical effect upon young Christians.

A boy is born in a Christian family; as soon as he is able to join words together into sentences his mother teaches him to lisp the child's prayer: "Now I lay me down to sleep; I pray the Lord my soul to keep; if I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take." A little later the boy is taught the Lord's Prayer and each day he lays his pet.i.tion before the Heavenly Father: "Give us this day our daily bread"; "Lead us not into temptation"; "Deliver us from evil"; "Forgive our trespa.s.ses"; etc.

He talks with G.o.d. He goes to Sunday school and learns that the Heavenly Father is even more kind than earthly parents; he hears the preacher tell how precious our lives are in the sight of G.o.d--how even a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice. All his faith is built upon the Book that informs him that he is made in the image of G.o.d; that Christ came to reveal G.o.d to man and to be man's Saviour.

Then he goes to college and a learned professor leads him through a book 600 pages thick, largely devoted to resemblances between man and the beasts about him. His attention is called to a point in the ear that is like a point in the ear of the ourang, to canine teeth, to muscles like those by which a horse moves his ears.

He is then told that everything found in a human brain is found in miniature in a brute brain.

And how about morals? He is a.s.sured that the development of the moral sense can be explained on a brute basis without any act of, or aid from, G.o.d. (See pages 113-114.)

No mention of religion, the only basis for morality; not a suggestion of a sense of responsibility to G.o.d--nothing but cold, clammy materialism!

Darwinism transforms the Bible into a story book and reduces Christ to man's level. It gives him an ape for an ancestor on His mother's side at least and, as many evolutionists believe, on His Father's side also.

The instructor gives the student a new family tree millions of years long, with its roots in the water (marine animals) and then sets him adrift, with infinite capacity for good or evil but with no light to guide him, no compa.s.s to direct him and no chart of the sea of life!

No wonder so large a percentage of the boys and girls who go from Sunday schools and churches to colleges (sometimes as high as seventy-five per cent.) never return to religious work. How can one feel G.o.d's presence in his daily life if Darwin's reasoning is sound? This restraining influence, more potent than any external force, is paralyzed when G.o.d is put so far away. How can one believe in prayer if, for millions of years, G.o.d has never touched a human life or laid His hand upon the destiny of the human race? What mockery to pet.i.tion or implore, if G.o.d neither hears nor answers. Elijah taunted the prophets of Baal when their G.o.d failed to answer with fire; "Cry aloud," he said, "peradventure he sleepeth." Darwin mocks the Christians even more cruelly; he tells us that our G.o.d has been asleep for millions of years.

Even worse, he does not affirm that Jehovah was ever awake. Nowhere does he collect for the reader the evidences of a Creative Power and call upon man to wors.h.i.+p and obey G.o.d. The great scientist is, if I may borrow a phrase, "too much absorbed in the things infinitely small to consider the things infinitely great." Darwinism chills the spiritual nature and quenches the fires of religious enthusiasm. If the proof in support of Darwinism does not compel acceptance--and it does not--why subst.i.tute it for an account of the Creation that links man directly with the Creator and holds before him an example to be imitated? As the eminent theologian, Charles Hodge, says: "The Scriptural doctrine (of Creation) accounts for the spiritual nature of man, and meets all his spiritual necessities. It gives him an object of adoration, love and confidence. It reveals the Being on whom his indestructible sense of responsibility terminates. The truth of this doctrine, therefore, rests not only upon the authority of the Scriptures but on the very const.i.tution of our nature."

I have spoken of what would seem to be the natural and logical effect of the Darwin hypothesis on the minds of the young. This view is confirmed by its _actual_ effect on Darwin himself. In his "Life and Letters," he says: "I am much engaged, an old man, and out of health, and I cannot spare time to answer your questions fully--nor indeed can they be answered. Science has nothing to do with Christ, except in so far as the habit of scientific research makes a man cautious in admitting evidence.

For myself, I do not believe that there ever has been any revelation. As for a future life, every man must judge for himself between conflicting vague probabilities." It will be seen that science, according to Darwin, has nothing to do with Christ (except to discredit _revelation_ which makes Christ's mission known to men). Darwin himself does not believe that there has ever been _any revelation_, which, of course, excludes Christ. It will be seen also that he has no definite views on the _future life_--"every man," he says, "must judge for himself between _conflicting vague probabilities_."

It is fair to conclude that it was _his own doctrine_ that led him astray, for in the same connection (in "Life and Letters") he says that when aboard the _Beagle_ he was called "orthodox and was heartily laughed at by several of the officers for quoting the Bible as an unanswerable authority on some point of morality." In the same connection he thus describes his change and his final att.i.tude: "When thus reflecting I feel compelled to look to a First Cause, having an intelligent mind in some degree a.n.a.logous to that of man; and I deserve to be called a Theist. This conclusion was strong in my mind about the time, as far as I can remember, when I wrote the 'Origin of Species'; and it is since that time that it has very gradually, with many fluctuations, become weaker. But then arises the doubt: _Can_ the mind of man, which has, as I fully believe, been developed from a mind as low as that possessed by the lowest animals, be trusted when it draws such grand conclusions?

"I cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems.

The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble by us; and I for one must be content to remain an Agnostic."

A careful reading of the above discloses the gradual transition wrought in Darwin himself by the unsupported hypothesis which he launched upon the world, or which he endorsed with such earnestness and industry as to impress his name upon it He was regarded as "_orthodox_" when he was young; he was even laughed at for quoting the Bible "_as an unanswerable authority on some point of morality_." In the beginning he regarded himself as a Theist and felt compelled "to look to a First Cause, having an intelligent mind in some degree a.n.a.logous to that of man."

This conclusion, he says, was strong in his mind when he wrote "The Origin of Species," but he observes that since that time this conclusion very gradually became _weaker_, and then he unconsciously brings a telling indictment against his own hypothesis. He says, "_Can the mind of man_ (which, according to his belief, has been _developed from a mind as low as that possessed by the lowest animals) be trusted when it draws such grand conclusions_?" He first links man with the animals, and then, because of this _supposed_ connection, estimates man's mind by brute standards. Agnosticism is the natural att.i.tude of the evolutionist. How can a brute mind comprehend spiritual things? It makes a tremendous difference what a man thinks about his origin whether he looks up or down. Who will say, after reading these words, that it is immaterial what man thinks about his origin? Who will deny that the acceptance of the Darwinian hypothesis shuts out the higher reasonings and the larger conceptions of man?

On the very brink of the grave, after he had extracted from his hypothesis all the good that there was in it and all the benefit that it could confer, he is helplessly in the dark, and "cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems." When he believed in G.o.d, in the Bible, in Christ and in a future life there were no mysteries that disturbed him, but a _guess_ with nothing in the universe to support it swept him away from his moorings and left him in his old age in the midst of mysteries that he thought _insoluble_. He must content himself with _Agnosticism_. What can Darwinism ever do to compensate any one for the destruction of faith in G.o.d, in His Word, in His Son, and of hope of immortality?

It would seem sufficient to quote Darwin against himself and to cite the confessed effect of the doctrine as a sufficient reason for rejecting it, but the situation is a very serious one and there is other evidence that should be presented.

James H. Leuba, a professor of Psychology in Bryn Mawr College, Pennsylvania, wrote a book five years ago, ent.i.tled "Belief in G.o.d and Immortality." It was published by Sherman French & Co., of Boston, and republished by The Open Court Publis.h.i.+ng Company of Chicago. Every Christian preacher should procure a copy of this book and it should be in the hands of every Christian layman who is anxious to aid in the defense of the Bible against its enemies. Leuba has discarded belief in a personal G.o.d and in personal immortality. He a.s.serts that belief in a personal G.o.d and personal immortality is declining in the United States, and he furnishes proof, which, as long as it is unchallenged, seems conclusive. He takes a book containing the names of fifty-five hundred scientists--the names of practically all American scientists of prominence, he affirms--and sends them questions. Upon the answers received he a.s.serts that _more than one-half_ of the prominent scientists of the United States, those teaching Biology, Psychology, Geology and History especially, have discarded belief in a personal G.o.d and in personal immortality.

This is what the doctrine of evolution is doing for those who teach our children. They first discard the Mosaic account of man's creation, and they do it on the ground that there are no miracles. This in itself const.i.tutes a practical repudiation of the Bible; the miracles of the Old and New Testament cannot be cut out without a mutilation that is equivalent to rejection. They reject the supernatural along with the miracle, and with the supernatural the inspiration of the Bible and the authority that rests upon inspiration. If these believers in evolution are consistent and have the courage to carry their doctrine to its logical conclusion, they reject the virgin birth of Christ and the resurrection. They may still regard Christ as an unusual man, but they will not make much headway in converting people to Christianity, if they declare Jesus to be nothing more than a man and either a deliberate impostor or a deluded enthusiast.

The evil influence of these Materialistic, Atheistic or Agnostic professors is disclosed by further investigation made by Leuba. He questioned the students of nine representative colleges, and upon their answers declares that, while only fifteen per cent. of the freshmen have discarded the Christian religion, thirty per cent. of the juniors and that forty to forty-five per cent, of the men _graduates_ have abandoned the cardinal principles of the Christian faith. Can Christians be indifferent to such statistics? Is it an immaterial thing that so large a percentage of the young men who go from Christian homes into inst.i.tutions of learning should go out from these inst.i.tutions with the spiritual element eliminated from their lives? What shall it profit a man if he shall gain all the learning of the schools and lose his faith in G.o.d?

To show how these evolutionists undermine the faith of students let me give you an ill.u.s.tration that recently came to my attention: A student in one of the largest State universities of the nation recently gave me a printed speech delivered by the president of the university, a year ago this month, to 3,500 students, and printed and circulated by the Student Christian a.s.sociation of the inst.i.tution. The student who gave me the speech marked the following paragraph: "And, again, religion must not be thought of as something that is inconsistent with reasonable, scientific thinking in regard to the nature of the universe. I go so far as to say that, if you cannot reconcile religion with the things taught in biology, in psychology, or in the other fields of study in this university, then you should throw your religion away. Scientific truth is here to stay." What about the Bible, is it not here to stay? If he had stopped with the first sentence, his language might not have been construed to the injury of religion, because religion is not "inconsistent with reasonable, scientific thinking in regard to the nature of the universe." There is nothing _unreasonable_ about Christianity, and there is nothing _unscientific_ about Christianity.

No scientific _fact_--no _fact_ of any other kind can disturb religion, because _facts are not in conflict with each other_. It is _guessing_ by scientists and so-called scientists that is doing the harm. And it is _guessing_ that is endorsed by this distinguished college president (a D.D., too, as well as an LL.D. and a Ph.D.) when he says, "I go so far as to say that, if you cannot reconcile religion with the things taught in biology, in psychology, or in the other fields of study in this university, then you should throw your religion away." What does this mean, except that the books on biology and on other scientific subjects used in that university are to be preferred to the Bible in case of conflict? The student is told, "throw your religion away," if he cannot reconcile it (the Bible, of course,) with the things taught in biology, psychology, etc. Books on biology change constantly, likewise books on psychology, and yet they are held before the students as better authority than the unchanging Word of G.o.d.

Is any other proof needed to show the irreligious influence exerted by Darwinism applied to man? At the University of Wisconsin (so a Methodist preacher told me) a teacher told his cla.s.s that the Bible was a collection of myths. When I brought the matter to the attention of the President of the University, he criticized me but avoided all reference to the professor. At Ann Arbor a professor argued with students against religion and a.s.serted that no thinking man could believe in G.o.d or the Bible. At Columbia (I learned this from a Baptist preacher) a professor began his course in geology by telling his cla.s.s to throw away all that they had learned in the Sunday school. There is a professor in Yale of whom it is said that no one leaves his cla.s.s a believer in G.o.d. (This came from a young man who told me that his brother was being led away from the Christian faith by this professor.) A father (a Congressman) tells me that a daughter on her return from Wellesley told him that n.o.body believed in the Bible stories now. Another father (a Congressman) tells me of a son whose faith was undermined by this doctrine in a Divinity School. Three preachers told me of having their interest in the subject aroused by the return of their children from college with their faith shaken. The Northern Baptists have recently, after a spirited contest, secured the adoption of a Confession of Faith; it was opposed by the evolutionists.

In Kentucky the fight is on among the Disciples, and it is becoming more and more acute in the Northern branches of the Methodist and Presbyterian Churches. A young preacher, just out of a theological seminary, who did not believe in the virgin birth of Christ, was recently ordained in Western New York. Last April I met a young man who was made an atheist by two teachers in a Christian college.

These are only a few ill.u.s.trations that have come under my own observation--nearly all of them within a year. What is to be done? Are the members of the various Christian churches willing to have the power of the pulpit paralyzed by a false, absurd and ridiculous doctrine which is without support in the written Word of G.o.d and without support also in nature? Is "thus saith the Lord" to be supplanted by guesses and speculations and a.s.sumptions? I submit three propositions for the consideration of the Christians of the nation:

First, the preachers who are to break the bread of life to the lay members should believe that man has in him the breath of the Almighty, as the Bible declares, and not the blood of the brute, as the evolutionists affirm. He should also believe in the virgin birth of the Saviour.

Second, none but Christians in good standing and with a spiritual conception of life should be allowed to teach in Christian schools.

Church schools are worse than useless if they bring students under the influence of those who do not believe in the religion upon which the Church and church schools are built. Atheism and Agnosticism are more dangerous when hidden under the cloak of religion than when they are exposed to view.

Third, in schools supported by taxation we should have a real neutrality wherever neutrality in religion is desired. If the Bible cannot be defended in these schools it should not be attacked, either directly or under the guise of philosophy or science. The neutrality which we now have is often but a sham; it carefully excludes the Christian religion but permits the use of the schoolrooms for the destruction of faith and for the teaching of materialistic doctrines.

It is not sufficient to say that _some_ believers in Darwinism retain their belief in Christianity; some survive smallpox. As we avoid smallpox because _many_ die of it, so we should avoid Darwinism because it _leads many astray_.

If it is contended that an instructor has a right to teach anything he likes, I reply that the parents who pay the salary have a right to decide what shall be taught. To continue the ill.u.s.tration used above, a person can expose himself to the smallpox if he desires to do so, but he has no right to communicate it to others. So a man can believe anything he pleases but he has no right to teach it against the protest of his employers.

Acceptance of Darwin's doctrine tends to destroy one's belief in immortality as taught by the Bible. If there has been no break in the line between man and the beasts--no time when by the act of the Heavenly Father man became "a living Soul," at what period in man's development was he endowed with the hope of a future life? And, if the brute theory leads to the abandonment of belief in a future life with its rewards and punishments, what stimulus to righteous living is offered in its place?

Darwinism leads to a denial of G.o.d. Nietzsche carried Darwinism to its logical conclusion and it made him the most extreme of anti-Christians.

I had read extracts from his writings--enough to acquaint me with his sweeping denial of G.o.d and of the Saviour--but not enough to make me familiar with his philosophy.

As the war progressed I became more and more impressed with the conviction that the German propaganda rested upon a materialistic foundation. I secured the writings of Nietzsche and found in them a defense, made in advance, of all the cruelties and atrocities practiced by the militarists of Germany. Nietzsche tried to subst.i.tute the wors.h.i.+p of the "Superman" for the wors.h.i.+p of G.o.d. He not only rejected the Creator, but he rejected all moral standards. He praised war and eulogized hatred because it led to war. He denounced sympathy and pity as attributes unworthy of man. He believed that the teachings of Christ made degenerates and, logical to the end, he regarded Democracy as the refuge of weaklings. He saw in man nothing but an animal and in that animal the highest virtue he recognized was "The Will to Power"--a will which should know no let or hindrance, no restraint or limitation.

Nietzsche's philosophy would convert the world into a ferocious conflict between beasts, each brute trampling ruthlessly on everything in his way. In his book ent.i.tled "Joyful Wisdom," Nietzsche ascribes to Napoleon the very same dream of power--Europe under one sovereign and that sovereign the master of the world--that lured the Kaiser into a sea of blood from which he emerged an exile seeking security under a foreign flag. Nietzsche names Darwin as one of the three great men of his century, but tries to deprive him of credit (?) for the doctrine that bears his name by saying that Hegel made an earlier announcement of it.

Nietzsche died hopelessly insane, but his philosophy has wrought the moral ruin of a mult.i.tude, if it is not actually responsible for bringing upon the world its greatest war.

His philosophy, if it is worthy the name of philosophy, is the ripened fruit of Darwinism--and a tree is known by its fruit.

In 1900--over twenty years ago--while an International Peace Congress was in session in Paris the following editorial appeared in _L'Univers_:

"The spirit of peace has fled the earth because evolution has taken possession of it. The plea for peace in past years has been inspired by faith in the divine nature and the divine origin of man; men were then looked upon as children of one Father and war, therefore, was fratricide. But now that men are looked upon as children of apes, what matters it whether they are slaughtered or not?"

I have given you above the words of a French writer published twenty years ago. I have just found in a book recently published by a prominent English writer words along the same line, only more comprehensive. The corroding influence of Darwinism has spread as the doctrine has been increasingly accepted. In the American preface to "The Gla.s.s of Fas.h.i.+on" these words are to be found: "Darwinism not only justifies the sensualist at the trough and Fas.h.i.+on at her gla.s.s; it justifies Prussianism at the cannon's mouth and Bolshevism at the prison-door.

If Darwinism be true, if Mind is to be driven out of the universe and accident accepted as a sufficient cause for all the majesty and glory of physical nature, then there is no crime or violence, however abominable in its circ.u.mstances and however cruel in its execution, which cannot be justified by success, and no triviality, no absurdity of Fas.h.i.+on which deserves a censure: more--there is no act of disinterested love and tenderness, no deed of self-sacrifice and mercy, no aspiration after beauty and excellence, for which a single reason can be adduced in logic."

To destroy the faith of Christians and lay the foundation for the bloodiest war in history would seem enough to condemn Darwinism, but there are still two other indictments to bring against it. First, that it is the basis of the gigantic cla.s.s struggle that is now shaking society throughout the world. Both the capitalist and the labourer are increasingly cla.s.s conscious. Why? Because the doctrine of the "Individual efficient for himself"--the brute doctrine of the "survival of the fittest"--is driving men into a life-and-death struggle from which sympathy and the spirit of brotherhood are eliminated. It is transforming the industrial world into a slaughter-house.

Benjamin Kidd, in a masterful work, ent.i.tled, "The Science of Power,"

points out how Darwinism furnished Nietzsche with a scientific basis for his G.o.dless system of philosophy and is demoralizing industry.

He also quotes eminent English scientists to support the last charge in the indictment, namely, that Darwinism robs the reformer of hope. Its plan of operation is to improve the race by "scientific breeding" on a purely physical basis. A few hundred years may be required--possibly a few thousand--but what is time to one who carries eons in his quiver and envelopes his opponents in the "Mist of Ages"?

Kidd would subst.i.tute the "Emotion of the Ideal" for scientific breeding and thus shorten the time necessary for the triumph of a social reform.

He counts one or two generations as sufficient. This is an enormous advance over Darwin's doctrine, but Christ's plan is still more encouraging. A man can be born again; the springs of life can be cleansed instantly so that the heart loves the things that it formerly hated and hates the things that it once loved. If this is true of _one_, it can be true of _any number_. Thus, a nation can be born in a day if the ideals of the people can be changed.