Book: In His Image

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Is it conceivable that the hawk and the hummingbird, the spider and the
honey bee, the turkey gobbler and the mocking-bird, the butterfly and
the eagle, the ostrich and the wren, the tree toad and the elephant,
the giraffe and the kangaroo, the wolf and the lamb should all be the
descendants of a common ancestor? Yet these and all other creatures must
be blood relatives if man is next of kin to the monkey.

If the evolutionists are correct; if it is true that all that we see is
the result of development from one or a few invisible germs of life,
then, in plants as well as in animals there must be a line of descent
connecting all the trees and vegetables and flowers with a common
ancestry. Does it not strain the imagination to the breaking point to
believe that the oak, the cedar, the pine and the palm are all the
progeny of one ancient seed and that this seed was also the ancestor
of wheat and corn, potato and tomato, onion and sugar beet, rose and
violet, orchid and daisy, mountain flower and magnolia? Is it not more
rational to believe in _God_ and explain the varieties of life in terms
of divine power than to waste our lives in ridiculous attempts to
explain the unexplainable? There is no mortification in admitting that
there are insoluble mysteries; but it is shameful to spend the time that
God has given for nobler use in vain attempts to exclude God from His
own universe and to find in chance a substitute for God's power and
wisdom and love.

While evolution in plant life and in animal life _up to the highest form
of animal_ might, if there were proof of it, be admitted without raising
a presumption that would compel us to give a brute origin to man, why
should we admit a thing of which there is no proof? Why should we
encourage the guesses of these speculators and thus weaken our power
to protest when they attempt the leap from the monkey to man? Let the
evolutionist furnish his proof.

Although our chief concern is in protecting man from the demoralization
involved in accepting a brute ancestry, it is better to put the
advocates of evolution upon the defensive and challenge them to produce
proof in support of their hypothesis in plant life and in the animal
world. They will be kept so busy trying to find support for their
hypothesis in the kingdoms below man that they will have little time
left to combat the Word of God in respect to man's origin. Evolution
joins issue with the Mosaic account of creation. God's law, as stated
in Genesis, is _reproduction according to kind_; evolution implies
reproduction _not_ according to kind. While the process of change
implied in evolution is covered up in endless eons of time it is
_change_ nevertheless. The Bible does not say that reproduction shall
be _nearly_ according to kind or _seemingly_ according to kind. The
statement is positive that it is _according to kind_, and that does not
leave any room for the _changes_ however gradual or imperceptible that
are necessary to support the evolutionary hypothesis.

We see about us everywhere and always proof of the Bible law, viz.,
reproduction according to kind; we find nothing in the universe to
support Darwin's doctrine of reproduction other than of kind.

If you question the possibility of such changes as the Darwinian
doctrine supposes you are reminded that the scientific speculators have
raised the time limit. "If ten million years are not sufficient, take
twenty," they say: "If fifty million years are not enough take one or
two hundred millions." That accuracy is not essential in such guessing
may be inferred from the fact that the estimates of the time that has
elapsed since life began on the earth, vary from less than twenty-five
million years to more than three hundred million. Darwin estimated this
period at two hundred million years while Darwin's son estimated it at
fifty-seven million.

It requires more than millions of years to account for the varieties of
life that inhabit the earth; it requires a Creator, unlimited in power,
unlimited intelligence, and unlimited love.

But the doctrine of evolution is sometimes carried farther than that.
A short while ago Canon Barnes, of Westminster Abbey, startled his
congregation by an interpretation of evolution that ran like this: "It
now seems highly probable (probability again) that from some fundamental
stuff in the universe the electrons arose. From them came matter.
From matter, life emerged. From life came mind. From mind, spiritual
consciousness was developing. There was a time when matter, life and
mind, and the soul of man were not, but now they are. Each has arisen as
a part of the vast scheme planned by God." (An American professor in a
Christian college has recently expressed himself along substantially the
same lines.)

But what has God been doing since the "stuff" began to develop? The
verbs used by Canon Barnes indicate an internal development unaided from
above. "Arose, came, emerged, etc.," all exclude the idea that God is
within reach or call in man's extremity.

When I was a boy in college the materialists began with matter separated
into infinitely small particles and every particle separated from every
other particle by distance infinitely great. But now they say that it
takes 1,740 electrons to make an atom of infinite fineness. God, they
insist, has not had anything to do with this universe since 1,740
electrons formed a chorus and sang, "We'll be an atom by and by."

It requires measureless credulity to enable one to believe that all that
we see about us came by chance, by a series of happy-go-lucky accidents.
If only an infinite God could have formed hydrogen and oxygen and united
them in just the right proportions to produce water--the daily need of
every living thing--scattered among the flowers all the colours of the
rainbow and every variety of perfume, adjusted the mocking-bird's throat
to its musical scale, and fashioned a soul for man, why should we want
to imprison such a God in an impenetrable past? This is a living world;
why not a _living_ God upon the throne? Why not allow Him to work _now_?

Darwin is so sure that his theory is correct that he is ready to accuse
the Creator of trying to deceive man if the theory is not sound. On page
41 he says: "To take any other view is to admit that our structure and
that of all animals about us, is a mere snare to entrap our judgment;"
as if the Almighty were in duty bound to make each species so
separate from every other that _no one_ could possibly be confused by
resemblances. There would seem to be differences enough. To put man in a
class with the chimpanzee because of any resemblances that may be found
is so unreasonable that the masses have never accepted it.

If we see houses of different size, from one room to one hundred, we
do not say that the large houses grew out of small ones, but that the
architect that could plan one could plan all.

But a groundless hypothesis--even an absurd one--would be unworthy of
notice if it did no harm. This hypothesis, however, does incalculable
harm. It teaches that Christianity impairs the race physically. That
was the first implication at which I revolted. It led me to review
the doctrine and reject it entirely. If hatred is the law of man's
development; that is, if man has reached his present perfection by a
cruel law under which the strong kill off the weak--then, if there is
any logic that can bind the human mind, we must turn backward toward the
brute if we dare to substitute the law of love for the law of hate. That
is the conclusion that I reached and it is the conclusion that Darwin
himself reached. On pages 149-50 he says: "With savages the weak in body
or mind are soon eliminated; and those that survive commonly exhibit a
vigorous state of health. We civilized men, on the other hand, do our
utmost to check the progress of elimination. We build asylums for the
imbecile, the maimed and the sick; we institute poor laws; our medical
experts exert their utmost skill to save the lives of every one to the
last moment. There is reason to believe that vaccination has preserved
thousands who from weak constitutions would have succumbed to smallpox.
Thus the weak members of civilized societies propagate their kind. No
one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that
this must be highly injurious to the race of man."

This confession deserves analysis. First, he commends, by implication,
the savage method of eliminating the weak, while, by implication, he
condemns "civilized men" for prolonging the life of the weak. He
even blames vaccination because it has preserved thousands who might
otherwise have succumbed (for the benefit of the race?). Can you imagine
anything more brutal? And then note the low level of the argument. "No
one who has attended the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that
this must be highly injurious to the race of man." All on a brute basis.

His hypothesis breaks down here. The minds which, according to Darwin,
are developed by natural selection and sexual selection, use their power
to suspend the law by which they have reached their high positions.
Medicine is one of the greatest of the sciences and its chief object is
to save life and strengthen the weak. That, Darwin complains, interferes
with "the survival of the fittest." If he complains of vaccination, what
would he say of the more recent discovery of remedies for typhoid fever,
yellow fever and the black plague? And what would he think of saving
weak babies by pasteurizing milk and of the efforts to find a specific
for tuberculosis and cancer? Can such a barbarous doctrine be sound?

But Darwin's doctrine is even more destructive. His heart rebels against
the "hard reason" upon which his heartless hypothesis is built. He says:
"The aid which we feel impelled to give to the helpless is mainly the
result of the instinct of sympathy, which was originally acquired as a
part of the social instincts, but subsequently rendered in the manner
indicated, more tender and more widely diffused. Nor could we check our
sympathy even at the urging of hard reason, without deterioration in
the noblest part of our nature. The surgeon may harden himself while
performing an operation, for he knows he is acting for the good of
his patient; but if we were to intentionally neglect the weak and the
helpless, it could be only for a contingent benefit, with overwhelming
present evil. We must therefore bear the undoubted bad effects of the
weak surviving and propagating their kind."

The moral nature which, according to Darwin, is also developed by
natural selection and sexual selection, repudiates the brutal law
to which, if his reasoning is correct, it owes its origin. Can that
doctrine be accepted as scientific when its author admits that we cannot
apply it "without deterioration in the noblest part of our nature"? On
the contrary, civilization is measured by the moral revolt against the
cruel doctrine developed by Darwin.

Darwin rightly decided to suspend his doctrine, even at the risk of
impairing the race. But some of his followers are more hardened. A few
years ago I read a book in which the author defended the use of alcohol
on the ground that it rendered a service to society by killing off the
degenerates. And this argument was advanced by a scientist in the fall
of 1920 at a congress against alcohol.

The language which I have quoted proves that Darwinism is directly
antagonistic to Christianity, which boasts of its eleemosynary
institutions 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 God to believe that the Creator fashioned
a germ of life and endowed it with power to develop into what we see
to-day. It is true that a God 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 attitude toward Darwin's God be the same as it would be
toward the God of Moses? Will the believer in Darwin's God be as
conscious of God's presence in his daily life? Will he be as sensitive
to God's will and as anxious to find out what God wants him to do?

Will the believer in Darwin's God 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
petition before the Heavenly Father: "Give us this day our daily bread";
"Lead us not into temptation"; "Deliver us from evil"; "Forgive our
trespasses"; etc.

He talks with God. 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 God--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 God; that
Christ came to reveal God 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 assured that the development of the moral
sense can be explained on a brute basis without any act of, or aid from,
God. (See pages 113-114.)

No mention of religion, the only basis for morality; not a suggestion of
a sense of responsibility to God--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 compass 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 God's presence
in his daily life if Darwin's reasoning is sound? This restraining
influence, more potent than any external force, is paralyzed when God
is put so far away. How can one believe in prayer if, for millions of
years, God has never touched a human life or laid His hand upon the
destiny of the human race? What mockery to petition or implore, if God
neither hears nor answers. Elijah taunted the prophets of Baal
when their god failed to answer with fire; "Cry aloud," he said,
"peradventure he sleepeth." Darwin mocks the Christians even more
cruelly; he tells us that our God 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 worship and obey God. 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
substitute 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
constitution 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 attitude: "When
thus reflecting I feel compelled to look to a First Cause, having an
intelligent mind in some degree analogous 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 analogous 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 attitude 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 God, 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 God, 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, entitled "Belief in God and
Immortality." It was published by Sherman French & Co., of Boston, and
republished by The Open Court Publishing 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 God and in personal immortality. He asserts that belief in a
personal God 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 asserts 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 God
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
constitutes 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
institutions of learning should go out from these institutions 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 God?

To show how these evolutionists undermine the faith of students let me
give you an illustration 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 Association of the institution. 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 God.

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