OUR OLD EARTH

Hokitika Guardian, 19 March 1927, Page 4

OUR OLD EARTH

ITS (WONDERS AND SURPRISES. (By REV. T. H. MARTIN, M.A., in a Sydney paper.) Too many conclusions have been palmed off on the public as scientific, which further knowledge has proved untenable. Unlortunately it is) dillioull to overtake a wrong idea when once it has got started with some eminent scientific name attached to it. ,iiany ideas are abroad to-day and thought to be scientific, which are not

scientific at all. Flowers, for instance, we were told, put on their colours in order to attract the insects which would assist in their propagation. Some gay lluwers do attract- insects, some do not. Poppies, with their flaming colours, do not; mignonette, in spite of its dowdiness, does. “The flowers of the sycamore and lime trees are so modest they can scarcely he seen, but they are favourites with the hoes, whereas the (lowers which the horse-chesnut and hawthorn thrust at you are not favourites. Why do Bowers open in the daytime and close at night? To attract insects., we are told.

•• But the goatsbeard closes at midday, just when the insects arc most astir, and the beautiful globe-flower never opens at all. shutting in its stamens and nislils, so that no insect can reach them. Nevertheless, they ripen and propagate themselves in spite of the law which was said to govern their existence. flow can a Bower “ choose ” or “ attract,” or

“put on” anything? That presumes intelligence, discrimination of a high order.

“ AYliy do the convolvulus and the scarlet runner in climbing always go to the right and honeysuckle and the; hop and black hryonv always to the I left? There are many species of con-1 volvulus differing in every respect but] this one, that they all turn in one i way. How comes it about that ■ lie sand-martin will select from a number of similar puddles, without a moment’s hesitation, the precise kind j of clay it wants for its nest, which man could only distinguish alter long and close examination? “ How do the Bowers and insects and birds retain their own particular marks, colours, habits? Laws of survival, struggle, development, don’t explain it. The explanations which 1 ave been given do not cover the lacls. Instinct is only a name, and explains nothing. Instinct ought surely to have taught generations of jackdaws that it is useless to carry a stick crosswise through a crevice—but it has not. A thousand other facts contradict the 1 laws ’ which have been put forth as explanations. “We talk about ‘mechanical theories

and philosophies,’ but what machine ever made itself? AYliat machine ever mended itself when it broke clown, or renewed and replaced itsell when worn out? There is nothing mechanical which does not imply a mechanic. The whole earth lives, moves, and has its being by reason of a force we call gravitation. AA'c depend upon it absvlutely, every moment, for our existence.

“This force is like no other force. It is timeless and spaceless. It acts instantaneously everywhere, in the uttermost recesses of space as well as here when the apple drops from the tree in the orchard. All earths, planets, suns, system, are held in its tremendous embrace. Day and night, summer and winter, the ebb and Bow of the tides, are because of its mighty pull upon our little earth. A\ hat is gravitation? Nqiiodv knows. Yet wc depend upon it and trust it for everything we are and have.

“ What is the power which turns the magnet to the North Pole? Nobody knows. Yet a thousand ships upon the trackless seas depend upon it to guide them. What brings birds back front distant continents across land and sea. and enables them to find their way back to their old haunts? What makes the salmon in the vast ocean turn to the mouth of the river and. ascend the stream, and seek the pool where it was born? Nobody knows. AYe can call it by a name, but that explains nothing. AA'e are simply surrounded by mysteries, which are utterly beyond the power of science or reason to explain, 15ut the biggest wonder of all remains. On this old earth of ours the outstanding fact is man, with reason, conscience, will. alFection in him. He came with nothing in his hands.-and everything to learn and fashion. With a few rough tools he began—a hone, a hit of flint that he picked up. a limb of a tree broken off. Every step of the ground was beset with difficulty, danger, darkness, death, and from these rude beginnings has come the world we confront to-day—-its civilisations, its cities, roads, literature, arts, crafts, agriculture, science, schools, universities, cathedrals ; every sea navigated, every rock and shoal charted and lighted, every forest penetrated every mountain climbed, land and sea and air made subject to his will.

“ Man in liis primitive state, gross and sensual, nevertheless ‘laying hold of groat ideals, believing in an eternal right, an eternal truth, an eternal justice, an everlasting goodness and love, making great ventures for it, and

sublime sacrifices for it. and at the end, thinking over it all, trying to understand it all, talking about ‘ God.’

"So unpromising it beginning, so glorious an end. How came this to he? Where did he get the idea from? Can .science tell us? Is it blind force or chance? Is it the result of a fortuitous assemblage of atoms? “Our old earth is more than matter, or force, or atoms. Something calls, constrains, pulls, draws, holds, lifts, saves, satisfies, cares. Someone is out there m the distant,- here in the near, who speaks, subdues, silences me. God. Is it really so? And the answer comes, gentle and low; “E’en so. it is