Was Man Created?

Thames Star, Volume XIII, Issue 4248, 12 August 1882, Page 2

Was Man Created?

The Eev. Henry Bull, minister of this circuit, preached a sermon on the origin of man on Sunday evening at the Wes* leyan Church, Grahamstown. The preached remarked that the Bible differed at the outset from uninspired volumes. It had no preface, but burst upon us with majestic sublimity. It dealt not with mere scientific surmises, but declared the universe to be the creative act of the Almighty. The Book of Genesis had been the battle ground where Christian and Sceptic had fought, but the result left no ground for serious apprehension on the part of Christian believers, for as in the past, so now— every hostile attack led to a more pbilisophic study of the Divine record, and so placed it upon a sounder basis and in a clearer light. Between true science and inspired revelation there could be no conflict, for both are Divine. Expositions of the Bible had not been free from fault in passages relating to scientific subjects. But the chief difficulty had arisen from the dogmatic pretentiousness of vendors of so-called scientific theories. The preacher read an extract from the Edinburgh Review illustrating this point. The answers of scientists to the followiug question were also read : By whom were all things created P Buchner: " Matter and force are uncreated, and have given rise to the present order of things.'* Huxley: " When the Materialists begin to talk about there being nothing else in the universe but matter

and force, I decline to follow them."

Spencer: "The origin of things is unknowable." These conflicting theories of scientists were referred to that caution and hesitancy might be induced in dealing with the surmises and conjectures of rash theory*vendors whose oifensivedogmatism was so painfully apparent. The book of Genesis told us that " in the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." This might refer to a work effected millions of years or ages ago. The fact to be assured of was that the universe had a beginning, and that its existence, and the harmonious laws by which it was governed, were-the absolute acts of, a personal and beneficient creator, for as John Stuart Mill observed^-" The law* of nature account for their own origin." The atomic theory, and the theory of inherent force were then dealt wilh, and the absurdity of the latter theory was forcibly shown by a quotation from Sir Edmund Beckett's " Origin of the Laws of Nature." The preacher remarked that if the Biblical account of the creation of the universe presented difficulties they were incomparably small beside those which the conflicting theories of scientists raised. Bational men might believe that all things had a beginning, and that what we now saw around and above us had an adequate cause, and that that cause was a personal God. They might accept this without feeling that a heavy tax was made upon their faith. But when called upon to believe that this universe with all its won* drous harmonies, its surpassing grandeur, its unspeakable beauties, was the working of blind chance, or impersonal law, they must accept something like insane or childish credulity, and if they have strained at a gnat they must now swallow a camel. And though there might be erratic move* meuts of the individual mind—in which lit?lit atheism, pantheism, and agnosticism might be regarded—it was certain the minds of men generally would recoil from such isms with strong repugnance. And the grand opening verse of Genesis would ! be viewed as conveying a well deserved rebuke to the superstitions and credulities of atheists and pantheists who were soft and simple enough to believe that the universe had been developed by its in« herent powers; for, in the words of the eminent astronomer, Herschell, " Force and matter might make a chaos, bat never a cosmos."

In dealing with the subject of the "Origin of Man," there were, said the preacher, two theories to consider, viz.— the theory of spontane^i generation, and i the theory of evolution. In answer to the question, What is the origin of life ? the following scientific replies were read: —Darwin: " The Creator at first breathed | life into a few forms." Hr W.Thomson: " Perhaps the first germs of life reached our globe falling through the sky, on a moss-grown fragment, from the ruins of another world." Spencer: " The origin of life is probably undiscoverable." Dr C. Bastian: " Living, things are being generated every instant all the world over." Huxley: "There is no experimental proof of spontaneous generation. The doctrine that life now only springs from already living creatures is trium> phant." The preacher then explained the nature of Bastian's experiment!. This scientist had boiled water teeming with living nomads known as bacteria. He observed that at 140 deg. Fahrenheit the nomads died. Still the water-heating process was continued beyond boiling point. And yet, after this, when the hermetically sealed water had cooled, living bacteria were found in the solution. The theory of spontaneous generation was at once proclaimed as a scientific fact. But it was not long before the theory Iras triumphantly disproved by the elaborate investigations of W. H. Dallinger, assisted by Dr Drysdale. Th©

itnltn of these investigations were detailed by Mr Dallinger in three lectures # deliTered four years ago lasfc June in London at the Royal Institution. By a series of controlled experiments it was proved that no adult form of bacteria lurrired beyond 140 deg., but this remarkable fact, entirely overlooked by Bastian, was discovered, viz., that, while the adult form was destroyed at 140 deg., the bacteria germ remained uninjured up to 220 deg. of fluid heat, and up to 250 deg. of dry heat, but this was the limit above which not even the bacteria germ survived. And yet, although more than, four years had elapsed since the rashlyformed theory of Bastian was demolished by the most elaborate scientific demonstration of Dallinger — supported and Terfiied by" Drysdale and Tyndall, We were quite recently assured by a public lecturer, Mr Denton, that there was spontaneous generation, and that a gentleman named Bastian had discovered it! Were we as creduK ous as atheists and pantheists we might believe it, but lie, the preacher, regarded spontaneous general ion as another phrase of spontaneous nonsense. With respect to the doctrine of transmutation and evolution from primordial cells, it was shown after the most careful research that there was no ground . whatever for the supposition that one . organism could cbanee into another however low in the scale of organisation might be. In treating upon evolution reference was made to Cook's Boston lectures and the remarks of Fro fessorDana. It had been conceded by evolutionists tbat natural selection did not take leaps, and that a multitude of links must have existed between man and the higher apes if evolution were true, and yet after searching for nearly forty years not a single trace of the missing links had been found. Dana remarked, "If - the links ever existed, their annihilation without trace, is so extemely improbable that it may be pronounced impossible." The cubic capacity of the brain of the highest apes was 34in, and of the lowest men 6Sin. Apes were as unprogressive as other animals, they were governed by mere instinct, and had no language. The antiquity of man was next dealt with. It was shown that scientific researches confirmed the Bible chronology that man had been on the earth about 6,000 years. The earth had been bored by geologists in innumerable places, but no human remains had ever been discovered, except in a stratum of superficial depth. Theorists had endeavored to make capital, and swell the years of man's antiquity by calculations based upon the discovery of old; flint instruments, a jaw-bone "in a French valley, and a skull said to have been found at 140 ft. depth in California. One theorist computed man's antiquity to be 20,000 years ; a second, 100,000 years ; while a third thought 9,000,000 years Dearer the mark I But Professor Hitchcock's view seemed at once more commonsense and rational, because the inductive and not the mere deductive method of reasoning was employed. He said, " That , man was among the very last of the animals created is made certain by the fact tbat his remains are found only in the highest part of alluvium. This is rarely more than 100 feet in thickness, while the.other fossiliferous strata, lying beneath the alluvium, are six miles thick. . . . . Although geology can rarely give chronological dates, but only a succession of events, she is able to say, from the monuments she deciphers, tbat man cannot have occupied the globe more than six thousand years." ■ The next point considered was the subject of the unity of man. The theory of a plurality of races was discussed at length^ and the arguments based upon the diversities of complexion, variety of casts of features, mental idiosyncracies, languages, and physical differences were folly examined, and the amazing changes wrought under certain climatic conditions and other surroundings were pressed into the argument in favor of tbe unity of the race..*".The descendants of the Portugese in tfieir African colonies had become - entirely black. An ancient settlement of Jews in India had the jet-black skin and crisp hair of the native Hindoo. But the Jew in Poland and Germany had light hair and a fair complexion,, and in Syria dark hair and a dusky hue. We had been recently/ informed by a public lecturer tbat the c ;grouse of Scotland, originally white* hatl, by tbe same law of adaptation, taken on them the reddish tint of their native heather. Philology afforded a strong argumeJQt in favor of the unity of man, tracing, as it did, languages, which appeared endlessly ramified, to a few parent stems. A still stronger proof was found in man's religious nature, and the universality of religion. Huxley, Tyndall, Augustus Comte, Max Miiller, and Dot Dawson were quoted to bear out this fact. The difficulties in connection with belief in the unity of man were not insuperable. Many had been overcome fully, and it was believed that further ethnological researches would reduce if not remove remaining difficulties which presented . themselves to the minds of those who firmly believe in the unity of the human race. ■■' > ■■,■■■ ■■' ■ Tn conclusion, the preacher remarked that Christianity appealed more to the intellect, and made far less demands upon our credulity than paganism, atheism, or .pantheism. The testimony of the foremost men of science was conclusive that no die-" coveries had been made which weakened the Divine authority of the Bible, or for the existence and government of tbe world by a Supreme Being. A great scientific authority, C. Pritchard, M.A., President of the BoyaU Astronomical Society, said, '* For my pif^ I have gathered from the results of modern research additional reasons for resting in the simplicity of the ancient Christian faith; and in modern discoveries I have found many a new and unexpected trace of the Creator's majesty —of His power, His wisdom, and His love." Thus, the timid student, the perplexed inquirer, the sincere searcher after truth, might, on the authority of men of science themselves, " rest in the Lord," and feel well assured that He in His own good time would bring to light the hidden , things of darkness, and make perfectly clear what might now seem obscure.