The small section of the brain pan, weighing but a few ounces, was found about 50 feet from the thigh bone. One tooth was found 3 feet from the fragment of skull, and one near the thigh bone, _50 feet away_. Since the small section of the brain pan belonged to a chimpanzee, and the thigh bone is that of a man, is it likely that these scattered bones belonged to the same creature? Even if they did, is it likely that these bones would be preserved in the sand 750,000 years, or even 375,000 years according to a later estimate? We know that petrified skeletons, encased in rock, may be millions of years old, but where are the unpetrified skeletons of men who lived even 5,000 years ago? If unpetrified skeletons could last 750,000 years, there would be millions of them. Without a doubt, this skull of a chimpanzee, and femur of a man, belong to a modern beast and a modern man, buried by floods or earthquakes, or some other convulsion of nature, or by slow acc.u.mulations. It is said that the Jerusalem of Christ"s day is buried 20 feet under the surface, by the quiet accretions of the dust of 1900 years. Rome also has been covered up in recent centuries. It would be easy for 40 feet of sand to acc.u.mulate over the bones of a modern man or chimpanzee in a valley, in a few centuries, if 20 feet of dust acc.u.mulated on the mountain city of Jerusalem in 1900 years.
Elsewhere we have shown that an ape-man with a cranium of two-thirds normal capacity must have lived at least 20,000,000 years ago,--one third the period of animal existence; or even 166,666,666 years ago, if we accept a later claim that life has existed 500,000,000 years. It is absolutely impossible that a normal creature of the alleged mental capacity could have lived 750,000 years ago, much less 375,000, according to a later estimate cutting in two the first one. But the quickest way to disprove these wild guesses is to check them up by a mathematical test. If these bones are normal, such an ape-man could not have lived at the time a.s.signed. If they are not normal, they prove nothing whatever for evolution. They can be duplicated now.
We are asked to believe that these scattered bones,--some the bones of a modern brute, some the bones of a modern man--were preserved in the sand 750,000 years and belonged to an ancestor of the human race, while of the millions of his generation and of the generations following for many thousands of years, we have not a trace! We are asked upon such a flimsy pretext to accept a theory, unsupported by a single compelling argument, and irreconcilable with numerous facts,--a theory which takes away man"s hope of immortality, destroys faith in G.o.d and his inspired word, and in the Christian religion itself.
There is a limit. How much more truthful and majestic is Gen. 1:27: "And G.o.d created man in his own image, in the image of G.o.d created he him."
One distinguished evolutionist has said, "We might as well be made out of monkey as out of mud. It is mud or monkey." Most of us would retort, "I would rather be created a human being out of the filthiest mud by Almighty G.o.d than owe my existence to the brainiest monkey that ever lived." Please note, "The Lord G.o.d formed man of the _dust_ of the ground," not _mud_. The evolutionists are as wild in their exegesis as in their guesses.
2. THE HEIDELBERG JAW. The second relic, in the order of time, relied upon by the evolutionists to prove the brute origin of man, is a "human jaw of great antiquity, discovered in the _sands_ of the Mauer River, near Heidelberg." Hence, it is called the Mauer jaw, or the Heidelberg Jaw, or Heidelberg man, or the high sounding Latin name of h.o.m.o Heidelbergensis. It needs all the names that can be given to it, to elevate it to the dignity of an ancestor. "This jaw was found in undisturbed stratified _sand_, (sand again) at the depth of about 69 feet from the summit of the deposit." Dr. Schoetensack, the discoverer, says, "Had the teeth been absent, it would have been impossible to diagnose it as human."
They say it is 700,000 years old, preserved in sand. A later estimate says 375,000 years. (Any wild guess will do.) It resembles the jaw of an ape, and the tooth of a man. Was it not likely the abnormal jaw of a modern man, in historic time swept into the sands by the freshets and floods of a few centuries? It is only fair to say that many scientists of the evolutionary school, do not believe the Heidelberg man an ancestor of our race. "These remains," says one, "show no trace of being intermediate between man and the anthropoid ape." Some claim it a connecting link. Others deny it. Some say the find is of the utmost value; others say it is worthless. All are guesses, wild guesses at that. They hopefully reach out their hands in the night, and gather nothing but handfuls of darkness.
Since a modern Eskimo skull has been shown by a distinguished scientist to have the same appearance and peculiarities as the Heidelberg jaw, it is easy to believe that this jaw can be duplicated in many graveyards. Greater abnormalities, in great numbers, can be found in the skeletons of modern man. Without doubt, this jaw belongs to modern man, and has no evidential value at all in favor of evolution.
We count these relics normal, in our arguments, because evolutionists do. If they are not normal, they are the remains of modern man and brutes and their whole argument falls to the ground.
3. THE PILTDOWN MAN (OR FAKE). The next fragments of bones, in chronological order, upon which evolutionists rely to prove their impossible theory, has been called the Piltdown man. It has been more truthfully called the Piltdown fake. Dr. Chapin gravely tells us (Social Evolution, p. 67): "During the years 1912, a series of fragments of a human skull and a jaw bone were found a.s.sociated with eolithic implements and the bones of extinct mammals in Pleistocene deposits on a plateau, 80 feet above the river bed, at Piltdown, Fletching, Suss.e.x, Eng.....The remains were of great importance. The discoverers regard this relic as a specimen of a distinct genus of the human species and it has been called Eoanthropus Dawsoni. This extinct man lived in Europe hundreds of thousands of years ago." We have pa.s.sed over 200,000 to 300,000 years since the Heidelberg man, that have not yielded a sc.r.a.p of bone, though according to the theory, countless millions of ape-men must have lived in various stages of development, in that great stretch of time. Why were not some of them preserved? Simply because there were no ape-men. There are countless relics of apes, but none of ape-men. Even Wells says: "At a great open-air camp at Solutre, where they seem to have had annual gatherings for many centuries, it is estimated there are the bones of 100,000 horses." Would we not expect as many bones of ape-men? While Wells says the bones of 100,000 horses were found in a single locality, Dr. Ales Hrdlicka says that the bones of 200,000 prehistoric horses were found in another place. Why should we not find, for the same reason, the bones of millions of ape-men and ape-women in 750,000 years? Instead of millions we have the alleged fragments of 4, all of which are of a very doubtful character.
The bones of this precious Piltdown find consisted, at first, of a _piece of the jaw bone, another small piece of bone from the skull_, and a canine tooth, which the zealous evolutionists located in the lower right jaw, when it belonged in the upper left; later, two molar teeth and two nasal bones,--scarcely a double hand full in all. An ape-man was "reconstructed" made to look like an ape-man, according to the fancy of the artist. The artist can create an ape-man, even if G.o.d could not create a real man! But scientists said the teeth did not belong to the same skull, and the jaw could not be a.s.sociated with the same skull. Ales Hrdlicka says, "The jaw and the tooth belong to a fossil chimpanzee." Conscientious scientists said that the pieces of the jaw and skull could not belong to the same individual. They constructed a scarecrow from the bones of an ape and of a man, and offer this, without the batting of an eye, as a scientific proof of the antiquity of man. The great anthropologist of world-wide reputation, Prof. Virchow, said: "In vain have Darwin"s adherents sought for connecting links which should connect man with the monkey. _Not a single one has been found_. This so-called pro-anthropus, which is supposed to represent this connecting link, has not appeared. No true scientist claims to have seen him." Sir Ray Lancaster, writing to H. G. Wells, concerning the Piltdown find, says, "We are stumped and baffled." Yet in spite of all this, nearly 1,000,000 persons annually pa.s.s through the American Museum of Natural History in New York, and view the "reconstruction" according to the artist"s fancy, of the pithecanthropus, the Heidelberg man, the Piltdown man, and the Neanderthal man, the "ancestors of the human race;" and the mult.i.tude of high school students and teachers, as well as the general public, are not told how dubious and unscientific the representation is.
The brain capacity of the Piltdown individual (man or ape) is set down by his discoverers at 1070 c.c., which is 28 2/3% short of the normal skull capacity, 1500 c.c. Therefore, he must have lived 17,200,000 years ago, if we accept the estimate of 60,000,000 years since life began; or 143,333,333 years ago, if we accept the later guess of 500,000,000 years. It could not have lived near the time a.s.signed. In short, no guess of the origin of man that differs materially from the time a.s.signed in the word of G.o.d, can be harmonized with the facts.
4. THE NEANDERTHAL MAN. The next slender prop is the Neanderthal man, claimed to be 40,000 to 50,000 years old, although we are told that that is very uncertain.
Dr. Chapin says, "The first important discovery of the existence of an early example of mankind differing markedly from any living (?) and of a decidedly lower type, was made in 1857, when a part of a skull was found in a cave near Dusseldorf, Germany. The bones consisted of the upper portion of a cranium, remarkable for its flat retreating curve, the upper arm and thigh bones, a collar bone, and rib fragments." From these fragments, an ape-man has been created (by the artist), about 5 ft. 3 in. high, strong, fierce in look, and having other characteristics created by the artist.
Dr. Osborn a.s.signs to the Neanderthal skull a capacity of 1408 c.c., which would indicate that he lived 3,680,000 years ago, if life began 60,000,000 years ago; or 30,666,666 years ago, if life began 500,000,000 years ago.
From the first, many naturalists claimed that these bones belonged to an abnormal specimen of humanity. They can be easily duplicated.
Naturalists have maintained many divergent opinions: an idiot, an early German, a Cossack, a European of various other nationalities, a Mongolian, a primitive ape-man, an ancestor of modern man, and an impossible ancestor of man. Not very reliable evidence to support the stupendous scheme of evolution!
Now these four finds are the weak props supporting the desperate claim of the brute origin of man. Dr. Chapin says (Social Evolution, p. 68): "Other skulls and bone parts of prehistoric man have been found, and preserved in museums, but the specimens described (the four above mentioned) are sufficient to ill.u.s.trate _the type of evidence_ they const.i.tute." The later finds measuring close to normal capacity, doubtless are the bones of the descendants of Adam. Even by the admission of this text-book author, the evidence from other remains is no more convincing than that from these four types.
Some evolutionists say that the pithecanthropus, the Heidelberg man, the Piltdown man, and the Neanderthal man, form an unbroken line of descent from the ape, each in turn becoming less like the ape, and more like man. Others claim that the pithecanthropus was the end of a special branch of the apes; the Heidelberg man the last of another extinct branch; the Piltdown man and the Neanderthal man, likewise the last of other extinct species. In this case, all four finds have no evidential value whatever. All these confusing guesses from evidence so scant and uncertain, stamp evolution a "science falsely so called."
If these branches, species, or races of ape-like creatures ended, as claimed, in the age to which these alleged remains belonged, they could not have been the ancestors of the human race, and these alleged links were not links at all. Some evolutionists say that the Neanderthal race became extinct 25,000 years ago. If so, they were not our ancestors. We are curious to know what caused the extinction of all these races. Prof. R. S. Lull confesses, "However we account for it, the fact remains that ancient men are _rare_." Most unbiased students would say such men never existed. The entire absence of human remains during the 750,000 years and more is a demonstration against the brute origin of man, and a proof of special creation.
It will be remembered that there is no complete skeleton among all the remains, nor enough parts to make one altogether, nor to make any large part of a skeleton,--not even an entire skull. What bones are found are not joined together, and some of them scattered so widely apart, that no one can be certain they belong to the same individual. Some of the bones belong to an ape, and some to man,--doubtless modern man. Ardent evolutionists, with a zeal worthy of a better cause, have taken a fractional bone of a man, and a bone of an ape, and fashioned a composite being, and called it an ape-man, and their ancestor.
Every one of these finds is disputed by scientists, and even by evolutionists. And all these doubtful relics would not fill a small market basket. Yet some are ready to say that evolution is no longer a guess or a theory, but a proven fact. Text books like Chapin"s Social Evolution are placed in the hands of pupils giving only the arguments in favor, and the student, even if disposed to question this flimsy and unsupported theory, is helpless in the hands of an adroit professor. Dr. Gruenberg"s high school text book teaches that man is descended from the pithecanthropus, the Heidelberg, the Piltdown and the Neanderthal man, without the slightest intimation that such descent is at all disputed or questioned. What right has anyone to teach this false and unproved theory as the truth?
30. CONFESSED COLLAPSE OF "PROOF"
The claim that the pithecanthropus, the Heidelberg man, the Piltdown man, and the Neanderthal man, were the ancestors of man, collapses under the admissions of evolutionists themselves. The eminent Wa.s.sman says: "There are numerous fossils of apes, the remains of which are buried in the various strata from the lower Eocene to the close of the alluvial epoch, but _not one connecting link_ has been found between their hypothetical ancestral forms and man at the present time. The whole hypothetical pedigree of man is _not supported by a single fossil genus or a single fossil species_" (all italics ours). Darwin says: "When we descend to details, _we can prove that not one species has changed_." How, then, can man be descended from the brute?
Even H. G. Wells, who seems ready to endorse the most extravagant views, says (Outline of History, p. 69), "We can not say that it (the pithecanthropus) is a direct human ancestor." On p. 116, is a "Diagram of the Relationship of Human Races," showing that neither the pithecanthropus, the Heidelberg man, the Piltdown man, nor the Neanderthal man, could have been an ancestor of the human race, because each were the last of their species, and therefore had no descendants.
Dr. Keith, a London evolutionist, says that the Piltdown man is not an ancestor of man, much less an intermediate between the Heidelberg man and the Neanderthal man. Sir Ray Lancaster confesses he is "baffled and stumped" as to the Piltdown man. Dr. Keith says the "Neanderthal man was not quite of our species."
Dr. Osborn says that the Heidelberg man "shows no trace of being intermediate between man and the anthropoid ape." Again, speaking of the teeth of the St. Brelade man, Dr. Osborn says, "This special feature alone would exclude the Neanderthals from the ancestry of the higher races."
Prof. R. S. Lull says, "Certain authorities have tried to prove that the pithecanthropus is nothing but a large gibbon, but the weight of authority considers it prehuman, though not in the line of direct development in humanity."
Prof. Cope, a distinguished anatomist, says, "The femur [of the pithecanthropus] is that of a man, it is in no sense a connecting link."
In his "Men of the Old Stone Age," Dr. Osborn puts the pithecanthropus, the Heidelberg man, the Piltdown man, and the Neanderthal man, on limbs which _terminate abruptly as extinct races_. They can, in no sense, then, be the ancestors of man, or connecting links. Why, then, do they cling so desperately to these alleged proofs, when they admit they have no evidential value? Only sheer desperation, just as a drowning man will clutch a straw.
Dr. W. E. Orchard says: "The remains bearing on this issue, which have been found are very few, and their _significance is hotly disputed by scientists themselves,--both their age, and whether they are human or animal, or mere abnormalities_."
Since these four creatures (of the evolutionists) can not be the ancestors of the human race, where are their descendants?
Evolutionists are obliged to say they were the last of their kind. Strange! But there is no other way of escape.
Prof. Bronco, of the Geological and Palaeontological Inst.i.tute of Berlin University, says, "_Man appeared suddenly in the Quaternary period. Palaeontology tells us nothing on the subject,--it knows nothing of the ancestors of man_."
As fossils must be imbedded in rock, there is not a single fossil of an ape-man in the world.
31. PICTURES IN CAVERNS
To bolster up the hypothesis, that some of the sc.r.a.ps of bones belonged to ape-men; who lived about 50,000 years ago, we are told that, in many caverns there are paintings of animals, some of which are extinct, proving that the artists were ape-men of advancing intellect, living in that day. These drawings are rude, and inexact, and the resemblance to extinct animals rather fanciful. If the writer were to try to draw a picture of a horse on the stone walls of a dark cavern, with no light, it would be just as likely to resemble an extinct animal, or possibly an animal that never did live and never will. Many of the paintings are found in the depths of unlit caverns, often difficult of access. How could they paint any picture in the dark, when even fire was unknown, and the torch and lamp-wick had not yet been invented? And how could they make a ladder, or erect scaffolding of any sort in that rude age, before there were inventions of any kind? Yet they tell us that the frescoes on the ceiling of the dark cavern of Altamira, Spain, were made 25,000 to 50,000 years ago, when fire was unknown, and they ask us to believe that several colors are used, brown, red, black, yellow, and white; and that these drawings and colors have remained undisturbed and unchanged through these long ages. Is it easier to believe this, than to believe that these drawings were made by modern man, using modern inventions? A theory left to such support, must be poverty-stricken in argument indeed.
32. VESTIGIAL ORGANS
The claim is made that the so-called rudimentary organs in the human body such as the appendix, are the remnants of more complete organs inherited from our animal ancestors. It is a strange argument that a once complete and useful organ in our alleged animal ancestors, when it becomes atrophied in man, causes such an improvement and advance, as to cause man to survive, when his ancestors with more perfect organs became extinct. Man with less perfect organs became the dominant species. If the perfect organ were better than the rudimentary organ, how can man be the "survival of the fittest"? If rudimentary organs are a proof of descent from animals with more extensive, if not more perfect, organs, then both man and monkeys must be descended from the rat, which has the longest proportionate appendix of all. If unused muscles speak of our ancestry, the horse has the strongest claim to be our ancestor.
But many organs, such as "the thyroid gland, the thymus gland, and the pineal gland," formerly cla.s.sified as rudimentary organs, are found to be very useful and necessary.
Physicians have found the appendix very useful in preventing constipation, which its removal usually increases. If we only knew enough, we would, no doubt, discover a beneficial use for all the so-called vestigial organs. Our ignorance is no argument against the wisdom of their creation. The claim that human hair is vestigial is spoiled by the fact that there is none on the back where most abundant on simians.
33. SEROLOGY, OR BLOOD TESTS
They tell us that the blood of a dog injected into the veins of a horse, will kill the horse, whereas the blood of a man injected into the veins of an ape results in very feeble reaction, which proves that the dog and the horse, they say, are not related by blood, while the man and the ape are so related. But a distinguished authority says, "The blood of the dog is poisonous to other animals, whilst, on the other hand, the blood and the blood serum of the _sheep, goat_ and _horse_, have generally little effect on other animals _and on man_. It is for this reason that these animals and particularly the horse, are used in preparation of the serums employed in medicines."
It is also stated as a fact that mare"s milk more nearly resembles human milk than that of any other animal save the a.s.s, a nearly related species--to the mare, let us hope, not to us. Because of this resemblance, it is reported by Dr. Hutchinson that, "One of the large dairy companies in England now keeps a stock of milch a.s.ses for the purpose of supplying a.s.ses" milk for delicate human babes."
These well-known facts would prove the horse and the a.s.s a nearer relative than the ape, since serums are not made from the blood of the ape. We prefer the innocent sheep to the ape as our near relative, and will allow the evolutionists to claim the goat.
Dr. W. W. Keen, Prof. Emeritus of Jefferson College, Phila., in his book, "I believe in G.o.d and in Evolution," on p. 48 says, "Here again you perceive such ident.i.ty of function, that the thyroid gland of animals, when given as a remedy to man, performs precisely the same function as the human thyroid. Moreover, it is not the thyroid gland from the anthropoid apes that is used as a remedy but that from the more lowly sheep." Again the force of Dr. Keen"s argument goes to prove, so far as it has any weight, that we have a nearer kinship to the sheep than the ape. Children are nourished by the milk of the cow, the a.s.s and the goat, not of the ape. Vaccine matter is taken from the cow and serums from the horse, not from any species of monkey, to which we do not seem to be related at all.