As in the religious question, so in the ethical, Carneri also takes a peculiar position. In reducing all the phenomena of existence, together with the whole spiritual life of mankind, to a close development of nature according to the causal law, in expressly grouping also the utterances of the will of man under this law of an absolute necessity, in fully adopting Darwin"s doctrine as the wholly satisfactory key for the comprehension of the entire development of nature up to the history of {239} mankind, in advocating an absolutely monistic determinism and a nearly exclusive dependence of the efficacy of moral principles on the theoretic cultivation of the mind, on reasoning and education, he, as before mentioned, stands on exactly the same ground with materialists and monists among whom he expressly ranks himself; in the inconsequence with which he makes concessions to the power of the idea and the ideal over man--concessions which could never be concluded from a mere immanent process of nature--he is closely related to Strauss. But it is peculiar that, although entirely dependent in his reasoning on that monistic view of the world, and that Darwinian view of nature, he defines his ethical developments and his reflections on the organizations of human life in a relative independence, which again separates him as moralist from these before-mentioned monists and materialists, and rather ranks him, as we have seen in Chap. I, -- 4, in the line of the disciples of Spinoza and Hegel. From this it can also be explained, how it could happen that in criticisms and reviews of Darwinism and its literature the standpoint which he takes could find such different and diametrically opposed expositions. While, for instance, the "Beweis des Glaubens," in the March number of 1873, thinks that Carneri wishes to seek on Darwinian ground a new and better basis for morality than we had heretofore; while Hackel in the preface to the third edition of his "Natural History of Creation," page XXIX, mentions the publication of Carneri with the greatest praise, earnestly recommends all theologians and philosophers to read it, and greets it as the first successful attempt at applying fruitfully the monistic view {240} of the world, as established by Darwinism, to the realm of practical philosophy and at showing that the immense progress of our knowledge of the world caused by the descent theory has only the most beneficial effect upon the further progressing development of mankind in practical life;--a criticism in the "Ausland" (8 April, 1872, No. 15), calls the same publication "an attempt at harmonizing Darwin"s hypothesis with the current views of ethics, and at showing that those doctrines cannot be sustained which result as strictly logical conclusions from Darwin"s theory, and which are opposed to the present views of morality."
In returning from this digression to Darwinism in its purest form, to Darwin himself, we have in the first place to resume the discussion entered upon as to the way and manner in which, according to Darwin, self-determination is originated. Love and sympathy, moral feeling (with this definition he seems to point at the consciousness of moral freedom of will and of responsibility), and conscience, are to him very important elements of morality; and in the moral disposition of man he sees the greatest of all differences between man and animal. He also willingly acknowledges the powerful impulse which morality has from religion, when he says ("Descent of Man," Vol. II, page 347): "With the more civilized races, the conviction of the existence of an all-seeing Deity has had a potent influence on the advance of morality." From these and all his other deductions, we see that Darwin in no way intends to modify the maxims of moral action; and if under the expression "reform of morality," with which we have headed the present chapter, we should understand but {241} a reform of moral action itself, we should without hesitation have to rank Darwin with the next group, and not with that of which we now treat; just as in our review of the position of Darwinism in reference to the religious question, we had to rank him with those who take a neutral and peaceful position in reference to religion.
But if he does not touch upon morality in the maxims, he nevertheless comes forth in the _theory_ of moral action, in the science of morality with reformatory claims,--namely, with the fact that reduces the whole moral life to those agencies which are already active in the preceding animalic stage. It is true, he makes, as we have seen, a distinction in the genetic derivation of morality. He wholly reduces love and sympathy to social instincts which man has in common with the animal; and he lets the formal motives of moral action, sense of duty and conscience, originate through the high development of intelligence and other spiritual forces, and to be increased and transmitted by custom and inheritance, if those are present.
But, on the other hand, development of intelligence is to him an exclusive product of the preceding stage on which it was developed, and thus, in his opinion, entire morality, notwithstanding that double derivation, certainly has purely and exclusively the natural basis as its origin. If that is once the standpoint to which man sees himself led, he has, in order to reason logically, but a double choice. He must either say that a development out of a natural basis can possibly be consistent with the appearance of a new and higher principle, or must give up the autonomy of the moral law, and leave the moral action of {242} man, even in his maxims, to the unsteady flowing of development, or even of arbitrariness, and to the degree of education and intelligence of subjectivity. Neither the one nor the other is done by Darwin. It is true, on the one hand he shows that modesty, so often exhibited by him, of the investigator who does not wish to express any opinion on questions regarding which he has not yet attained a mature judgment; but on the other hand he also manifests the same aversion to going beyond purely naturo-historical speculations which, as we have seen in Part I, Book II, Chapter I, -- 1, hindered him from obtaining a clear conception of the importance of the question as to the origin of self-consciousness and of moral self-determination, and the same want of sequence in reasoning, which, as we have found in Chap. III, prevented him from giving an affirmative or negative decision in such an important question, as whether a divine end is to be observed in the processes of the world.
In this naturalization of ethical principles, he is closely related to that peculiar moral-philosophic tendency in England, which long before Darwin"s appearance, took its origin in John Stuart Mill, but which now, in the closest connection with Darwin"s principles, has its main advocate in Herbert Spencer, and is commonly called the _utilitarian_ tendency. We understand by this that conception of the moral motive which allows the moral good, however it may be ideally separated from the useful in the developed condition of mankind at the present time, in its origin to be developed at the outset from the same origin as the useful,--namely, from the sensation of like and dislike; a theory of utility which Sir John Lubbock still tried to complete and deepen by {243} the theory of an inheritance of the sensation of authority. Activities which originally proved to be only useful, were inherited as traditional instinct by the offspring, and were thus freed from the sensation of the useful, and acted as _authority_; this is the origin of _duty_, according to the history of development. Inasmuch as this philosophic system aims at taking from ethics the absoluteness of its demands, and at drawing down these demands into the activities of originating and developing, it is also to be treated of in this place.
As in the religious question, so in the ethical, Gustav Jager also stands nearer to a neutral relation between Darwinism and the hitherto valid principles. He puts the moral principles the same as the religious, into the balance of utility to man in his struggle for existence, and finds it thus easy and to be taken for granted, that the principles of morality, as they became the common property of mankind as influenced by Christianity, really prove themselves also the most serviceable to mankind. Social life is of more benefit to man than hermit life; this reflection leads him to the moral principle of charity. And as, according to Darwinism, rising development shows itself in an increasing differentiation and more richly organized physical development, so the organization of society according to the principle of the division of work is that form of social life which proves itself the most practical to man; and this reflection leads him to the full acknowledgment of the entire ethical organization of human life and its tasks.
But, as we saw, in treating of the religious question, that n.o.body, neither friend nor foe, could possibly be {244} satisfied with the subst.i.tution of the category of utility for that of truth, we are compelled to say in reference to the ethical question, that a moral principle which, on such a foundation, has its basis and authority only in its utility, is really no authority, and loses its value with every individual who is unwilling to acknowledge its utility and thinks another ground of action may be more useful than the moral.
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CHAPTER VI.
NEUTRALITY AND PEACE BETWEEN DARWINISM AND MORALITY.
-- 1. _Mivart, Alex. Braun, and Others._
Evidently a real neutrality between the Darwinian theories of development and the hitherto valid and absolute authority of the moral principle is possible only, when we deny that the ethical demand is simply a natural process--although we may perceive its origin within the limits of a natural process--and when we fail to identify that demand with this process, and do not deduce it from the latter as its sufficient ground of explanation; but harmony between the two theories, in spite of all traces of Darwinism in the scientific parts of anthropology, is possible when we acknowledge the moral demand, if once present and valid, in its entire and, so to speak, its metaphysical independence in its full value, far exceeding all natural necessity.
It is shown by Mivart that such an absolute authority of the ethical demands, and such an independence of the whole science of morality, may be brought into accord with the scientific theories of development. In his book on "The Genesis of Species," he devotes a whole chapter to ethical questions. He discriminates, in the moral good, between the formal good (good with consciousness and will of the good) and the {246} material good (good without consciousness and design), ascribes only the latter to the animal world in its moral features, and the former exclusively to mankind, and thus takes ground quite a.n.a.logous to that held by him on the religious question, where he includes in the theory of development the physical part of man, but excludes the intellectual part, with the single qualification that in the religious question he unnecessarily renders his position more difficult by designating this intellectual or spiritual part by the term "soul."
German authorities, who see in Darwinism only a scientific question which can be solved by means of natural investigation, and who therefore, think the religious and ethical questions but little affected by it, have expressed themselves in regard to this neutral position toward morality still more rarely than as to its neutrality toward religion. The reason for this is probably that the independence of moral principles and the absoluteness of their authority entirely result from themselves, as soon as we have once admitted theism and left room in general for a freedom standing above natural causality--and perhaps it is due to the further fact that the realm of the moral is more palpably urged as a reality and necessity upon even the most indifferent mind than the realm of religion.
On the other hand, we find frequent utterances which _indirectly_ refer to the ethical realm--for instance, expressions in reference to the ethical importance of an animal descent of man. Alex. Braun says: "Man _a.s.sents_ to the idea of being appointed _lord_ of the creatures, but then he may also acknowledge that he is not placed over his subjects as a stranger, but originated from the {247} beings whose lord he wishes to be. It is not an unworthy idea, but rather an elevating one, that man const.i.tutes the last and highest member in the ancient and infinitely rich development of organic nature on our planet, being connected by the most intimate bonds of relationship with the other members, as the latter are connected among themselves with one another: not a pernicious parasite on the tree of natural life, but the true son of the blissful mother Nature." In reducing descent, which he accepts, to a development from an _inner_ force, and in ascribing to the Darwinian selection, with its struggle for existence, the value only of a regulator (he adopts this term of Wallace as a very striking one), Braun, in his concluding appeal to young students, calls especial attention to the ethical importance of a development proceeding from within, saying: "Life has its outer and its inner side; all its works and ways must follow mechanical laws, but its tasks and aims belong to a higher realm. We are permitted to take a glance into this realm through the all-embracing history of the development of nature, which leads up into our own inmost being, up to our highest end. Truly progressive development is the best wish for every youth," etc.
Inasmuch as that in which Alex. Braun finds a satisfaction for the fulfillment of the ethical tasks--namely, a deeper knowledge of man"s connection with lower nature, and the pointing to the proper tasks of the development of mankind,--has thus far been the substance of all sound systems of morality, we did not mention these and similar utterances, of which we could gather many more from other writers, in the preceding part of our {248} work--_i.e._, in describing those who ascribe to Darwinism a reformatory influence upon morality; but we rank these utterances with those which predict from the descent theory neither injury to morality nor any especial enlightenment regarding it.
We have now reached the end of that part of our work which considers and treats of the views of others. To our regret, we have been compelled to restrict ourselves, in this review, to the countries of the English and German tongues; the former being the home of Darwin, the latter our own. We should have preferred to take into our review also the literature of France and Belgium, Holland and Italy; but we feared being able to give only an incomplete report. Besides, it is in Germany and Great Britain--and partly also in North America, related to both in language and origin--where the Darwinian agitation has taken deepest hold of the mind; and, in restricting our report to these countries, we are not likely to have omitted any view essential to the consideration of the present question. It is true that in the other countries named the Darwinian literature is also rich, and we are well aware of the incompleteness of our report in that respect. But we believe that we have not omitted any essential views and evidences, even if the names of many of their advocates have not been mentioned.
It still remains to us to investigate independently the position of the Darwinian theories, with their philosophic supplements, in reference to religion and morality: a task for which we hope to have essentially prepared the way through the preceding representations and investigations.
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BOOK II.
a.n.a.lYTICAL.
PRELIMINARY VIEW.
In treating the _religious_ question, we proceed from the supposition that religion is concerned not only in this subjective truth of religious impulse and sensation, but also in the objective truth and reality of its faith, although it attains these in a different way from natural science. A religion which should have the authorization of its existence only in psychology, and which was not allowed to ask whether the object of its faith also has objective reality, would stand on a weak basis, and its end would only be a question of time; for an impulse which can only be psychologically established, and to which no real objective necessity could correspond, must sooner or later either be proven a psychological error or be eliminated by progressing culture. On the other hand, if we find a reconcilableness or an irreconcilableness of Darwin"s views with the objective substance of religion, the possible question as to its reconcilableness or irreconcilableness with subjective religiousness on the ground of those results wholly answers itself. In no way, not even in the most indirect, can we approve that method of book-keeping by which something can be true in regard to religion and false in regard to science, or vice-versa; on the contrary, we see {250} in all attempts at healing in such a way the rupture which at present exists in the minds of so many, only a more emphatic avowal of that rupture.
In treating of the religious question as it affects the position of Darwinism in reference to the substance and the objective truth of the religious faith, without going into a detailed treatment of the question of the reconcilableness of a purely subjective religiousness with the Darwinian views, it will be of advantage to speak first of the position of the Darwinian theories in reference to the basis of all true and sound religion and religiousness--the _theistic view of the world_. In doing this, we shall discriminate the purely scientific theories of Darwin from the philosophic supplements and conclusions which have been given to and drawn from them, and shall have to consider each of them separately in connection with the theistic view of the world. If thereby we shall discover Darwinian views which can be brought into accord with a theistic view of the world, we shall also, in order to close our investigation, have to consider them with those parts of the theology of _positive Christianity_ which can be affected by the Darwinian questions.
In treating the question of the relation of Darwinism to morality, our investigation can be somewhat abridged, because many of the princ.i.p.al questions which have to be considered have found their solution in what has been previously said, and partly also because they will present themselves in it different form.
The princ.i.p.al division in our discussion we shall most appropriately a.s.sign to ethics, and thus treat first of the position of Darwinism in reference to the moral principles, and then treat of this in reference to the concrete {251} moral life. Where the question as to the position of Darwinism in reference to morality occurs, we shall no longer have to treat of it separately as to the different aspects of its problems--we should otherwise get lost in too many repet.i.tions; but we shall only have to separate an ethical naturalism which supports itself upon Darwinian grounds, from pure Darwinism, and to treat of each in turn as to its position in reference to morality.
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_A. THE DARWINIAN THEORIES AND RELIGION._
CHAPTER I.
THE DARWINIAN THEORIES AND THE THEISTIC VIEW OF THE WORLD.
A. THE POSITION OF PURELY SCIENTIFIC DARWINISM IN REFERENCE TO THEISM.
-- 1. _Scientific Investigation and Theism. The Idea of Creation._
At the very beginning of our investigation, we have to state that the absolute freedom of scientific investigation lies not only in the interest of natural science, but just as clearly in the direct interest of religion; and that every attempt at limiting the freedom of scientific investigation in a pretended religious interest, can only have its cause in the fullest misapprehension of that which the religious interest requires. For the religious view of the world consists in this: that it sees in the universe, with all its inhabitants and processes, the work of an almighty Creator and Ruler of the world; and therefore it cannot be unimportant to it, whether we also have a knowledge of this work, to a certain extent, whether we make use of the means which lead to the knowledge of the world, {253} and whether we make progress in the knowledge, or not. The religious view of the world sees in every correction and enrichment of our scientific knowledge only a correction and enrichment of our knowledge of the way and manner of the divine creation and action; and every such correction and enrichment acts directly as an incitement to religiousness--although, fortunately for the universal destination of religion, the degree of our religiousness is not dependent upon the degree of our knowledge of nature.
Therefore, the religious view of the world does not throw any barriers in the way of scientific investigation; it does not prescribe the route by which the latter is to reach its aim, and it does not forbid it any scientific auxiliary means, nor, indeed, any scientific auxiliary hypothesis, nor does it, so far as the communication of scientific knowledge is concerned, inquire after the religious or the irreligious standpoint of those who offer it such knowledge. In all these directions, it knows of but one requirement: that of exact and correct presentation; in a word, of but one requirement of _truth_. Real, well-founded, and certain results of natural science can never come into antagonism with religion; for precisely the same thing which in the language of natural science is called natural causal connection, is in that of religion called the way and manner of divine action and government. Where man has adopted any view, the proving of which, according to its nature, belongs to natural science, and natural science should show an error in such a view, he must simply give it up and surrender the erroneous opinion, that such a view is to form a const.i.tuent part of our religious perception. Just as decidedly, on the other hand, religion can ask of {254} natural science that it should not use speculative views of religious character, the proving of which belongs to the science of religion, for the purpose of scientific generalizations, in case the science of religion should prove that such views are antagonistic to the nature and the principles of religion.
Those who, on religious grounds, look with suspicion upon scientific investigation, are frequently influenced by two erroneous notions, closely related to one another, without regard to the well-grounded aversion to the atheistic beauty with which so many scientific works are adorned. One of these errors is the notion that any object is remote from divine causality in the degree in which it has the cause of its origin in the natural connection, and that it would be easier for us to trace the origin of an object to the authorship of G.o.d, if we could not find any natural cause of its origin, than if we had knowledge of such a natural cause. The other error is the notion that the idea of "creation" excludes the idea of the action of secondary causes.
If the first mentioned opinion were correct, those certainly would be right who identify the progress of sciences with the progress of atheism; and ignorance would then be the most effective protection of piety. But this opinion is in direct conflict with all sound religious and scientific reasoning. It is in conflict with sound religious reasoning: for the religious view of the world sees in nature itself, with its whole a.s.sociation of causes and effects, a work of G.o.d; and as certainly as, according to the religious view of nature, a thousand years in the sight of G.o.d are but as yesterday when it is past, just so certainly is an object a work of {255} G.o.d, whether its origin is due to milliards of _well-known_ secondary causes, which all together are works of G.o.d--as well with reference to the laws which they obey as to the materials and forces in which these laws are active--or whether, when treating the question as to the immediate cause of its existence, we see ourselves led to an agency _unknown_ to us. And that opinion is also in conflict with all sound scientific reasoning: for the fact that we do not have any knowledge of the immediate cause of a phenomenon, is by no means a proof that this immediate cause is the direct action of G.o.d who does not use any secondary causes; the phenomena may just as well have still more material or immaterial secondary causes, unknown to us. We will ill.u.s.trate the error, referred to, by an example which will also reveal its relationship to the other error of which we shall have to speak immediately. It is certainly no evidence of an especially intensive piety, if we build the conviction that G.o.d is the Creator of man, among other things, on the obscurity in which for us the origin of mankind is wrapped. For from this obscurity no other conclusion can be drawn than increased proofs of the limitation of our knowledge; that piety which traces those phenomena whose natural causes we know, just as decidedly to the causality of G.o.d, is much more--we shall not say, intensive, but correctly guided--than that piety which traces back those whose natural causes are hidden to us. And, on the other hand, it is also no evidence of especial religious coolness or indifference, when we pursue with interest and the desire of success the attempts at bringing light into the history of the origin of mankind. He who does the latter can, according to his religious or {256} irreligious standpoint, just as easily connect his interest with the hope of an enrichment of his knowledge of the ways and works of G.o.d, as with the hope of a confirmation in his atheistic view of the world. The reverence with which we stand before the action of G.o.d in those works whose existence is in a higher degree a mystery to us than the existence of others (for in reality everything is a mystery to us), is perhaps a little differently modified from the reverence with which we stand before the action of G.o.d in those of his works in the mode of whose origin we are permitted to get a deeper glance; but each is reverence, and we can get from both nutriment for our religious nature.
Those who favor the second error--namely, that the idea of creation excludes the idea of secondary causes--overlook the facts that the idea of the creation of the universe is essentially different from the idea of the creation of the single elements of the universe, as, for instance, of the earth, of the organisms, of man; that the idea of a creation without secondary causes can only be applied to the origin of the universe in its elements, forces, and laws, and that the first origin of the single elements in the world--as of the single planets, organisms, man--not only admits the action of secondary causes, but even requires and presupposes the action of conditions. For all single species of beings which have originated within the already existing world, have also certain elements, even the whole basis and condition of their existence, in common with that which was already before in existence; the planet has its elements in common with the elements of other planets, the organic has the same material substances as the inorganic, man has {257} the elements and the organization of his body as well as a great part of his psychical activity in common with animals. Nothing urges us to suppose--and the a.n.a.logy of all that we know even forbids us to suppose--that with the appearance of a new species of beings, the same matter and the same quality of matter which the last appearance has in common with the already existing, has each time been called anew into existence out of nothing. Only that which in the new species is really new, comes into existence anew with its first appearance.
But we do not even know whether the proximate cause of this new does really come into existence for the first time, or whether it was not before in existence in a real, perhaps latent, condition, and is now set free for the first time. In the one case as in the other, we shall call the new, which comes into existence, a new creation. And if man thinks that the new only deserves the name of creation, when it occurs suddenly and at once, where before only other things were present, like a _deus ex machina_, certainly such an opinion is only a childlike conception, which becomes childish as soon as we scientifically reason about the process. It cannot be doubtful that religious minds which are not accustomed to scientific reasoning, have such a conception; whether theologians also favor it, we do not know, although it is possible. Certainly those scientists who intend to attack the faith in a living Creator and Lord of the world, take it as the wholly natural, even as the only possible, conception of a Creator and his creation; and of course it is to them a great and cheap pleasure to become victorious knights in such a puppet-show view of the conception of creation. But the source whence Christians derive their {258} religious knowledge tells them precisely the contrary. The Holy Scripture, it is true, sees in the entire universe a work of G.o.d. But where it describes the creation of the single elements of the world, it describes at the same time their creation as the product of natural causes, brought about by natural conditions. The reader may see, for instance, the words: "And G.o.d said, Let the earth bring forth gra.s.s, the herb yielding seed, etc. And _the earth brought forth_ gra.s.s and herb," etc. "And G.o.d said, Let _the earth bring forth the living creature_." Even the creation of man is thus related: "And the Lord G.o.d _formed_ man of the dust of the ground." Certainly the forming presupposes a matter out of which man is formed. And, on the other hand, where the Bible speaks of single beings in the kingdoms long before created and perfected, of the individual man who is originated by generation and birth, of single plants and animals--in general, of single processes and phenomena in the world long before perfected, of wind and waves, of rain and flames, which altogether have their natural causes of origin--it speaks of them all precisely in the same way as when describing their first creation as works of G.o.d. The expressions "create, make, form, cause to appear," are applied to the single individuals of the kingdoms long before created, precisely in the same way as they are to the first origin of the first individuals of those kingdoms.
Thus, by the full freedom which religious interest gives to scientific investigation, we are well prepared to treat with entire impartiality the question as to the position of each of the Darwinian theories in reference to theism. {259}
-- 2. _The Descent Theory and Theism._
In the first part of our investigation, we found that the idea of the origin of the species, especially of the higher organized species, through descent from the next related lower ones, has a high degree of probability, although it is still not proven in a strictly scientific sense, and although especially the supposition of an often-separated primitive generation of single types is not excluded by that idea, and we can hardly suppose that the main types of the animal kingdom are developed out of one another. Now we are far from asking of _religion_ to decide for itself in favor of the one or the other mode of conception, or to place its influence in the one or the other balance-scale of scientific investigations. It leaves the answering of these questions exclusively to natural science, knowing beforehand that it will be able to come to an understanding with the one as well as with the other result of its investigations. But we confess frankly that it is incomparably _easier_ for us to bring the origin of the higher groups of organisms in accord with a theistic and teleological view of the world through descent than the origin of each single species of organisms through a primitive generation; and we reach this result especially by the attempt at teleologically perceiving the palaeontological remains of organic life on earth. Theism and teleology see in the origin of things a striving towards a goal, a rising from the lower to the higher, a development--it is true a development really taken only in the ideal sense of an ideal connection, of a plan; or, as K. E. v. Baer, in 1834, in his lecture on the most common law of nature in all development, expresses {260} himself, of a progressive victory of mind over matter. Such a plan and its realization we can much more easily conceive when, in the past genera which geological formations show us, a genealogical connection takes place between the preceding species and the now living species, than when each species perished and beside or after it the newly appearing species always originated out of the inorganic through primitive generation. In the first case, we see in the preceding a _real_ preparation for the following, and also easily perceive, the apparent waste of enormous periods of time for the successive processes of creation. In the second case, the coming and going of genera in innumerable thousands of years, without any exterior connection, becomes an incomprehensible problem, and the striving towards an end according to a regular plan, which we observe in the development, of the organic kingdoms on earth, disappears completely in metaphysical darkness.
Precisely because so many advocates of a theistic view of the world have thought that for the sake of the theistic idea of creation they were obliged to suppose a primitive origin of all the organic species, and because, nevertheless, the fact is patent that in the course of the pre-historic thousands of years myriads of species came and perished, not to return again, they became liable to the reproach on the part of the adversaries of theism, that the Creator, as they supposed him, makes unsuccessful attempts, which he has to throw away, as the potter a defective vessel, until he finally succeeds in making something durable and useful; and this objection was and is still made, not only to these superficial theists and their unhappily-selected and indefensible position, but to {261} the whole view of the world of theism itself and to the faith in G.o.d and the Creator in general.
For all these reasons, we can from the religious point of view but welcome the idea of a descent of species. Philologists have, if we are correctly informed, the canon that as a rule the more difficult text is the more correct one; but we doubt whether those should adopt this canon who try to read in the book of nature, whether with the eye of science or with that of religion--unless the faculty of reasoning is given to us in order to conceal the truth.
But, we have also to look for a manner of reconciling theism with all the different possibilities under which a descent is at all reasonable and conceivable. One of these possibilities is that of an entirely successive development of species out of one another by imperceptibly small transitions; and of this we shall soon speak. Another is the possibility of a descent by leaps, through a metamorphosis of germs or a heterogenetic generation. The real causes of such a heterogenetic generation, if it took place at all, have not yet been found; therefore we have to treat only of the abstract possibilities of its conceivableness. There are two such possibilities.
The birth of a new species took place in one of two ways: Either to those materials and forces which formed the germ of the new species, were added entirely new metaphysical agencies which did not exist before, and only the basis and the frame within which the new appeared, or that which the new species has in common with the old mother-species had the cause of its existence in the preceding. Likewise even the original productions {262} of man are always composed of two factors--of the given pre-suppositions and conditions, and of the new which on their basis and within their frame comes into existence. Otherwise the causes of the new which was to originate already lay in all former stages, but were still latent and still hindered in their activity, and only at the time of the birth the new impulse came which set them free for their activity. This new impulse may very well belong to the causal connection of the universe, and be caused by something a.n.a.logous to natural selection.
In the first case, which in its application to the origin of man is adopted by A. R. Wallace and Karl Snell, the reconciliation between descent and theism has not the least difficulty; for if the agency which in the new-appearing species produces that which is specifically new in it, came only into existence with the first formation of the germs of the new species in the mother-species, this new certainly cannot have its origin anywhere else than in the supermundane _prima causa_ in the Creator and Lord of the world.
In the second case also, theism is in no way threatened. For if we have to refer the cause of a new phenomenon in the world so far back as even to the beginning and the first elements of all things, we nevertheless have to arrive at last at the cause of all causes; and this is the living G.o.d, the Creator and Lord of the world. Thus the new form of existence would anyhow have the cause of its existence in G.o.d; and the value, the importance, and the substance of its existence, would only commence from where it really made its appearance, and not from where its still latent causes existed. As little as we attribute to the just fecundated {263} egg of man the value of man, although we know that under the right conditions the full man is to be developed out of it, just so little in accordance with that view would the differences of value within the created world be dissolved in a ma.s.s of atoms or potencies of a similar value. Neither should we have to fear that from such a theory cold deism would be subst.i.tuted for our theism, full of life. For as certainly as theism does not exclude, but includes, all that is relative truth in deism, so certainly the supposition that the Creator had laid the latent causes of all following creatures in the first germs of the created, would also not exclude the idea of a constant and omnipotent presence of the Creator in the world. Undoubtedly it belongs to our most elementary conceptions of G.o.d, that we have to conceive his lofty position above time, not as an abstract distance from finite development, but, as an absolute domination over it; so that for G.o.d himself, who creates time and developments in time, there is no dependence on the temporal succession of created things, and it is quite the same to him whether he instantly calls a creature into existence, or whether he prepares it in a short s.p.a.ce of time, or years, or in millions of years. In this idea we also find the only possible and simple solution of the before-mentioned problem of a timeless time which Fr. Vischer wishes to propose to philosophy.
-- 3. _The Evolution Theory and Theism._
In speaking of an evolution theory, in distinction from the descent theory, we mean, as is evident from the first part of our work, that way and mode of {264} constructing the doctrine of the descent of species which permit this descent to take place, not by the leaps of a metamorphosis of germs, but by transitions so imperceptably small that the difference of two generations which lie in the same line of descent, is never greater than those differences which always take place between parents and children of the same species--transitions so gradual that only the continuation of these individual changes in a single direction produces an increase and, finally and gradually, the new species. The treatment of the question as to what position this _evolution theory_ takes regarding theism, is even more simple than answering the question as to the position of the descent idea in reference to theism.