that is, to the extent of that reasonable certainty which satisfies the
ordinary "prudent man" in affairs of weight and importance. I have tried
to show that evolution, apart from fanciful and speculative extensions
of it, allows, if it does not directly establish, that the operation of
nature is not a chance or uncontrolled procedure, but one that suggests
a distinct set of lines, and an orderly obedience to pre-conceived law,
intelligently and beneficently (in the end) designed.

There are obviously two main points which the Christian reader requires
to have made clear. The first is that, the modern theory of evolution
being admitted, the constitution of matter in the universe and the
principles of development in organic life, which that theory
establishes, not only do not exclude, but positively demand, the
conception of a Divine artificer and director. The second point, which
is perhaps of still greater weight with the believer, is that where
revelation (which is his ultimate standard of appeal) has touched upon
the subject of creation, its statements are not merely a literary fancy,
an imaginary cosmogony, false in its facts though enshrining Divine
truth, but are as a whole perfectly true.

Whatever novelty there may be, is to be found in the treatment of the
second subject. The first portion of the work is only a brief and
popular statement of facts, quite unnecessary to the scientific reader
but probably very necessary to the large body of Churchmen, who have not
studied science, but are quite able to appreciate scientific fact and
its bearings when placed before them in an untechnical form, and
divested of needless details and subordinate questions.

But it is around the supposed declarations of Scripture on the subject
of creation that the real "conflict" has centred. Let us look the matter