quite fairly in the face. We accept the conclusion that (let us say) the
horse was developed and gradually perfected or advanced to his present
form and characteristics, by a number of stages, and that it took a very
long time to effect this result. Now, if there is anywhere a statement
in Holy Writ that (_a_) a horse was _per saltum_ called into existence
in a distinctive and complete form, by a special creative _fiat_, and
that (_b_) this happened not gradually, but in a limited and specified
moment of time, then I will at once admit that the record (assuming that
its meaning is not to be mistaken) is not provably right, if it is not
clearly wrong; and accept the consequences, momentous as they would be.
If, in the same way, the Record asserts that man, or at least man the
direct progenitor of the Semitic race,[1] was a distinct and special
creation, his bodily frame having some not completely explained
developmental connection with the animal creation, but his higher nature
being imparted as a special and unique creative endowment out of the
line of physical development altogether, then I shall accept the Record,
because the proved facts of science have nothing to say against it,
whatever Drs. Buchner, Vogt, Häckel, and others may assert to the
contrary.


[Footnote 1: With whose history, as leading up to the advent of the
Saviour in the line of David, the Bible is mainly concerned.]

In the first of my two instances, the popular idea has long been that
the sacred record _does_ say something about a direct and separate
creative act; and this idea has been the origin and ground of all the
supposed conflict between science and "religion." As long as this idea
continues, it can hardly be said that a book addressed to the clearing
up of the subject is unnecessary or to be rejected _per se_.