on, which theological speculators have based upon
the history narrated in the opening of the book of Genesis.

There is a great deal of talk and not a little lamentation about the
so-called religious difficulties which physical science has created.
In theological science, as a matter of fact, it has created none. Not
a solitary problem presents itself to the philosophical Theist, at the
present day, which has not existed from the time that philosophers
began to think out the logical grounds and the logical consequences of
Theism. All the real or imaginary perplexities which flow from the
conception of the universe as a determinate mechanism, are equally
involved in the assumption of an Eternal, Omnipotent and Omniscient
Deity. The theological equivalent of the scientific conception of
order is Providence; and the doctrine of determinism follows as surely
from the attributes of foreknowledge assumed by the theologian, as from
the universality of natural causation assumed by the man of science.
The angels in 'Paradise Lost' would have found the task of enlightening
Adam upon the mysteries of "Fate, Foreknowledge, and Free-will," not a
whit more difficult, if their pupil had been educated in a
"Real-schule" and trained in every laboratory of a modern university.
In respect of the great problems of Philosophy, the post-Darwinian
generation is, in one sense, exactly where the prae-Darwinian
generations were. They remain insoluble. But the present generation
has the advantage of being better provided with the means of freeing
itself from the tyranny of certain sham solutions.

The known is finite, the unknown infinite; intellectually we stand on
an islet in the midst of an illimitable ocean of inexplicability. Our
business in every generation is to reclaim a little more land, to add
something to the extent and the solidity of our possessions. And even
a cursory glance at the history of the biological sciences during the
last quarter of a century is sufficient to justify the assertion, that
the most potent instrument for the extension of the realm of natural
knowledge which has come into men's hands, since the publication of
Newton's 'Principia,' is Darwin's 'Origin of Species.'

It was badly received by the generation to which it was first
addressed, and the outpouring of angry nonsense to which it gave rise
is sad to think upon. But the present generation will probably behave
just as badly if another Darwin should