The Theories of Darwin and Their Relation to Philosophy, Religion, and Morality Part 9

For now we have no longer to discuss the different possibilities of a development, as heretofore we have discussed those of a descent, but only the idea of a gradual development or of an evolution in general. Of such possibilities, it is true, we find several. In the first place, we can look for the inciting principle of the development of species either in the interior of organisms, or we can see it approaching the latter from without. The only scientific system which has made any attempt at mentioning and elaborating the inciting principle of development is that of Darwin; a system that chooses the second of the alternatives just stated and sees the essential principle that makes the transmission of individuals a progress beyond one species, approaching the individuals from without.

But while we shall have to treat of this specific Darwinian theory--the selection theory--still more in detail in the following section, we shall also there have to point, out {265} everything that theism has to say in reference to a principle of development which approaches the organisms from without. Another possible explanation of the origin of species through development is to be found in the fact that we look for the inciting principle of development in the interior of organisms. This is done, so far as we know, by all those scientists who, although inclined to an evolution theory, are adversaries of the selection theory; but none of them claim to have found the inciting agencies of development. Thus, as in the preceding section, we are again referred only to the wholly abstract possibility of conceiving these inciting agencies either as coming into existence anew in the organism with each smallest individual modification which leads to a development of the species, or as being before present in the organisms, but still latent, and only coming into activity when they are set free. But the question whether theism could accept the one or the other possibility had to be treated of in the preceding section, and was there answered in the affirmative.

Thus it only remains to treat in general of the question as to the reconcilableness of the idea of the origin of species through evolution, through gradual development, _in general_ with a theistic view of the world.

In the first place, we wish to render evident the fact which is so often overlooked by the friends of monism and still more by theistic adversaries of the idea of evolution, that the idea of a development of species, and also of man, does not offer to theistic reasoning any new or any other difficulties than those which have been long present, and which had found their solution in the religious consciousness long before any idea of evolution disturbed the {266} mind. It is true, the question as to the origin of _mankind_ is, to speak in the language of natural history, a still unsolved _problem_; and the supposition of its gradual development out of the animal kingdom is still an _hypothesis_--one of all those attempts at solving this problem which still wait for confirmation or refutation. But there is another quite a.n.a.logous question whose position has long ceased to be a mere problem, and whose solution is no longer a mere hypothesis; namely, the question as to the origin of the perfect human or any other organic _individual_. To speak again in the language of natural history, this origin is no longer a problem--that is, without regard to the obscurity in which the existence and origin of every creature, as to its last causes, is always and will always be veiled for us. We know that the human, and, in general, every organic individual, becomes that which it is through _development_. It begins the course of its being with the existence of a single cell, the egg, and goes through all stages of this development by wholly gradual and imperceptible transitions, so that the precise moment cannot exactly be fixed when any organ, any physical or psychical function, comes into existence, until perfect man is _developed_. Man has this mode of coming into existence in common with all organized beings, down to the lowest organisms which stand above the value and rank of a single cell. At this place, and with the design of our present discussion in view, we ought not to render the importance of this fact obscure by a teleological comparison of the different eggs and germs with one another. If we look upon that which is to _come out_ of the germs, and which certainly if prepared and present in the first vital functions of the {267} germ, although we are not able to observe, prove, and estimate it by means of the microscope and the retort, then of course the difference in the value of the germs must be immense; and from this point of view we certainly look upon the germ of man differently than upon the germ of an oyster. But here the question is not as to the differences of value of organisms: no scientist who remains within the limits of his realm, will ever deny them; but we treat of the question whether such valuable objects come into existence suddenly or gradually--whether it is possible, or even a fact which repeats itself before our eyes, that a form of being of higher value comes forth from a form of being of a lower value in gradual development. And here it is an undisputed fact that all qualities of man, the physical as well as the spiritual, come into existence in such a gradual development that not in a single one of them can be fixed any moment of which it may be said: on the other side of this moment it did not exist, but on this side it did exist. All differentiations of his body, from the first differentiation of the egg-cell into a complexity of cells up to the last formation of his organs, take place in the same gliding development. All his psychical and spiritual functions and forces come into existence in this form of gradual development. Where, in the development of the human individual, is the moment in which consciousness, language, self-consciousness, memory, will, the perception of G.o.d, moral responsibility, the perception of the idea and the ideal, or whatever else we may mention, came into existence? Nowhere; all this, and all the rest, is developed in a gradual process. The only marked time in this development is the time of birth: {268} it brings a great change into physical life, and is perhaps the beginning epoch of the spiritual development of man. But even the birth is not absolutely bound to a certain time; the child may be born too early, by weeks or even months, and its development nevertheless takes place; and even after birth, how slowly and gradually spiritual development begins and continues!

With this gradual process of individual development which we have long known, we have never found any difficulty in bringing two things into harmony. First, we always judged the value of the single qualities of man only in the proportion in which they were really present and came into existence, and in such a way that we entirely followed the flowing development of the individual. Therefore we looked upon the suckling, for instance, not at all as a morally responsible individual; upon the child of two years as more responsible, but to a far less degree than the child of school-age, and the latter again to a less degree than the man; and thus we have been long accustomed to reason, when looking upon all single qualities of man. Second, we did not find any difficulty in bringing into perfect harmony the idea of a gradual process of individual development and of the dependence of the latter on a complex totality of natural causes: with the idea of the absolute dependence on G.o.d, the Creator, of that which arose through development. Every religiously reasoning man has always looked upon himself as the child of his parents, gradually developed under the activity of complex natural causes, as well as the creature of G.o.d, that owes the existence of all its forces and parts of body and soul to G.o.d. Should it then, be so difficult, or is it only {269} something new, to bring into harmony, when looking upon the entire species and genus, that which we were long ago able to bring into harmony when looking upon the individual--it being presupposed that the investigation leads us to a development of the entire species and genus similar to that of the individual development? Or have we here again to ask, as in -- 1: is it more religious to make no attempt at removing the veil which covers the natural process of the origin of mankind, than to make it? It is true, the not knowing anything can, under certain circ.u.mstances, create and increase the sensation of reverence for the depth of divine power and wisdom; but a perception of the ways of G.o.d is also certainly able to create the same. On that account, we need not at all fear that by such an attempt and its eventual success we might get into the shallows of superficiality, to which nothing seems any longer to be hidden, only because it has no presentiment of the depths which are to be sounded. There will always remain enough of the mysterious and the uninvestigated, and each new step forward will only lead to new views, to new secrets, to new wonders.

But does not a development, like that which we here for the moment a.s.sume hypothetically, efface and destroy the specific value of man and mankind from still another side? Would not a _beginning_ of mankind be really lost, in case that theory of evolution should gain authority? and would not there still lie between that which is decidedly called animal world and that which is decidedly called mankind an innumerable series of generations of beings which were neither animal nor man? We do not believe it. What makes man _man_, {270} we can exactly point out: it is self-consciousness and moral self-determination. Now, in case development took place in the above sense, it may have pa.s.sed ever so gradually; the epochs of preparation between that which we know as highest animal development and that which const.i.tutes the substance of man, may have stretched over ever so many generations, and, if the friends of evolution desire it, we say over ever so many thousands of generations; yet that which makes man _man_--self-consciousness and moral self-determination--must have always come into actual reality in _individuals_. Those individuals in which self-consciousness came into existence and activity, for the first time, and with it the entire possibility of the world of ideas--the consciousness of moral responsibility, and with it also the entire dignity of moral self-determination--were the first men. The individuals which preceded the latter may have been ever so interesting and promising as objects of observation, if we imagine ourselves spectators of these once supposed processes; yet, they were not men.

-- 4. _The Selection Theory and Theism._

The last scientific theory whose position in reference to theism we have to discuss, is the selection theory.

We have found but little reason for sympathizing with this theory. But since we believed that we were obliged to suspect it, not for religious but for scientific reasons, so the completeness of our investigation requires us to a.s.sume hypothetically that the selection principle really manifests itself as the only and exclusive principle of the origin of species, and to ask now what position it would in such a case take in reference to theism.

{271}

The only answer we are able to give is decidedly favorable to theism.

It is true, development would in such a case approach the organisms merely from without. For the principle lying within the organisms, which would then be the indispensable condition of all development, would be first the principle in itself, wholly without plan or end, of individual variability; second, the principle of inheritance which for itself and without that first principle is indeed no principle of development, but the contrary.

The causes from which the single individuals vary in such or such a way, would then be the outer conditions of life and adaptation to them: _i.e._, something coming from without. And the causes from which one individual, varying in such or such a way, is preserved in the struggle for existence, and another, varying differently, perishes, would be approaching the individuals also from without; hence they are a larger or smaller useful variation for the existence of the individual.

Now if, through these influencing causes of development, approaching the most simple organisms from without, a rising line of higher and higher organized beings comes finally into existence (a line in which sensation and consciousness, finally self-consciousness and free-will, appear) we again reach the teleological dilemma: all this has either happened by chance, or it has not. No man who claims to treat this question earnestly and in a manner worthy of respect, will a.s.sert that it happened by chance, but by necessity. But with this word the materialist only hides or avoids the necessity of supposing a plan and end in place of chance, as we have convinced ourselves in Part I, Book II, Chap. II, -- 1. {272} The only exception in this case is, that the bearer and agent of this plan would not be the single organism (as is easily possible when we accept a descent theory which is more independent from the selection theory), but the collection of all forces and conditions, acting upon the organism from without. And for the question, whence this plan and its realization comes, we had again but the one answer: from a highest intelligence and omnipotence, from the personal G.o.d of theism. The _locus_ of creation and the _locus_ of providence would now, as ever, retain their value in the theological system, with the sole exception that most of that which so far belonged to the _locus_ of creation would now belong, in a higher degree than in the hitherto naturo-historical view, to the _locus_ of providence and of the government of the world. When looked upon from the theocentric point of view, the new forms which we had to suppose as called into existence only by selection, would remain products of divine creation: the "G.o.d said, and it was so," would retain its undiminished importance; but looked upon from the cosmic point of view, they would present themselves as products of the divine providence and government of the world, still more exclusively than in every princ.i.p.al of explanation which finds the causes of development in the organisms themselves or in an immaterial cause acting upon the organisms from within. The first as well as the second point of view is in full harmony with the religious view of things.

We do not conceal that on the ground of all other a.n.a.logies we sympathize more with those who look for the determining influences of the origin of new species rather within than without nature, and who, while {273} looking at that which the higher species have in common with the lower, do not forget or neglect the new, the original, which they possess. But we are indeed neither obliged nor ent.i.tled, in the name of religion, to take beforehand in the realm of scientific investigation the side of the one or the other direction of investigation, or even of the one or the other result of investigation, before it is arrived at. Let us unreservedly allow scientists free investigation in their realm, so long as they do not meddle with ethical or religious principles, and quietly await their results.

These results, when once reached, may correspond ever so closely with our present view and our speculative expectations, or in both relations be ever so surprising and new; the one case as well as the other has already happened: at any rate they will not affect our religious principles, but only enrich our perception of the way and manner of divine activity in the world, and thereby give new food and refreshment, to our religious life.

A. THE DARWINISTIC PHILOSOPHEMES IN THEIR POSITION REGARDING THEISM.

-- 5. _The Naturo-Philosophic Supplements of Darwinism and Theism._

We still have to discuss the position of theism in reference to the _philosophic_ problems to which a Darwinistic view of nature sees itself led, and in the first place its position in reference to the naturo-philosophic theories with which the descent idea tries to complete itself.

In the first part of our book, we have found that not {274} a single one of the naturo-philosophic problems before which the descent idea places us, is really solved: neither the origin of self-consciousness and of moral self-determination, nor the origin of consciousness and of sensation, nor the origin of life; and even the theory of atoms, although it is quite important and indispensable for the natural philosopher and chemist according to the present state of his knowledge and investigation, has not yet been able to divest itself of its hypothetical character. Religion might, therefore, refuse to define its position in reference to theories which are still of a quite problematic and hypothetical nature. But by giving such a refusal, religion would not act in its own interest. The reproach is often made that it has an open or hidden aversion to the freedom of scientific investigation--a reproach which, it is true, is often enough provoked by its own advocates; often the a.s.sertion is made by advocates of free investigation, that free science has led, or can lead at any moment, to results which shake or even destroy theism and with it the objective and scientifically established truth of a religious view of the world. The consequence of this a.s.sertion is exactly, as before-mentioned, that minds whose religious possession is to them an inviolable sanctuary, and who lack time and occasion, inclination and ability, to examine scientifically these a.s.serted results of science, really suspect free science and contest the right of its existence. Another consequence of this state of war between religion and science is the fact that so many minds in both camps fall into a servile dependence upon battle-cries: they confound freedom of investigation with license; science with apathy or {275} hostility to faith; faith with lack of scientific perception, blind unreasoning belief, etc. Such a state of affairs does not, indeed, serve the interests of peace and truth; only a correct treatment of philosophy as well as of religion can lead to them.

Such a way of peace and truth from the side of religion and its scientific treatment is entered upon, when religion sets itself right, not only with all real, but also with all _conceivable_, _possible_ results of the other sciences, not only of the exact, but also of the philosophic sciences. If it finds, in such an investigation, that such conceivable results are reconcilable with the theistic view of the world which is the basis of religion, it has already shown its relations.h.i.+p to the freedom of investigation. But if it finds anywhere a possible result which is in conflict with its theistic view of the world, it is obliged to examine the mutual grounds of dissent, as to the degree of their truth and their power of demonstration; and in case its own position is the stronger, better founded, and more convincing, to prove this fact. If it does this, it again acts according to the principle of free investigation--with the single difference that in such a case it not only makes this allowance to the opponent, but also uses this principle for itself in its own realm and especially in the border land between itself and its opponent; but at the same time it shows in this case (what, indeed, so many are inclined to deny), that religion also has its science, and that theology itself is this science, and has the same rights as the sciences which are built up in the realm of material things or of abstract reasoning.

We therefore a.s.sume hypothetically, that the origin {276} of self-consciousness and of moral self-determination is fully explained by consciousness; the origin of consciousness and sensation by that which has no sensation; the origin of the living and organic by the lifeless and inorganic; and that atomism also is scientifically established and proven: how, then, would such a theory of the world and theism stand in respect to each other? By this a.s.sumption, we think we should simply stand again at the point, the basis of which we had to discuss in Part I, Book II, Chap.

II, -- 1, when treating of teleology. We should always see something new, something harmoniously arranged: a process of objects of value, continually rising higher and higher, coming forth out of one another in direct causal connection; and should have a choice of one of two ways of explaining this process. We should either have to be satisfied with this final causal connection, and perceive in this process itself its highest and last cause, in doing which we should be obliged again to deny order and plan in this process, to reject the category of lower and higher and the acknowledgment of a striving towards an end in these developments, and after having climbed to that Faust-height of investigation and knowledge, to throw ourselves in spiritual suicide back into the night and barbarism of chaos, or of a rigid mechanism to which all development, all life, all spiritual and ethical tasks, are but appearance; or we should have to treat the idea of development seriously and recognize a plan and a striving towards an end in this world-process, and should then find ourselves referred to a higher intelligence and a creative will as the highest and last cause which appoints the end and conditions of this process. This would be the case still more, as we actually {277} see that at present the single beings which stand on a lower stage of existence no longer produce beings of a higher stage, although, according to that theory whose correctness we now a.s.sume hypothetically, the elements and factors for the production of those higher forms of existence are fully present in the lower ones. Inorganic matter no longer produces organisms; the lower species of plants or animals no longer develop higher ones; the animal no longer becomes man; and yet there were periods, lying widely apart, in which, according to that theory, such things took place. What else set free those active causes, at the right time and in the right place? What else closed again at the precise place and moment the valves of the proceeding development, and brought to rest again the inciting force of the rising development?--what else but the highest end-appointing intelligence and omnipotence?

Even the inherent qualities of the elements, and the products of all the higher forms of existence which in the future shall arise out of them, the whole striving toward an end of the processes in the world, would present itself to us much more vividly than now, where we are still in the dark as to all these questions. We should see in _atoms_ the _real_ inherent qualities of all things and processes which are to be developed out of them; in the inorganic the _real_ inherent qualities for the organic and living; in that which has no consciousness and sensation the _real_ inherent qualities for self-consciousness. Instead of being now obliged to recur to the ideal and metaphysical, we should see the threads of the world's plan uncovered before us in empirical reality; and far from bearing with it an impoverishment of our {278} consciousness of G.o.d, all this would bring us only an immense enrichment of its contents; for with such an enlargement of our knowledge, we should only be permitted to take glances into the way and manner of divine creation and action--glances of a depth which at present we are far from being permitted to take.

Even very concrete parts of a theistic view of the world, as they present themselves to us--_e.g._, in the Holy Scripture, from its most developed points of view--would now find only richer ill.u.s.trations than heretofore.

St. Paul, for instance, in Rom. viii, speaks of the earnest expectation of the creature that waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of G.o.d. As to the present state of our knowledge of nature, those who adopt this view are only ent.i.tled to see in the sensation of pain of the _animal world_ a sensation of this longing, unconscious of the end; but as to all soulless and lifeless beings and elements in the world, they can see in these words of a sighing and longing creation only a strong figurative expression used because of its suitableness to denote suffering of the animal world, as well as of men,--for the destination of the world to another and higher existence in which the law of perishableness and suffering no longer governs. On the other hand, if, as we a.s.sume hypothetically, all higher forms of existence in the world could be explained out of the preceding lower ones, and if the before-mentioned theorem of a sensation of atoms should form a needed and correct link in that chain of explanation, those words of sighing and longing would have to be literally taken in a still more comprehensive sense than now and in their directly literal meaning {279} would refer not only to the animal world but indeed to everything in the world.

Therefore, so long as attempts at explaining the different forms of existence in the world wholly from one another keep within their own limits, and do not of themselves undermine theism; and so long as there are men who on the one hand favor such a mode of explanation and on the other hand still adhere firmly to a faith in G.o.d, whether it be the deeper theism or the more shallow and superficial deism--so long religion has no reason for opposing those attempts at explanation. And there are such men; we need only to mention Huxley, whose position in reference to religion we have already discussed; or Oskar Peschel, who, in his "Volkerkunde"

("Ethnology"), says: "It is not quite clear how pious minds can be disturbed by this theory; for creation obtains more dignity and importance if it has in itself the power of renewal and development of the perfect."

Even Herbert Spencer, with his idea of the imperceptibility of the super-personal, of the final cause of all things, is still a living proof of the fact that man can trace the mechanism of causality back to its last consequences and, as Spencer does, even derive consciousness and sensation from that which is without sensation, and yet not necessarily proceed so far as _negation_ of a living G.o.d, even if he persists in his refusal to perceive in general the ultimate cause of things.

To meet those attempts, religion would have to take only two precautionary measures on two closely related points; and in doing this it would indeed make use of that before-mentioned right to defend freedom of {280} investigation both in its own realm and in the border-territory.

One precaution would consist in the requirement of the acknowledgment that even in that purely immanent mode of explanation the _idea of value is fixed_, but that the value of the new appears only when the new itself really comes into existence; that we therefore do not call, _e.g._, the inorganic _living_, because according to that mode of explanation life develops itself out of it; and that we do not ascribe to the animal the value of man, because according to that mode of explanation it also includes the causes of the development of man. Such a discrimination of ideas is indeed a _scientific postulate_, as we have had occasion to show at many points of our investigation; and we also complied with this requirement long ago in that realm of knowledge which is related to these questions as to the origin of things, but is more accessible and open to us, namely, in the realm of the development of the individual. We have spoken of this at length in -- 3. But in the interest of _religion_ also we have to request that the _differences of value_ of things be retained, even when man thinks he is able to explain their origin merely out of one another. For without this, all things would finally merge simply into existences of like value; man would stand in no other relation to G.o.d than would any other creature, irrational or lifeless; and the quintessence of religious life--the relation of mutual personal love between G.o.d and man, the certainty of being a child of G.o.d--would be illusory when there should no longer be a difference of value between man and animal, animal and plant, plant and stone. {281}

Many a reader thinks, perhaps, that with this precaution we make a restriction which is wholly a matter of course, and that n.o.body would think of denying these differences of value. Hackel, in his "Anthropogeny,"

repeatedly reproaches man with the "arrogant anthropocentric imagination"

which leads him to look upon himself as the aim of earthly life and the centre of earthly nature; this, he says, is nothing but vanity and haughtiness. Several writers in the "Ausland" faithfully second him in this debas.e.m.e.nt of the value of man. Its editor ("Ausland," 1874, No. 48, p.

957), for instance, reproaches Ludwig Noire, although he otherwise sympathizes with him, that in his book "Die Welt als Entwicklung des Geistes" ("The World as Development of Mind"), Leipzig, Veit & Co., 1874, he still takes this anthropocentric standpoint and can say: "The anthropocentric view recognizes in man's mind the highest bloom of matter, which has attained to the possession of a soul." This, Hackel says, is nothing else but the former conception, not yet overcome, that man is the crown of creation. This pleasure in debasing the value of man is also a characteristic sign of the times. K. E. von Baer is right, when, in his "Studies" (page 463), he says: "In our days, men like to ridicule as arrogant the looking upon man as the end of the history of earth. But it is certainly not man's merit that he has the most highly developed organic form. He also must not overlook the fact that with this his task of developing more and more his spiritual gifts has only begun.... Is it not more worthy of man to think highly of himself and his destination, than, fixing his attention only upon the low, to {282} acknowledge only the animalic basis in himself? I am sorry to say that the new doctrine is very much tainted in this direction of striving after the low. I should rather prefer to be haughty than base, and I well recollect the expression of Kant, 'Man cannot think highly enough of man.' By this expression the profound thinker especially meant that mankind has to set itself great tasks. But the modern views are more a palliation of all animal emotions in man."

The other precautionary measure referred to would be, that the _realm of mind_, and especially the _ethical realm_, is not dissolved into a _natural mechanism_. This precaution is also connected with the first one, the latter being its condition; for only where it is acknowledged that causes, so long as they are still latent, do not fall under the same category of value as their effects, when these are once realized, it can also be acknowledged that the realm of mind and morality, although it has grown out of the ground of the mechanism of nature, can still have brought something new and higher into the world. Besides, this precaution is also a postulate of anthropologic science. For spiritual and ethical facts have at least the same truth and reality as the material, and a still higher value, and can therefore not permit any injury to their full recognition. But religion also must require this acknowledgment. For if the specific _activity_ of mind in man is endangered, we also lose his specific _value_, and thus get into the before-mentioned dilemma; and if the moral responsibility of man is endangered, the relation of man to G.o.d loses its ethical character. Of the consequences in reference to morality, we shall have to speak hereafter. {283}

Moreover, religion does not require this acknowledgment without a rich compensation. For if that naturo-philosophic mode of explanation, whose correctness we hypothetically a.s.sume in this present section, prove to be right, and if the higher which comes anew into existence in the world, is to have the full cause of its origin in the preceding lower, such an admission, in accordance with the laws of logic, by which _causa aequat effectum_, is only possible when we either similarly, as above, invalidate all difference between higher and lower, all difference of value of creatures, and contest the possibility that that which appears anew can also follow new laws of existence and activity; or when, in the highest cause of all final causes in the world, we see the full abundance of all those possibilities present as real cause, which afterwards appear in succession in the world. This highest cause, then, lodges in material things the final causes of all which is to come, as still latent causes, waiting to be set free; and such a highest cause as the fullness of all that which is successively to be developed in the world, is offered to science by religion itself in the idea of a living G.o.d. We say expressly, that religion offers this idea to science, and not that science creates this idea; for the acknowledgment of G.o.d, as we have before had occasion to point out, is in the last instance not a result of science, but an ethical action of mind,--although from this acknowledgment the brightest light falls upon science and the whole series of its conclusions, and although science owes to precisely this idea of G.o.d the highest points of view to which it sees itself led and from which alone it is able to survey its entire realm. {284}

-- 6. _Elimination of the Idea of Design or its Acknowledgment and Theism._

In the whole preceding course of our investigation as to the position of religion and theism regarding the different scientific and naturo-philosophic theories, theism could quietly keep the position of a friendly and peaceful spectator. The degrees of our sympathy with the theories which have successively pa.s.sed before our eyes, were on scientific grounds very unequal; but on religious grounds, and in the interest of a theistic view of the world, we found ourselves nowhere induced to take sides for or against a theory. But the position of religion and theism becomes quite different in reference to the a.s.sertion that the existence of ends and designs in nature is refuted by the evolution theory or by any other hypothetical or real results of science. With this a.s.sertion, the existence of a living and personal G.o.d, of a Creator and Lord of the world, is denied; and every religion which claims objective truth for its basis is eliminated. It is true, man can under this supposition still speak of a religion in the sense of subjective religiousness; but the life-nerve is also cut off from this subjective religiousness. We have repeatedly had occasion to prove this in our historical review, and also in the section in which we pointed out the plan of our own a.n.a.lysis.

But still, where we have had to represent this anti-teleological view of the world, we have happily convinced ourselves of the fact that an existence of ends and designs in nature is not only _reconcilable_ with the conformity to law and the causal mechanism of its processes, but is {285} also _postulated_ by scientific contemplation of nature, as soon as the latter observes that in these processes, acting with lawful necessity, something in general is attained, and, moreover, when out of them comes forth something so infinitely rich and beautifully arranged, such a rising series of higher and higher developments, as the world. On the other hand, combatting the striving towards an end in nature leads to such scientific monstrosities, destroys so thoroughly the idea of G.o.d and also all ideas of value in the world, even all spiritual and ethical acquisitions of mankind, that we can explain the origin of such a doctrine only by the determined purpose of getting rid, at any cost, of the dependence on a living G.o.d: again a proof of the fact that faith, or want of faith, in its final causes, is not the product of reflecting intelligence, but an ethical action of that centre of human personality from which the spiritual process of life in the individual comes forth--an ethical action of mind.

Herewith the position of theism in reference to the elimination of the idea of design is also soon characterized: it is _the position of irreconcilable antagonism_. In rejecting the position of its opponent, theism perceives that it is in harmony not only with every correctly understood religious need, but equally so with every scientific interest--with the interest of a correct knowledge of nature, as well as with the interest of those sciences which have to take care of and try to understand the spiritual and ethical endowments of mankind.

If we now turn our attention to the _position of theism in reference to the idea of design in general_, theism on its part also gives an equally firm support to that intimate connection, proven by natural science, between causality {286} and striving toward an end--between actiology and teleology, as they are called in the language of the philosophical school.

While a contemplation of nature perceives in nature a mechanism governed by laws and necessities, it finds results reached through this chain of causality in which it must acknowledge ends toward which the preceding has striven. Now, theism, on its part, proceeds from the highest end-appointing cause of things and processes, and finds that the reaching of these ends postulates a mechanism of natural conformity to law. In order to prove this, we certainly must take a course which is prohibited by many as anthropomorphism, _i.e._, we must try to study the connection of ends and designs, and the possibility of such a connection where we are able to observe in general not only the _accomplishment_ of purposes, but also the _forming_ of purposes; and the only realm of this kind which we know of, is the realm of human action. He who, merely through fear of anthropomorphism, shrinks from this only possible comparison, may consider that for those who a.s.sume a highest end-appointing cause (and we, too, proceed from this standpoint) man also, who forms his designs and strives toward his ends, is a product of that highest end-appointing cause; and that, therefore, in the human striving toward an end, a certain a.n.a.logue of the divine striving toward an end must occur. We are, indeed, not obliged on this account to identify the two, and to close our eyes against the immense differences which exist between them, and which, wholly of themselves, intrude upon our observation. What we mean by that a.n.a.logy may thus be stated.

Man forms for himself designs and ends, and pursues {287} and reaches them by using the objects and forces of nature as means. He can do this only because the forces in nature act from necessity, strictly conformable to law. Because, and so far as man knows the action of forces, conformable to law, and the inviolable necessity of the connection between certain causes and their effects, he can select and make use of such causes as means, by virtue of which he reaches those effects as designs intended by him. If he could not depend on this conformity to law, on this causal connection taking place according to simple necessities, he could not select, make, and use, with certainty, any tool, from the club with which he defends himself against his enemies or cracks the sh.e.l.ls of fruit, up to the finest instruments of optics and chemistry, and even to the telegraph and steam engine. The conformity to law, with which the forces of nature act, far from being an impediment to his appointing and reaching his ends is much more the indispensable means by which he is enabled in general to reach them. Now, if we thus find, in the only action striving towards an end which we are able to observe to the extent of the appointing of ends and the selection of means--namely, man's end appointing action--such a strong dependence of finality on causality that the reaching of ends is not possible at all unless the means act of necessity conformably to law, then we are certainly obliged to draw the conclusion that the highest author of things has prepared the world so, that the reaching of ends requires the action of means, and that the category of finality and the category of causality are mutually prepared for each other. For, according to the theistic and teleological view of the world, the {288} laws of nature, acting with causality and necessity, are certainly not laws which the Creator found in some way, and with which he had to calculate as with factors given to him from somewhere else, in order to make use of them, so far as he was permitted, for the accomplishment of his designs--this would be the way and manner of _human_ teleological action, and transferring it to _divine_ action would be an anthropomorphism which we should have to reject. On the contrary, these laws themselves are the work of the teleologically acting Creator--he, indeed, will have given to them such a quality that with them he is able to reach his ends as a whole and in detail. The inviolability of the laws of nature also results from this idea. For means which would have to be supplemented, sometimes set aside, occasionally replaced by others, would be less perfect than such means as by virtue of their quality are able with certainty to serve the designs which are to be reached by them. How theism can reconcile with this view the indispensable idea of divine freedom, we shall have occasion to show in Chap. II, -- 4.

Among the writers who defend teleology, we can mention two who, starting from the a.n.a.logy of human teleological action, have pointed out the idea that teleology itself requires a necessity, conformable to law, in the activity of the forces of nature. One of the two is K. E. von Baer, in his oft-quoted essays on striving towards end; and the other is the Duke of Argyll. At a time when the a.s.sault against teleology had just begun, this n.o.ble author perceived the whole importance and weight of these attacks, and most energetically defended teleology. The expression of the just-mentioned ideas, {289} among others, forms one of the fundamentals of his work, "The Reign of Law" (London, Strahan & Co., first edition published in 1866, and since then in frequently repeated editions); a work which is well fitted to instruct us, in the most interesting manner, regarding the present state of the related questions as they are treated of in Great Britain.

* * * * * {290}

CHAPTER II.

THE DARWINIAN THEORIES AND POSITIVE CHRISTIANITY.

-- 1. _The Creation of the World._

Now that we have come to a clear understanding of the position of the Darwinian theories in reference to the basis of all religion and of all living religiousness, to theism in general, it remains to be seen what position those of the theories which are reconcilable with theism take in reference to the positive Christian view of the world.

We naturally omit all those objects and parts of Christian dogmatics which have no points of contact, or are very indirectly connected with the Darwinian ideas, or which--as, _e.g._, their position in reference to the idea of G.o.d in general--have found their princ.i.p.al ill.u.s.tration in our investigation just finished. We shall nevertheless have now to take into consideration once more, although from another side, some objects which we have discussed in treating of the relation of the Darwinian ideas to theism, on account of the specific part which theism has in Christianity.

This is especially the case with those Christian facts which belong to the first article of the Apostolic Creed, and immediately also with the doctrine of the creation of the world. {291}

At first sight it seems that the evolution theory and Christianity are in no other place more sharply opposed to each other than in that of the history of creation. Darwinism claims for its theory immense periods of time; and geology seems to furnish them according to its demand. The Holy Scripture, on the other hand, teaches a creation of the world in six days.

With the attempt to find the right way to end this conflict, we enter upon that part of the border-land between theology and natural science, which, among all others, is most contested, and which has offered to the most luxuriant fancy the widest field of action and the one most profitably taken advantage of.