The Relation of Science and Religion.pdf - Online Christian Library

276 SCIENCE AND RELIGION.involve only change of distribution and relation.Both matter and energy are, however,perpetually undergoing change or transformation,and whether the change be for the betteror for the worse in the history of theuniverse as a whole, the fact of unceasingchange in subordination to fixed law, is clearevidence that matter and energy are not eternalor self-subsisting, but are dependent onsome transcendent existence imposing thelaws determining their relations.Second, as to organized existence, recentresearches go to prove that there is in all animalsa measure of adaptability to surroundingconditions of life, providing for " adaptivechanges" i11 the organism, which becomefixed, and are transmitted to succeeding generationsof the same order under the law ofheredity. On warrant of the evidence forthis, it is to be taken as certain that thevarious orders of animals now familiar to usdid not at first come into being with all thecharacteristics now pertaining to them. Thelaw of their life has provided for a progressionin development, in accordance with which wehave distinct orders of the pigeon, the dog,and the horse, with variations in animals of