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

EVOLUTION AND CHRISTIANITY.DARWIN AND HIS RELATION TO RELIGION DIS-CUSSED BY DR. IEWTON.TLle Rev. Dr. R. Heber Newton, in All Sonls'Charch, in Forty-eighth street, near Sixth avenue,preached ih the mornin, on Darwinism, from thetext of the first two verses of Genesis. Darwinismis only a special form of a larger theory. One maybe an evolutionist without holding to Mr. Darwin'sview concerning the origin of man. 'Evolution isnot what it was once snpposed to b?, novel andunheard of, but is as old as historic human thought.Augustine knew it. The Roman and Greek philosopherswrote of it. &stern mystics dreamed of it. TheChnrch might have been in less of a hurry to bescared at it if it had looked behind this new theoryand reco,onizod the old conception. While it hasforced upon the churches the giving up of muchthat was once claimed as divine it has invalidatedno essciltinl faith, and in the changes it has broughtabout it has becn working n11consciously in the interestof real religion.THE BIBLE AS IT IS.The doctrine of evo111tion has nndonbtedly placeditself in direct onposition to the traditional readingof the Bible i~nd has forced upon us the qncstionof the true nature of this venerablebook. What then? Have we lost onr dear Bible?We have lost wl?at we thought u7e had and what wenever had-a11 infallible work on science. We havereceived the true Bible, the literature of the peoplewhose mission has been to teacll ni;rnkind spiritnala d ethical relicrion ancl prepare the way for therAslation of t& highest, holicst nanhood-JesusChrist. The firet chapter of Genesis bears on itsfacc its trne chiaractgr. Tt is a prose poem. It isthe dc-wish cosmogony or theory of the beginning.I never knew how ~vonderfnl, how heantifi~l, howprofound, ho.,r- spiritual, this first chapter of Genesiswas till I ceased to regard it superstitiously. Thisconflict, which the theors of cvolntion precipitatedupon the Chamh, has been in tlichands of God. It ha3 becn the menusof fieeing the concect.ion of ths Bible froinits old errors a11d superstitions and of forcing forwarda new aud higher couceptiou of it. And thisis, indeed, an imniorise boon to religion. It is truethat t'volnt~ion llas arrayecl itself against the oldthought of Gon, which we lcarllcd from the Hebrew.It \\rill no longcv allow the conception of God's actionurhich \\-:W in the mind of the pout who putinto its biblical form the noble nqth of eroation.Dr. Ncwton said tlmt the- enlightened Christians ofto-day have snbstitnted for tills the story of thc'! forlllatio~l of the globe and its animal lite as toldby science. The readj~lstmelit of faith as tocreation was not get complete. Our cosceptiorisarc Aryan and thc moulds intozbich we have to run them are Semitic,Ihe nineteenth century aCt.cr Christ a~id thc tenthoertury before Christ are still jlllubled 11p togetheraltboot any satisf:~ctory assimibtion. Forther, letIt bs noted that faith in God has never been an easymatter, though necessary and indispensable tooiind though; end noble life. You cannot, dcmonirateGod. H.: is not found at the end of a syllomism..Vliexr the light of reason and couscienco focus !h tllo~beolnte oonviction of Gocl the form is not so rcbolsedas 10 admit of uo qllestionings. There arehuestions nrlrioh any one eau raise, to which no oneEsn return conclusive answer.