

E-text prepared by Donald Cummings, Adrian Mastronardi, Les Galloway, and
the Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) from page
images generously made available by Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries
(https://archive.org/details/toronto)



Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
      file which includes the original illustration.
      See 50086-h.htm or 50086-h.zip:
      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/50086/50086-h/50086-h.htm)
      or
      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/50086/50086-h.zip)


      Images of the original pages are available through
      Internet Archive/Canadian Libraries. See
      https://archive.org/details/creationorevolut00curtuoft


Transcriber's note:

      Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).

      Text enclosed by equal signs is in bold face (=bold=).





CREATION OR EVOLUTION?

A Philosophical Inquiry.

by

GEORGE TICKNOR CURTIS.







New York:
D. Appleton and Company,
1, 3, And 5 Bond Street.
1887.

Copyright, 1887.
by George Ticknor Curtis.



    TO
    LEWIS A. SAYRE, M. D.,
    WHOSE PROFESSIONAL EMINENCE IS RECOGNIZED
    IN BOTH HEMISPHERES,
    WHOSE SKILL AS A SURGEON
    SUFFERING HUMANITY GRATEFULLY ACKNOWLEDGES,
    TO WHOSE ANATOMICAL LEARNING
    THE AUTHOR IS LARGELY INDEBTED,
    AND OF WHOSE FRIENDSHIP HE IS PROUD,
    This Book
    IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED.


    "_Dost thou not know, my new astronomer!
    Earth, turning from the sun, brings night to man?
    Man, turning from his God, brings endless night;
    Where thou canst read no morals, find no friend,
    Amend no manners, and expect no peace._"

    _YOUNG'S NIGHT THOUGHTS._




PREFACE.


Perhaps it is expected of a writer who steps out of the sphere of his
ordinary pursuits, and deals with such a subject as that which is
treated in this work, that he will account for his so doing. It is not
necessary for me to say that no class of men can have a monopoly in any
subject. But I am quite willing to take my readers into my confidence
so far as to state how I came to write this book.

Most men, who have a special pursuit, find the necessity for recreation
of some kind. Some take it in one way, and some in another. It has been
my habit through life to seek occasional relief from the monotony of
professional vocations in intellectual pursuits of another character.
Having this habit--which I have found by experience has no tendency
to lessen one's capacity for the duties of a profession, or one's
relish of its occupations--I some years ago took up the study of the
modern doctrine of animal evolution. Until after the death of the late
Mr. Charles Darwin, I had not given a very close attention to this
subject. The honors paid to his memory, and due to his indefatigable
research and extensive knowledge, led me to examine his "Descent of
Man" and his "Origin of Species," both of which I studied with care,
and I trust with candor. I was next induced to examine the writings
of Mr. Herbert Spencer on the subject of evolution, with which I had
also been previously unacquainted except in a general way. I was a
good deal surprised at the extent of Mr. Spencer's reputation as a
thinker, and by the currency which his peculiar philosophy has had in
this country, where it has led, among the young and inexperienced, as
well as among older persons, to very incorrect habits of reasoning on
subjects of the highest importance. The result of my studies of these
writers is the present book. I have written it because I have seen,
or believe that I have seen, where the conflict arises between some
of the deductions of modern science and the principles which ought to
regulate not only religious belief, but belief in anything that is
not open to the direct observation of our senses. But I trust that I
shall not be understood as having written for the purpose of specially
defending the foundations of religious belief. This is no official
duty of mine. How theologians manage, or ought to manage, the argument
which is to convince men of the existence and methods of God, it is
not for me to say. But a careful examination of the new philosophy
has convinced me that those who are the special teachers of religious
truth have need of great caution in the admissions or concessions which
they make, when they undertake to reconcile some of the conclusions
of modern scientists with belief in a Creator. I do not here speak of
the Biblical account of the creation, but I speak of that belief in
a Creator which is to be deduced from the phenomena of nature. While
there are naturalists, scientists, and philosophers at the present
day, whose speculations do not exclude the idea of a Supreme Being,
there are others whose theories are entirely inconsistent with a belief
in a personal God, the Creator and Governor of the universe. Moreover,
although there are great differences in this respect between the
different persons who accept evolution in some form, the whole doctrine
of the development of distinct species out of other species makes
demands upon our credulity which are irreconcilable with the principles
of belief by which we regulate, or ought to regulate, our acceptance
of any new matter of belief. The principles of belief which we apply
in the ordinary affairs of life are those which should be applied to
scientific or philosophical theories; and inasmuch as the judicial
method of reasoning upon facts is at once the most satisfactory and the
most in accordance with common sense, I have here undertaken to apply
it to the evidence which is supposed to establish the hypothesis of
animal evolution, in contrast with the hypothesis of special creations.

I am no ecclesiastic. I advance no arguments in favor of one or another
interpretation of the Scriptures about which there is controversy among
Christians. While I firmly believe that God exists, and that he has
made a revelation to mankind, whereby he has given us direct assurance
of immortality, I do not know that this belief disqualifies me from
judging, upon proper principles of evidence, of the soundness of a
theory which denies that he specially created either the body or the
mind of man. How far the hypothesis of evolution, by destroying our
belief that God specially created us, tends to negative any purpose
for which we can suppose him to have made to us a revelation of our
immortality, it is for the theologian to consider. For myself, I am
not conscious that in examining the theory of evolution I have been
influenced by my belief in what is called revealed religion. I have,
at all events, studiously excluded from the argument all that has been
inculcated by the Hebrew or the Christian records as authorized or
inspired teachings, and have treated the Mosaic account of the creation
like any other hypothesis of the origin of man and the other animals.
The result of my study of the hypothesis of evolution is, that it is an
ingenious but delusive mode of accounting for the existence of either
the body or the mind of man; and that it employs a kind of reasoning
which no person of sound judgment would apply to anything that might
affect his welfare, his happiness, his estate, or his conduct in the
practical affairs of life.

He who would truly know what the doctrine of evolution is, and to
what it leads, must literally begin at the beginning. He must free
his mind from the cant of agnosticism and from the cant of belief. He
must refuse to accept dogmas on the authority of any one, be they the
dogmas of the scientist, or of the theologian. He must learn that his
mental nature is placed under certain laws, as surely as his corporeal
structure; and he must cheerfully obey the necessities which compel him
to accept some conclusions and to reject others. Keeping his reasoning
powers in a well-balanced condition, he must prove all things, holding
fast to that which is in conformity with sound deduction, and to that
alone. But all persons may not be able to afford the time to pursue
truth in this way, or may not have the facilities for the requisite
research. It seemed to me, therefore, that an effort to do for them
what they can not do for themselves would be acceptable to a great many
people.

It may be objected that the imaginary philosopher whom I have
introduced in some of my chapters under the name of Sophereus, or the
searcher after wisdom, debating the doctrines of evolution with a
supposed disciple of that school, whom I have named Kosmicos, is an
impossible person. It may perhaps be said that the conception of a man
absolutely free from all dogmatic religious teaching, from all bias to
any kind of belief, and yet having as much knowledge of various systems
of belief as I have imputed to this imaginary person, would in modern
society be the conception of an unattainable character. My answer to
this criticism would be that I felt myself at liberty to imagine any
kind of character that would suit my purpose. How successfully I have
carried out the idea of a man in mature life entirely free from all
preconceived opinions, and forming his beliefs upon principles of
pure reason, it is for my readers to judge. With regard