n his manifestations of
reverence, who will talk over the anthropoid ape, the supposed founder of
the family to which we belong, and even go back with you to the
acephalous mollusk, first cousin to the clams and mussels, whose
rudimental spine was the hinted prophecy of humanity; all this time never
dreaming, apparently, that what she takes for a matter of curious
speculation involves the whole future of human progress and destiny.

I can't help thinking that if we had talked as freely as we can and do
now in the days of the first boarder at this table,--I mean the one who
introduced it to the public,--it would have sounded a good deal more
aggressively than it does now.--The old Master got rather warm in
talking; perhaps the consciousness of having a number of listeners had
something to do with it.

--This whole business is an open question,--he said,--and there is no use
in saying, "Hush! don't talk about such things!" People do talk about
'em everywhere; and if they don't talk about 'em they think about 'em,
and that is worse,--if there is anything bad about such questions, that
is. If for the Fall of man, science comes to substitute the RISE of man,
sir, it means the utter disintegration of all the spiritual pessimisms
which have been like a spasm in the heart and a cramp in the intellect of
men for so many centuries. And yet who dares to say that it is not a
perfectly legitimate and proper question to be discussed, without the
slightest regard to the fears or the threats of Pope or prelate?

Sir, I believe,--the Master rose from his chair as he spoke, and said in
a deep and solemn tone, but without any declamatory vehemence,--sir, I
believe that we are at this moment in what will be recognized not many
centuries hence as one of the late watches in the night of the dark ages.
There is a twilight ray, beyond question. We know something of the
universe, a very little, and, strangely enough, we know most of what is
farthest from us. We have weighed the planets and analyzed the flames of
the--sun and stars. We predict their movements as if they were machines
we ourselves had made and regulated. We know a good deal about the earth
on which we live. But the study of man has been so completely subjected
to our preconceived opinions, that we have got to begin all over again.
We have studied anthropology through theology; we have now to begin the
study of theology through anthropology. Until we have exhausted the
h