ust do so on the basis of belief in
their probability; it is no longer permissible to claim for them the
warrant of divine origin.

Modern science stringently demands facts in support of any assertion,
the word "faith" having no place in its lexicon. Facts are absolutely
and necessarily wanting in support of the creation doctrine, and the
only argument its advocates can advance is one that deals in negatives,
and demands its acceptance on the ground that the opposite doctrine has
not been proved. Such an argument is valueless. Disproof of one
statement is never proof of another. Its effect is simply to leave both
unproved, and neither, therefore, in condition for acceptance. In the
present case the weight of disproof is small. The facts in support of
the evolution hypothesis are multitudinous, and many of them of great
cogency; the facts against it are few, and none of them absolute. It is
simply argued that some questions remain unsolved, and that there are
facts which seem inconsistent with the Darwinian theory of development,
and which no supplementary hypotheses have explained. But no advocates
of evolution hold that the Darwinian theory is final. Evolution is a
growing doctrine. It has been expanding ever since it was first
promulgated. Various seeming difficulties have been explained away, and
it is quite possible that all may disappear as investigation widens. No
such arguments add any weight to the opposite view, which has not and
never could have any standing in science, since it is impossible to
adduce any facts to sustain it. We shall therefore dismiss it from
further consideration, and proceed to state certain general facts in
favor of the evolutionary hypothesis of the origin of man.

II

VESTIGES OF MAN'S ANCESTRY

When, some centuries ago, men began to find fossil remains of animals in
the rocks, a severe shock was given to the prevailing doctrine of the
recent creation of the earth. The adherents of the old theology made
strenuous efforts to explain away this unwelcome circumstance. The
shells found had been dropped by pilgrims on their way to Jerusalem;
they were mineral simulations of shells; they had been created by the
Deity and placed where found; they were anything but what they appeared
to be, the existing evidences of a long ancient period of animal life
reaching back very far beyond the assumed date of creation.

It need scarcely be said that these explanations, especially the one