subsequent forms. This is the _natural_ action of God in the physical
world, as distinguished from His direct, or, as it may be here called,
supernatural action.

In yet a third sense, the word "Creation" may be more or less improperly
applied to the construction of any complex formation or state by a
voluntary self-conscious being who makes use of the powers and laws which
God has imposed, as when a man is spoken of as the creator of a museum, or
of "his own fortune," &c. Such action of a created conscious intelligence
is purely natural, but more than physical, and may be conveniently spoken
of as hyperphysical.

We have thus (1) direct or supernatural action; (2) physical action; and
(3) hyperphysical action---the two latter both belonging to the order of
nature.[258] Neither the physical nor the hyperphysical actions, however,
exclude the idea of the Divine concurrence, and with every consistent
theist that idea is necessarily included. Dr. Asa Gray has given expression
to this.[259] He says, "Agreeing that plants and animals were produced by
Omnipotent fiat, does not exclude the idea of natural order and what we
call secondary causes. The record of the fiat--'Let the earth bring forth
grass, the herb yielding seed,' &c., 'let the earth bring forth the living
creature after his kind'--seems even to imply them," and leads to the
conclusion that the various kinds were produced through natural agencies.

{254}
Now, much confusion has arisen from not keeping clearly in view this
distinction between _absolute_ creation and _derivative_ creation. With the
first, physical science has plainly nothing whatever to do, and is impotent
to prove or to refute it. The second is also safe from any attack on the
part of physical science, for it is primarily derived from psychical not
physical phenomena. The greater part of the apparent force possessed by
objectors to creation, like Mr. Darwin, lies in their treating the
assertion of derivative creation as if it was an assertion of absolute
creation, or at least of supernatural action. Thus, he asks whether some of
his opponents believe "that at innumerable periods in the earth's history,
certain elemental atoms have been commanded suddenly to flash into living
tissues."[260] Certain of Mr. Darwin's objections, however, are not
physical, but _metaphysical_, and really attack the dogma of secondary or
derivative cr