harmonizing in any degree with such very
modern views,[268] nevertheless such most certainly is the case, and {263}
it would be easy to give numerous examples. It will be better, however,
only to cite one or two authorities of weight. Now, perhaps no writer {264}
of the earlier Christian ages could be quoted whose authority is more
generally recognized than that of St. Augustin. The same may be said of the
mediaeval period, for St. Thomas Aquinas; and, since the movement of Luther,
Suarez may be taken as a writer widely venerated as an authority and one
whose orthodoxy has never been questioned.

It must be borne in mind that for a considerable time after even the last
of these writers no one had disputed the generally received view as to the
small age of the world or at least of the kinds of animals and plants
inhabiting it. It becomes therefore much more striking if views formed
under such a condition of opinion are found to harmonize with modern ideas
regarding "Creation" and organic life.

Now St. Augustin insists in a very remarkable manner on the merely
derivative sense in which God's creation of organic forms is to be
understood; that is, that God created them by conferring on the material
world the power to evolve them under suitable conditions. He says in his
book on Genesis:[269] "Terrestria animalia, tanquam ex ultimo elemento
mundi ultima; nihilominus _potentialiter_, quorum numeros tempus postea
visibiliter explicaret."

Again he says:--

"Sicut autem in ipso grano invisibiliter erant omnia simul, quae per tempora
in arborem surgerent; ita ipse mundus cogitandus est, cum Deus _simul omnia
creavit_, habuisse simul omnia quae in illo et cum illo facta sunt quando
factus est dies; non solum coelum cum sole et luna et sideribus ... ; sed
etiam illa quae aqua et terra produxit potentialiter atque causaliter,
priusquam per temporum moras ita exorirentur, quomodo nobis jam nota sunt
in eis operibus, quae Deus usque nunc operatur."[270]

"Omnium quippe rerum quae corporaliter visibiliterque nascuntur, {265}
occulta quaedam semina in istis corporeis mundi hujus elementis
latent."[271]

And again: "Ista quippe originaliter ac primordialiter in quadam textura
elementorum cuncta jam creata sunt; sed acceptis opportunitatibus
prodeunt."[272]

St. Thomas Aquinas, as was said in the first chapter, quotes with approval
the saying of St. Augustin that in the first institution of nature we do
not look for _Mir