Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 8.djvu/788

Rh 752 EVOLUTION though the latter term is usually confined to processes of development in the moral as distinguished from the physical world. Further, this idea, as Mr Spencer remarks, has rather a subjective than an objective source, since it points to an increased value in existence as judged by our feelings. At the same time, inasmuch as conscious and more particularly human life is looked on by the evolutionist as the highest phase of all development, and since man s development is said to be an increase in well-being and happiness, we do not greatly err when we speak of evolution as a transition from the lower to the higher, from the worse to the better. An other respect in which the whole process of evolution may be eaid to be a progress is in its relation to our perceptions as aesthetic spectators, the higher phases of the process being the more varied, the fuller, and the more perfect. Apart from these subjective estimates, evolution is first of all as a whole a progress from the lower to the higher, in the sense that it is a substitution of a complex for a simple type of existence ; and it is such a progress, secondly, in the narrow sense of organic development if not in the wider sense of cosmic development, inasmuch as all advance im plies a larger measure of adaptation and so of permanence. Problems solved by Evolution.- The hypothesis of evolu tion aims at answering a number of questions respecting the becoming or genesis of things. Of these the first is the problem of explaining change, that is to say, of accounting for that incessant process of transformation which the world manifests. The form which this question has com monly taken is, &quot;What is motion, and how does it arise? &quot; The second inquiry relates to the factor of intelligible order in the world, to the existence of general classes of things, including minds, of universal laws, and finally to that appearance of a rational end towards which things tend. Thirdly, it is necessary to account for the origin of organic beings which appear to be subordinated to different prin ciples from those which control inorganic bodies. Lastly, we have the apparent mystery of a genesis of conscious minds in dependence on physical bodies. These are the principal inquiries which the various theories of evolution aim more or less completely at answering. As a subordinate question, we may mention the meaning of human history, and its relation to physical processes. Evolution, Creation, and Emanation. In seeking to answer these questions, the hypothesis of an evolution of the cosmos with all that it contains competes, in part at least, with two other principal doctrines respecting the origin of the world. These are the theory of direct creation by a personal Deity and that of emanation. It is clear that the doctrine of evolution is directly anta gonistic to that of creation. Just as the biological doctrine of the transmutation of species is opposed to that of special creations, so the idea of evolution as applied to the forma tion of the world as a whole, is opposed to that of a direct creative volition. It substitutes within the ground which it covers the idea of a natural and necessary process for that of an arbitrary volitional process. The theory of a personal Creator answers the questions enumerated above by referring the form of the world to an act of direct creation. As an extreme doctrine, it views matter as well as form as the product of divine volition ; in a modified form, it conceives the Deity as simply fashioning the uncreated material of the world; and in a still more restricted form, it regards the universal laws or forms which are impressed on things as co-eternal with the Deity. Advancing knowledge has gradually limited the sphere of direct creative activity, by referring the present order of the world to the action of secondary causes. Hence this theory only now competes with the hypothesis of evolution at one or two points, more especially the pro duction of living forms, the origin of the human mind, and the nature of history, which last is conceived as somehow controlled by divine action in the shape of Providence. The question how far the. doctrine of evolution, in its most ex tended and elaborate form, absolutely excludes the idea of creative activity need not be dwelt on here. It is sufficient to say that the theory of evolution, by assuming an intel ligible and adequate principle of change, simply eliminates the notion of creation from those regions of existence to which it is applied. The doctrine of emanation, which had its origin in the East, and was developed by the Neoplatonists, Gnostics, and Cabalists, is a philosophic transformation of the idea of an original creation of the world. It regards the world as a product of the divine nature, and so far it is a theory of creation. On the other hand, it conceives of this pro duction as necessary, and analogous rather to a physical than to a moral action. In this respect it agrees with the doctrine of evolution. It further coincides with this doctrine in the recognition of a scale of existence. It differs from this last inasmuch as it reverses the order of evolution, by making the original stage the most perfect and all later stages a succession of degradations. In one respect, the theory of emanation has a curious relation to that of evolu tion. As we have seen, the process of evolution is from the indeterminate to the determinate. This is often expressed as a progress from the universal to the particular. Thus the primordial matter assumed by the early Greek physicists may be said to be the universal substance out of which particular things arise. The doctrine of emanation again regards the world as a process of particulari/ation. Yet the resemblance here is more apparent than real. The universal is, as Mr Spencer remarks, a subjective idea; and the general forms, existing ante res, which play so pro minent apart in Greek and mediaeval philosophy, do not in the least correspond to the homogeneous matter of the physical evolutionists. The one process is a logical opera tion, the other a physical. The theory of emanation, which had its source in certain moral and religious ideas, aims first of all at explaining the origin of mental or spiritual existence as an effluence from the divine and absolute spirit. In the next place, it seeks to account for the general laws of the world, for the universal forms of existence, as ideas which emanate from the Deity. By some it was developed into a complete philosophy of the world, in which .matter itself is viewed as the lowest emanation from the absolute. In this form it stands in sharp antithesis to the doctrine of evolution, both because the former views the world of particular things and events as essentially unreal and illusory ; and because the latter, so far as it goes, looks on matter as eternal, and seeks to explain the general forms of things as we perceive them by help of simpler assumptions. In certain theories known as doctrines of emanation, only mental existence is referred to the absolute source, while matter is viewed as eternal and distinct from the divine nature. In this form the doctrine of emanation approaches, as we shall see, certain forms of the evolution theory. Forms of Doctrine of Evolution. Let us now see how 7 the doctrine of evolution deals with the problems of becoming as above defined. And here it becomes necessary to dis tinguish between different ways of formulating and inter preting the idea of evolution. The various modes of con ceiving and interpreting the idea of a natural evolution of things depend on the answers given to thrte principal questions respecting the nature and causes of the process. These are : I. How far is the process a real objective one 1 II. What is the nature of that reality which makes the content, so to speak, of the process of evolution ] and III. How is the process effected ? I. First of all, very different views may be taken of the reality of the process of becoming, generation, and transfur-