Page:The World's Most Famous Court Trial - 1925.djvu/332

328 mind in some degree analagousanalogous [sic] to man" was strong in his mind. It was after that time that "very gradually, with many fluctuations," his belief in God became weaker. He traces this decline for us and concludes by telling us that he cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems—the religious problems above referred to. Then comes the flat statement that he "must be content to remain an agnostic"; and to make clear what he means by the word, agnostic, he says that "the mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble by us"—not by him alone, but by everybody. Here we have the effect of evolution upon its most distinguished exponent; it led him from an orthodox Christian, believing every word of the Bible and in a personal God, down and down and down to helpless and hopeless agnosticism.

But there is one sentence upon which I reserved comment—it throws light upon his downward pathway. "Then arises the doubt, can the mind of man which has, as I fully believe, been developed from a mind as low as that possessed by the lowest animals, be trusted when it draws such grand conclusions?"

Here is the explanation: he drags man down to the brute level, and then, judging man by brute standards, he questions whether man's mind can be trusted to deal with God and immortality?

How can any teacher tell his students that evolution does not tend to destroy his religious faith? How can an honest teacher conceal from his students the effect of evolution upon Darwin himself? And is it not stranger still that preachers who advocate evolution never speak of Darwin's loss of faith, due to his belief in evolution? The parents of Tennessee have reason enough to fear the effect of evolution on the minds of their children. Belief in evolution cannot bring to those who hold such a belief any compensation for the loss of faith in God, trust in the Bible, and belief in the supernatural character of Christ. It is belief in evolution that has caused so many scientists and so many Christians to reject the miracles of the Bible, and then give up, one after another, every vital truth of Christianity. They finally cease to pray and sunder the tie that binds them to their Heavenly Father.

The miracle should not be a stumbling block to any one. It raises but three questions: First, could God perform a miracle? Yes, the God who created the universe can do anything He wants to with it. He can temporarily suspend any law that He has made or He may employ higher laws that we do not understand.

Second—Would God perform a miracle? To answer that question in the negative one would have to know more about God's plans and purposes than a finite mind can know, and yet some are so wedded to evolution that they deny that God would perform a miracle merely because a miracle is inconsistent with evolution.

If we believe that God can perform a miracle and might desire to do so, we are prepared to consider with open mind the third question, namely, Did God perform the miracles recorded in the Bible? The same evidence that establishes the authority of the Bible establishes the truth of the record of miracles performed.

Now, let me read to the honorable court and to you, gentlemen of the jury, one of the most pathetic confessions that has come to my notice. George John Romanes, a distinguished biologist, sometimes called the successor of Darwin, was prominent enough to be given extended space in both the Encyclopedia Britannica and Encyclopedia Americana. Like Darwin, he was reared in the orthodox faith, and like Darwin, was led away from it by evolution (see "Thoughts on Religion," page 180.) For twenty-five years he could not pray. Soon after he became an agnostic, he wrote a book entitled, "A Candid Examination of