Page:The church, the schools and evolution.djvu/34

 "exceeding sinful," for it is either inherent in the process of evolution, or, at worst, but an unfortunate slip in the working out of that process, if, indeed, it is not even a mark of budding virtue.

John Fiske says:


 * Theology has much to say about original sin. This original sin is neither more nor less than the brute inheritance that every man carries with him.

Rev. Dwight Bradley, a Cleveland, Ohio, pastor, says:


 * There is no escape for intelligent people today from the acceptance of the law of evolution. * * * It follows that what we call evil [sin] is the remains of a lower form of life. * * * We are in the midst of the slow process of ridding ourselves of our animal inheritance.

And Dr. Shailer Mathews follows the evolutionary philosophy to its logical and necessary end when he says:


 * But for men who think of God as dynamically imminent in an infinite universe, who think of man's relation to Him as determined not by statutory but by cosmic law, who regard sin and righteousness alike as the working out of the fundamental forces of life itself, the conception of God as King and of man as condemned or acquitted subject is but a figure of speech.

Such a doctrine as this absolutely and forever destroys man's responsibility for sin. For if sin is what Dr. Mathews suggests it is,—"the working out of the fundamental forces of life itself,"—then it is inherent