NO CAUSE OF EVOLUTION IS KNOWN.
Evolution is not a force. There is no power or cause which is known as Evolution. The word simply describes the order in which things have been supposed to come. We must draw a clear line of distinction between Cause and Order of Appearance. There is a certain order in the succession of living things as they came, but what caused that order is the very question at issue. The Duke of Argyle warns against confusing these when he says, "Evolution puts forward a visible order of phenomena as a complete and all-sufficient account of its own origin and cause." (Theories of Darwin.)
The absence of an agreed cause is admitted by evolutionists. Huxley says, "The great need of Evolution is a theory of derivation." (Man's Place in Nature.) Darwin admits, "Our ignorance of the laws of derivation is profound." (Descent of Man.) "The laws governing inheritance are for the most part unknown." (Origin of Species.) Prof. Conn in Evolution of To-day, says, "No two scientists are agreed as to what is the cause of the supposed changes of species." (p. 337.) Prof. Clodd traces it to the protoplasm which forms the germ and ends his exhaustive treatise by saying the cause is still unknown. (Method of Evolution.)
Darwin's theory was Natural Selection. It is this which is technically called "Darwinism," although some writers apply that name to the general subject of Evolution. Natural selection is the theory that inasmuch as minute variations occur in the struggle of living things for existence, the variations which would prove favorable to the welfare of the animal would be transmitted to its progeny and be increased and so, in many generations, the accumulating effects, aided by climate, food, sexual selection, and other causes, would amount to a new species. Prof. Conn says of this theory, "Natural selection is almost universally acknowledged as insufficient to meet the facts of nature, since many facts of life cannot be explained by it." (p. 243.)
Mr. Huxley said long before: "After much consideration, and with assuredly no bias against Mr. Darwin's views, it is our clear conviction that as the evidence now stands it is not absolutely proved that a group of animals, having all the characteristics exhibited by species in nature, has ever been originated by selection, whether natural or artificial." (Lay Sermons, 295.)
The theories as to what produced the supposed changes are as many as the writers on Evolution. Prof. Conn says, "All agreement disappears. Each thinker has his own views." And adds, "Thus far we have seen no indication of the manner in which this evolution has been manifested." (p. 20.) Prof. J. Arthur Thomson, lecturer on zoology in the School of Medicine, Edinburgh, said: "Unless we can give some theory of the origin of variations we have no material for further consideration. Unfortunately we are very ignorant about the whole matter." The various writers ascribe the changes to food, climate, sexual selection, extraordinary births, isolation and many other supposed causes. All these have been in turn combatted by other evolutionist writers, and the war goes on and has produced libraries of volumes. It is around this that the conflict rages and the war is a merry one.