There has never been witnessed, and it is impossible to imagine the apparition of a creature not derived from another creature: it would therefore be folly to pretend to an explanation of creation. If, as the advocates of transformism suppose, all species sprang from some primitive types, or even from a single primordial cell, the appearance, whether of those types or of that parent cell of the living world, would be neither more explicable nor less marvellous than the appearance of a host of creatures.
And, in like manner, Darwin's great ally and admirer, Sir Charles Lyell, when he had time to realize all the bearings of his friend's theory, wrote to him,[320]—"I think the old 'creation' is almost as much required as ever."[{270}]
XVIII
TO SUM UP
IT is time to return to the point from which we started our whole enquiry, and to ask what has been gathered in the course of it towards a solution of the question with which we began. That the Cosmos in which we dwell, the world of law, order, and life, has not existed for ever, we saw to be a truth enforced by the researches of physical Science, no less than by the clear teaching of reason. It certainly had a beginning, and there must be a cause to which that beginning was due,—a cause capable of producing all which we find to have been actually produced. The material Universe and the mechanism of the heavens,—organic life with all its infinite marvels and varieties—animal sensation—human intelligence—canons of beauty, the law of good and evil—all these must have existed potentially in the First Cause, as in the Source whence alone they could be derived.
The Nature of this Cause was the object of our quest. In particular we set ourselves to examine the assertion now so loudly made that Science has found a full explanation in the forces of the Universe[{271}] itself as they come within her cognizance, that is to say, the material forces which she can directly observe, and upon which she can experiment. In particular we have studied the Law of Evolution, in its various significations, and other laws subsidiary to it, in order to determine, from the point of view of reason and Science alone, whether it can be said that the prime factor of which we are in search is thus supplied.
The result has been to make it evident that while modern discovery has immensely multiplied and magnified the marvels which have to be accounted for, it has disclosed nothing which can be supposed to account for them in a manner to satisfy our reason. So far as the forces of Nature are concerned, the mysteries that lie beyond are even darker than they were. The origin and nature of matter and force, the source of motion, of life, of sensation and consciousness, of rational intelligence and language, of Free-will, of the reign of law and order to which all Nature testifies,—all these are for Science utterly unsolved problems, which, as some amongst her teachers tell us, must remain for ever insoluble. Even less prospect, if possible, can there be that any mechanical forces will ever account for perception of the sublime and beautiful,—and above all—of the distinction between right and wrong.
Here, then, Science stops,—confessing that she can be our guide no farther, and lending no colour whatever to the unscientific pretensions which are so noisily advanced by some persons in her name.[{272}] Her domain is the world of sense, and it is evident that nothing existing within that realm can possibly furnish an explanation which will satisfy our intellectual need for causality.
Are we therefore to say that we can know nothing concerning the First Cause to which the phenomena of the Universe are due? Such is the Agnostic's position. What we have no means of knowing, he says, we must not pretend to know. It were irrational and dishonest to do so. When Science fails us, the true wisdom is to profess ignorance,—thus only can our position still be scientific.