Also he says, "In prima autem rerum institutione fuit principium activum verbum Dei, quod de materia elementari produxit animalia, vel in actu vel virtute, secundum Aug. lib. 5 de Gen. ad lit. c. 5."[[275]]
Speaking of "kinds" (in scholastic phraseology "substantial forms") latent in matter, he says: "Quas quidam posuerunt non incipere per actionem naturæ sed prius in materia exstitisse, ponentes latitationem formarum. Et hoc accidit eis ex ignorantia materiæ, quia nesciebant distinguere inter potentiam et actum. Quia enim formæ præexistunt eas simpliciter præexistere."[[276]]
Also Cornelius à Lapide[[277]] contends that at least certain animals were not absolutely, but only derivatively created, saying of them, "Non fuerunt creata formaliter, sed potentialiter."
As to Suarez, it will be enough to refer to Disp. xv., 2, n. 9, p. 508, t. i. Edition Vives, Paris; also Nos. 13—15, and many
other references to the same effect could easily be given, but these may suffice.
It is then evident that ancient and most venerable theological authorities distinctly assert derivative creation, and thus harmonize with all that modern science can possibly require.
It may indeed truly be said with Roger Bacon, "The saints never condemned many an opinion which the moderns think ought to be condemned."[[278]]
The various extracts given show clearly how far "evolution" is from any necessary opposition to the most orthodox theology. The same may be said of spontaneous generation. The most recent form of it, lately advocated by Dr. H. Charlton Bastian,[[279]] teaches that matter exists in two different forms, the crystalline (or statical) and the colloidal (or dynamical) conditions. It also teaches that colloidal matter, when exposed to certain conditions, presents the phenomena of life, and that it can be formed from crystalline matter, and thus that the prima materia of which these are diverse forms contains potentially all the multitudinous kinds of animal and vegetable existence. This theory moreover harmonizes well with the views here advocated, for just as crystalline matter builds itself, under suitable conditions, along certain definite lines, so analogously colloidal matter has its definite lines and directions of development. It is not collected in haphazard, accidental aggregations, but evolves according to its proper laws and special properties.
The perfect orthodoxy of these views is unquestionable. Nothing is plainer from the venerable writers quoted, as well as
from a mass of other authorities, than that "the supernatural" is not to be looked for or expected in the sphere of mere nature. For this statement there is a general consensus of theological authority.