To the poet the birth of the child suggests the presence of forces other than those of the seen and temporal. The new life is "out of the deep, from the true world, within the world we see." Its roots are in another dimension of being than that of nature or the world of time and sense. In moments of insight, "though inland far we be, our souls have sight of that immortal sea which brought us hither."
Again to the philosopher there is in the individual something indescribable, unique, not to be compressed within the compass of any general law, something in each individual which his ancestry or antecedents will not explain nor his environment produce.[82]
Says a distinguished professor of biology[83]: "Familiarity with development does not remove the real mystery which lies back of it. The development of a human being, of a personality, from a germ cell seems to me the climax of all wonders, greater even than that involved in the evolution of a species or the making of a world." He remarks that "if personality is determined by heredity alone, all teaching, preaching, government, is useless." The only hope for the race, he says, is in eugenics—always supposing that enough freedom is left to carry out its program.
If the birth of the individual and the full story of his origin is thus enveloped in mystery for theologian, poet, philosopher and even scientist, it is not to be expected that the problem of the origin of the human race can be solved by a neat formula. Here the mystery of the birth of the individual from parents of the same species is intensified many fold. Here the problems of mind and body, of their genetic and metaphysical relations to each other, and of the ultimate relation of the spirit world to each, press for solution before there can be any full and final answer to the question of the origin of man. Is it any wonder that the single occurrence upon which was based the birth of all future generations which have peopled the earth should be thought to involve more than can be included in any scientific hypothesis?[84]
When we seek to interpret these critical points in the history of the world, such as the origin of life and of man, two roads are open before us. We may emphasize, with the advocates of preformation, the principle of continuity alone; and, explaining the higher by the lower, we may go back as Mr. Noyes would carry us, back on the dwindling track, explaining civilization by savagery, the non-moral by the moral, the conscious by the unconscious, the living by the non-living. In this process, it has been often pointed out, there lurks a sort of generatio æquivoca; primitive star-dust is endowed with the attributes of life, of consciousness, and even of purpose and morality. Thus J. A. Thomson says that "if we see any good reason for believing in the erstwhile origin of the living from the not-living, we give a greater continuity to the course of events, and we must again read something into the common denominator of science—Matter, Energy, and the Ether. We have already read into this Wonder and Mystery, Harmony and Order, and we must now read into it—Progress and, from a philosophical standpoint, Purpose."[85]
The objection will be made that to regard the primitive atoms or cells as practically self-preserving, self-repairing and self-improving, the fountain of all life, of all consciousness and morality and civilization, is to endow these entities with attributes that are manifestly inappropriate.
Seeing the difficulties of a theory of evolution based upon the principle of continuity alone, we may emphasize, with many popular interpreters, not so much this principle of continuity, as that of progress. Evolution would then mean not a mere shifting of the elements, a redistribution of matter and motion, but a creative synthesis, an epigenesis. It will then mean, not "There is nothing new under the sun," but rather, "What next?" The descent of man will no longer suggest the inference that as the progeny of the brute man must share his destiny, but rather the thought that "it doth not yet appear what we shall be."
But how to explain the new element which has arisen, not out of, but alongside of, the others? We would not be content to say, "Now the inorganic elements incapable of producing life; and now, presto! living matter;" for this after all would be a break in continuity not explained, and would lead once more to a sort of creation ex nihilo. The necessities of the case seem to call for some new conception which shall unite the two great principles of continuity and progress.
III. Theism and Evolution