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November 25, 1914.
A FAMILY PAPER.
given her, but it was a pretty dress nevertheless,
and though it was wet about the hem and
mussed from the damp coat, Schmidt was very
happy in it and her eyes shone through her
draggled frizzezs.
Ten minutes later she and I were seated before
a rousing open flre with a small table between
us. It was a sort of a postscript affair,
that belated feast, but if a truly thankful heart
combined with the atmosphere of home makes
Thanksgiving Day, then Schmidt surely had
one.
The fourth Thanksgiving Day at the depot
restaurant a sweet-faced Swede waitress said:
"You eat your Thanksgiving alone"
I told her of my plight and disappointment,
and both she and the Hungarian cashier did
their best to make my dinner suitable to the
occasion, and while they served me told with
sparkling eyes of their plans for a real Thanksgiving
meal at home that night.
Now this fifthlonely Thanksgiving was enlivened
by thoughts of 'Peggy—Peggy, who
loved the old New England things and longed
in her loyal soul to cook one real Thanksgiving
dinner; Peggy, who was full born Bulgarian
and would have been named Elinka had
she not been adopted by a Yankee grandma.
So Parthians, Modes, Elamites; the dwellers
in Mesopotamia, Judea, Cappadocia; in Pontus,
Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia; in Egypt;
strangers from Eome; Jews, Cretes and Arabians;
we do hear them speak in our tongue,
yea and echo our ovm thoughts as they climb
the ladder of our ideals.
Te Deum Laudamus, 1914.
Again Thanksgiving approaches. Last year
the fates were kind. No accident or sorrow
marred my celebration.
But what about the day that now draws near
Can we sing "Te Deum Laudamus" with
those awful cannon booming in our ears Can
we rejoice in the atmosphere of home when so
many millions of our fellow men lie homeless
on the sod
The letters that come to me and the words
friends speak to me all bear the same refrain—•
depression.
We who dwell in comfort and peace bear upon
our liearts the burden of the world. It is the
best of our civilization which is being swept
away. Was not the burden great enough before
We of the civilized races seemed so few.
Our heart fainted at the task before us as we
buckled on the antiseptic shield, pinned a flag
to our lapel, took a school book under our arm
and sallied forth with a prayer for strength and
wisdom. We felt ourselves outweighed before.
Xow with the prospect of a million less on our
side of the scales, no wonder we are depressed
—and with reasons.
But just supposing that we should lend a
hand to help, you and I, ten or twelve million
of us; each of us help one. The coming generation
lies at our door. Eeach out a hand
and heart to some little lad or lassie, give that
personal touch that shall speak a wider vision
to their soul. A few short seasons, and you and
I have passed. The old world and its problems
will be left behind. 'Tis not those in the
front of the battle who feel their hearts depressed.
Let us be up and doing, so may we
bravely sing "Te Deum Laudamus."—N. Y.
Christian Advocate.
IS EVOLUTION TRUE
By the Rev. J. M. Coleman.
The theory of evolution as applied to physical
and spiritual life is either one of the greatest discoveries
or the greatest superstitions of the nineteenth
century. This theory dominates the
teaching in many departments of our Universities,
Colleges and High Schools, determines the
acceptance or refusal of text-books by the publishing
houses, sits in the seats of the scornful
in many Theological Seminaries and echoes in
many pulpits. "What is this theory which is seriously
proposed as the regulator of our lives
past, present and future
A half century ago Darwin startled the world
by the suggestion—for Darwin never had the
dead sureness of his less scientific followers. Darwin
suggested that variations of plant and animal
life developed, through natural selection, into
new species, thus furnishing an explanation of
the origin of species through transmutation. Now
had the prophets of this new cult not tried to
extend the domain of evolution beyond the Darwinian
limits, it would not have become the vital
issue for our religious life and thought that it
s today. But Spencer, with his scheme of a
world philosophy founded on the principle of
evolution, followed Darwin and in more recent
times, the devotees of this new god have invaded
religion and theology until there is nothing
left of the life here below and no hope of the
life beyond which is not cut to fltinto an alleged
evolutionary process. The thoroughgoing application
of the theory entirely eliminates the supernatural
from history and prophecy.
Professor Le Conte gives us the briefest and
raost concise definition of evolution. It reads,
"All things come by continuous progressive
changes, according to certain laws by means of
resident forces." So far as this discussion is
concerned, the man who accepts this definition Is
an evolutionist andtjtie one who changes it is
something else. The last clause is the important
one for the orthodox Christian, since, if each
change in nature and in man is brought about
by a resident force, God must be either unknown,
absent, or non-existent.
Now it may seem clear that if man, body and
soul, evolved by resident forces from some kind
of animal, this from a plant, and this again from
mud, then it must appear that the resident force
in mud is sufficient to produce a Lincoln, or a
^Shakespeare, or a Jesus Christ. The definition
leaves no alternative.
It may also be clear that if man was not made
in the image of God and, therefore, never lo=t
that image through sin, that sin is not the
heinous thing which the Bible says it is. It is
rather a good which was pulled too soon. This
Is what we may call the green apple theory of
sin All that God needs in his relation to the
sinner is to have patience till the sinner evolves
out of his sin. Evolution has no place for regeneration
such as Jesus talked about to Nicodemus.
Nicodemus was told, "Ye must be born from
above." Evolution gets nothing from above. Everything
comes from below. Man is born, not
from God, but from the clod.
Conversion, according to evolution, is a normal
incident in certain adolescent years. Therefore
every normal child who passes his teens is converted.
If he is not, there is either something
wrong with him, or with the theory. Evolution
denies the divinity of Jesus Christ. Since all
things are produced by the resident forces "''n
the stage preceding, then Jesus, as the son ot
Mary and Joseph, had no higher claim to divinity
than his brothers.
Evolution leaves no place for a Savior who
ijomes into the world of sin from the outside
and makes himself a substitute for the sinner,
bearing away the guilt of his sin. Por this reason
the evolutionist must 'deny the truthfulness
of the Bible which, throughout, is based on the
idea of salvation through the atonement of Jesus
Christ. Evolution leaves no place for the resurrection
of Jesus or any other, since the forces residing
in a dead body can never restore life,
which they were not able to conserve when it
was there. It leaves no place for immortality,
at least in the sense of a hereafter for the
individual soul, so that the evolutionist, having
taken away God and connected man with mud as
his earliest ancestor, leaves him only this conclusion,
"Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we
die."
Now some evolutionist will insist that I am
not describing his brand of evolution, since a
good many in pulpit and pew are still trying the
impossible task of squaring their views with a
modified Christianity. Remember, I am not explaining
evolutionists, but evolution, i would
not undertake the former task. I am entirely at
a loss too understand why sensible men should
stake their issues for this life and the next on
the validity of a theory which is thoroughly un
scriptural and, I expect to show, is also ''.idscientific.
Not satisfied with ordering our lives, the evolutionists
are proposing to rearrange our Bible
to fit their views. The books of Moses are
taken from the period where they fitinto history
and placed flve hundred years later, because the
ideas in these books are too far advanced to be
accounted for by evolutionary processes. The
Bible accounts for the great truths by claiming
a revelation from God to Moses, but these alleged
scholars have no room for God in their plans. According
to the critics the Levites, who had for
a chief purpose the caring for the tabernacle, are
said not to have existed for fivehundred years
after the tabernacle ceased to be and the Israelites
were commanded to exterminate peoples
who were extinct centures before. And these
things, contradictory to the Bible, we are called
upon to accept in the name of scholarship. Heav.
en help this kind of scholarship, or whatever the
evolutionists have for heaven, for it does not
seem that resident forces would do much for
them.
Now, since evolution bids us give up our belief
in regeneration through the Spirit of God, in the
forgiveness of sin, in the atonement by Jesus
Christ, in the resurrection of the dead and in
the immortality of the individual soul, it is
certainly unscriptural and may be worth our
while to investigate its claims to be scientific.
If these claims hold, we may calmly fold our
arms and watch the forces resident in the saloon
evolve a Y. M. C. A., and Senator Penrose develop
into a saint. If it does not hold, we shall
put it away on the junk heap with the other
superstitions which "have had their brief reign
and passed away.