There can be, then, no well-grounded fear of science overturning Christianity. It is more likely thereby to be in the end not only more thoroughly and correctly understood, but more firmly established and more generally adopted. Even the inquiry which is now receiving so much attention from men of thought--that into the origin of man--need not be deemed as fraught with any real danger to the system which has given the world its present civilization. Were it possible to establish Mr. Darwin’s theory of evolution--and that it is more than a theory cannot be claimed for it by its most devoted advocate--and establish man’s origin in the ape, still would the act of his creation into man from ape be an act of infinite power and goodness. For the infinite power and goodness of the act consist in the creation, by some means, of a being of intellectual and moral attributes. The act of divine power is in breathing into the nostrils the breath of life, and causing the being to become a living soul. Even Mr. Darwin will not dispute that the ape was in the long ages evolved from dust, nor that, so far as science has shown or probably ever can show, there is no being in the universe with capacity to evolve thought except only God, as shown in His manifold works, and man. Whatever may be the result, therefore, of the interesting inquiries in commerce, religion, geography, geology, ethnology which now are being more and more directed toward Africa with each passing year, we may quite safely conclude, judging from the results of the past, that Christianity will come forth out of the conflicts that may arise, whether they be scientific or of other nature, with renewed beauty and power; with more liberal and enlightened views, doubtless, upon some questions which have been erroneously considered, but with greater influence on this account, and with brighter prospects of more speedily than might have been but for these conflicts extending the rule of her pure and beneficent morality among all the nations and tribes of men. [Illustration] CHAPTER III. THE RESULTS OF THE EXPLORATIONS IN AFRICA. The Result in Behalf of Science, Religion, and Humanity of the Explorations and Missionary Labors of Dr. Livingstone and Others in Africa -- Review of Recent Discoveries in Respect to the People and the Physical Nature of the African Continent -- The Diamond Fields of South Africa -- Bird’s-Eye View of that Division of the World -- Its Capabilities and Its Wants -- Christianity and Modern Journalism Dissipating Old Barbarisms, and Leading the Way to Triumphs of Civilization.