A glance, almost at random, at current literature in which the conception of evolution is employed in philosophical and theological discussion, shows that the theory has suffered a sea-change. It has now come to mean, to many who use it freely, not the unfolding of the implicit, but the production or appearance of something essentially new, a creative synthesis or epigenesis. Bergson, James Ward, Baron von Hügel and Loisy are among those who use the term in this sense. Thus the last named writer says: "That which constitutes man as a human being is that which he possesses more than the beasts, and not that which he possesses in common with them. From the fact that humanity proceeds from animality, it does not follow that it is explained and defined altogether by animality, otherwise evolution must be denied."[75] 75: "Histoire des Religions," 1911, pp. 61 f. This modification of meaning is important when the doctrine of evolution is extended downward into the inorganic sphere. Since species are derived from one another, it used to be argued, life must be derived from the lifeless; and it is obvious that if this process is pursued it will lead to an infinite regress. We go back from the civilized to the savage, from the conscious to the unconscious, from the organic to the inorganic, till finally the evolution of the atom becomes the problem of problems. We go back in an infinite regress, approaching the ideal limit: In the beginning, nothing. The goal would seem to be the evolution of primitive matter out of nothing, as Alfred Noyes has suggested in his poem, "The Origin of Life": In the beginning?--Slowly grope we back Along the narrowing track, Back to the deserts of the world's pale prime, The mire, the clay, the slime; And then ... what then? Surely to something less; Back, back, to Nothingness! * * * * * Will you have courage, then, to bow the head, And say, when all is said-- "Out of this Nothingness arose our thought! This blank abysmal Nought Woke, and brought forth that lighted city street, Those towers, that armoured fleet"? * * * * * Will you have courage, then, to front that law (From which your sophists draw Their only right to flout one human creed) That nothing can proceed-- Not even thought, not even love--from less Than its own nothingness? The law is yours! But dare you waive your pride, And kneel where you denied? The law is yours! Dare you rekindle, then, One faith for faithless men, And say you found, on that dark road you trod, In the beginning--God?