Creation; Evolution; Human beings -- Origin; Natural selection
Richard Owen says:[51] "In the endeavor to clearly comprehend and
explain the functions of the combination of forces called 'brain,' the
physiologist is hindered and troubled by the views of the nature of
those cerebral forces which the needs of dogmatic theology have imposed
on mankind. * * * Religion, pure and undefiled, can best answer how far
it is righteous or just to charge a neighbor with being unsound in his
principles who holds the term 'life' to be a sound expressing the sum of
living phenomena, and who maintains these phenomena to be modes of
force into which other forms of force have passed from potential to
active states, and reciprocally, through the agency of the sums or
combinations of forces impressing the mind with the ideas signified by
the terms 'monad,' 'moss,' 'plant,' or 'animal.'"
We have now shown that the very forces which give vent to the attributes
of man, are correlated to the physical forces. Let us now consider his
attributes as manifested by his mental powers. There is no doubt the
difference between the mental faculties of the ape and that of the
lowest savage, who cannot express any number higher than four and who
uses hardly any abstract terms for common objects or for the
affections,[52] is still very great and would still be great, says
Darwin, "even if one of the higher apes had been improved or civilized
as much as a dog has been in comparison with its parent form, the wolf
or jackal." But when we examine the interval of mental power between one
of the lowest fishes, as a lamprey or a lancelet, and one of the higher
apes, and recognize the fact that this interval is filled up by
numberless gradations, it does not become so difficult to understand the
interval between an ape and man, which is not by far so great. As in
finding out what is peculiar to a living body in distinction to a body
not living, we found it absurd to take man as the perfection of the
animal scale--the microscopic monad possessing life as well as him--so
in the case of man's mental attributes, which have always been
increasing, always perfecting, since the first genuine man came into
existence, it would be equally absurd to compare the intellectual man of
to-day with an ape to see what attributes he possesses which the ape
does not possess; but if we go down in the scale and compare the savage
with the ape, the difficulty is not by far so great. It will be found
on close examination, though, that man and the higher animals,
especially the primates, have many instincts in common. "All," says
Darwin, "have the same senses, intuitions and sensations; similar
passions, affections, and emotions; even the more complex ones, such as
jealousy, suspicion, emulation, gratitude and magnanimity; they practice
deceit and are revengeful; they are sometimes susceptible to ridicule
and even have a sense of humor; they feel wonder and curiosity; they
possess the same faculties of imitation, attention, deliberation,
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