Involution

“ If we glance for a moment at the various fields in which the idea of evolution is scientifically applied we find that, firstly, the whole universe is conceived as a unity; secondly, our earth; thirdly, organic life on the earth; fourthly, man, as its highest product; and fifthly, the soul, as a special immaterial entity. Thus we have, in historical succession, the evolutionary research of cosmology, geology, biology, anthropology, and psychology. ”

“ Nor is the value of the doctrine of Evolution to the philosophic thinker diminished by the fact that it applies the same method to the living and the not-living world; and embraces, in one stupendous analogy, the growth of a solar system from molecular chaos, the shaping of the earth from the nebulous cubhood of its youth, through innumerable changes and immeasurable ages, to its present form; and the development of a living being from the shapeless mass of protoplasm we term a germ. ”

“ If the theory that the different species of animals now known to us have been evolved successively by descent from some primordial simplest form through modifications induced by change of habitation, of medium of life, and accumulation of new structures occurring through an immense period of time, be a sound hypothesis, the process which has evolved superior out of inferior organizations ought, in consistency with itself and with all its supposed conditions, to be capable of being reversed, so as to lead to the evolution of inferior out of superior organisms. ”

“ The concept of evolution an attempt to interpret natural processes in terms of individual growth. § 2. Evolution means change culminating in an end which is the result of the process and is qualitatively new. The concept is thus teleological. § 3. Evolution, being teleological, is essentially either progress or degeneration. If it is more than illusion, there must be real ends in the physical order. And ends can only be real as subjective interests of sentient beings which are actualised by the process of change. § 4. Thus all evolution must take place within an individual subject. ”

“ That there are other factors of evolution not yet discovered is almost inevitable; they, however, will be but added ‘laws;’ supplementary and co-ordinated methods—giving greater completeness to our knowledge of the origin of species.
But having reached this conclusion, we are at once compelled to ask, What is the origin of this unceasing continuity of variation in all living things? this power to become constantly adapted to change of environment, and for ever, in the fittest form, to survive? ”

“ If this adjustment constitutes vitality, and if natural selection furnishes an explanation of the manner in which the adjustment has been brought about, have we not, in the law of natural selection, an explanation of the origin of life?—not of course of the origin of the matter of life, nor of the changes of which life is made up, nor of the production of living beings, but of the origin of those attributes by which living things are especially characterized, and in which they differ from all other forms of existence. ”

“ Let it simply be agreed, as it now is by all science, that the evolution of form is a universal and well evidenced principle, working out through the various well established and comprehensible incidents, such as natural selection, adaptation to environment, and so on—yet this statement of the fact is not an explanation of its cause. ”

“ Let us turn to define Evolution—a word about which much ambiguity exists. In its narrower sense 'Evolution,' a term not at first used by Darwin, means the morphological and physiological variations of organic beings by the action of natural selection. It then came to be loosely applied to almost any specific theory about the origin and development of things. ”

“ The interest which Evolution has awakened in the minds of the most acute and profound thinkers in the scientific and religious world, shows its intimate connection with the growing tendency to regard all things as connected, and related, and moving on in the paths of an immutable order. It is the effect of this intelligent, scientific spirit brooding over the chaotic theories of creation, causing a deeper penetration into its mysteries, and a more determined effort to solve the enigmas of the universe. ”

“ Here, then, is evolution, or development: primarily an evolution of the generic into the individual, the continued differentiation of a generic idea through successive individualizations, each adding to the previous group of attributes, thus rendering the idea increasingly complex; and, secondly, an apparent physical evolution or development, interpreting this logical process by a series of physical forms so related as to reveal the relation existing between the thoughts thus interpreted. ”

“ It will be very satisfactory if such correspondence between the real and the ideal is found to result; but how can I know beforehand that it must result?
Evolution and progress: what do the terms respectively mean? Evolution, we learn, is an increase in the complexity, definiteness, individuality and organic connection of phenomena. But progress is any series of changes that meets with the constantly increasing approval of somebody. The growth of a tree or of a thistle is an evolution. The climbing of a hill for some purpose may throughout be a progress. ”

“ In trying to explain Evolution in a mechanical—sometimes called monistic, but in reality natural—way, we exclude anything like a set purpose, a goal, or ideal, a final condition which the organism strives to attain. ”

“ But one difficulty with the evolution theory as the sole method by which the past or present inhabitants of the world have come into existence is that, so far as we can judge, it has done and completed its work just as effectually and finally as special creation appears to have terminated in certain forms, some of which are extinct and some of which are living. Take the Darwinian pedigree of man, as stated in a former chapter, or any other mode of tracing the supposed stages of animal evolution. ”

“ Creation implies an abrupt appearance, transformation a gradual change.
In this manner is presented to our contemplation the great theory of Evolution. Every organic being has a place in a chain of events. ”

“ The doctrines of the New Church give us a theory of evolution which is free from any of these defects. It begins at the highest and describes every step of descent to the lowest. It takes its position in the centre; in the first untreated and infinite Cause which is adequate to every possible effect, and traces the evolution of every plane and link in the creation, shows the relation of the whole to every part, and of the least part to the whole. ”

“ Wherever educated people talked the conversation came round to the question of evolution. Were animals and plants the results of special creations, or were they, including man, the result of the gradual transformations of a few simple primitive types evolving under the stress of some such force as Darwin's natural selection? ”

“ Darwin, however, has systematized the theory of evolution, and now the branches of human knowledge can only be advantageously pursued if we trace in all phenomena, whether material or spiritual, a beginning and a gradual development. ”

“ The last leafy ramifications—flower-bearing and fruit-bearing—of this tree of life, are the fauna and flora of the present epoch. The law might be called a law of ramification, of specialization of the parts, and diversification of the whole.
b. Law of Progress of the Whole.—Many imagine that progress is the one law of evolution; in fact, that evolution and progress are coextensive and convertible terms. They imagine that in evolution the movement must be upward and onward in all parts; that degeneration is the opposite of evolution. ”

“ Physical Evil in Relation to Man.—But organic evolution, completed in man, was immediately transferred to a higher plane, and continued as social evolution; material evolution is transformed into psychical evolution; unconscious evolution, according to necessary law, to conscious voluntary progress toward a recognized goal, and according to a freer law. ”

“ Development or evolution, then, definitely implies the culmination of a process of change in the establishment of a state of things which is relatively new, and implies, further, that the relatively new state of things may truly be regarded as the end or completion of this special process of change. Thus the fundamental peculiarity of all evolutionary ideas is that they are essentially teleological; the changes which are evolutions are all changes thought of as throughout relative to an end or result. ”

“ I should expect not merely change but a new method of producing the change. Or, to make an Irish bull, I should expect the next stage in Evolution not to be a stage in Evolution at all: should expect that Evolution itself as a method of producing change will be superseded. ”

“ It is therefore simpler and more plausible to suppose that each higher step has arisen from the one before it, than to suppose that each has, so to speak, begun an evolution on its own account. A series of corroborative arguments might be adduced, and there is no doubt, as we have said before, that the transition from the general idea of evolution to that of descent will be fully accomplished. ”

“ A fifth theory of evolution is held by many. It is called polyphyletic evolution, which means that God created numerous stocks, or beginnings of both plant and animal life, which were subject to change and growth, deterioration and development, according to his plan and purpose. ”

“ Evolution from this point of view has consisted largely in introducing new factors that influence characters already present in the animal or plant.
Such a view gives us a somewhat different picture of the process of evolution from the old idea of a ferocious struggle between the individuals of a species with the survival of the fittest and the annihilation of the less fit. Evolution assumes a more peaceful aspect. New and advantageous characters survive by incorporating themselves into the race, improving it and opening to it new opportunities. ”

“ And first, ‘evolution,’ ‘developement,’ ‘progress,’ all imply something identical throughout, a subject of the evolution, which is one and the same. If what is there at the beginning is not there at the end, and the same as what was there at the beginning, then evolution is a word with no meaning. Something must evolve itself, and that something, which is the end, must also be the beginning. ”

“ Evolution, or transformism, as it is more properly called, may be defined as the theory which regards the present species of plants and animals as modified descendants of earlier forms of life. Nowadays, therefore, the principal use of the term evolution is to denote the developmental theory of organic species. ”

“ It is surely obvious that the complement of Evolution is Advolution, and the inquiry, Whence has all this system of things come, is, after all, of minor importance compared with the question, Whither does all this tend? Science, as such, may have little to say on such a question. And it is perhaps impossible, with such faculties as we now possess, to imagine an Evolution with a future as great as its past. ”

“ Darwin's scientific theory of 'natural selection,' which has mainly caused the modern vogue of the term 'Evolution,' must be carefully distinguished from certain ideas which are commonly associated with the latter term. ”

“ When we turn to a department in which human influence has largely or wholly shaped the phenomena, we find numerous special creations that are not attributable to the operation of any law of development or evolution such as is supposed to have led to the production of one species of animal out of another, or out of several previous species. ”

“ Evolution in its theistic construction sees in the lower orders of existence and in the earlier stages of life the promise, but not the potency, of the higher. It assumes the existence of a power immanent in the universe and adequate to account for the appearance of new forces. It can interpret alike the continuity of the evolutionary process, and the appearance once for all in the irreversible moments of progress of new forms and forces of life. ”

“ The increasing complexity of living forms is not the result of the movements of matter, or of chemical-physical laws, but of an opposition, successful in a unique degree in men, to the imprisoning and entangling forces of matter.
3. The later stages in evolution, while connected with the earlier in continuity of development, may contain elements that are essentially new. A living being is "a reservoir of indetermination and unforeseeability." [152] The new species cannot be explained, except by an illegitimate process of thought, by what is presented in the old. ”

“ As, after my study of the probable origin of the solar system, and our discussion of that subject, I expressed my conclusion that the phenomena called for and manifested the exercise of a formative will by some acts of special creation, so now, in reference to the animal kingdom, I have reached the same conclusion, for reasons which I have endeavored to assign. I can see that the operation of the process which you call evolution may have caused certain limited modifications in the structure and habits of life of different animals ”

“ It is this statical condition which is apt to be lost sight of in the modern philosophy of evolution. The modification of species, the survival and advancement of some and the depauperating and extinction of others, all forms of variation and transmutation—these are dynamical phenomena, and only take place under the influence of disturbing agencies. ”

“ All that the evolutionist needs to create a religion, a spiritual world, and a Supreme Being, is some hint or fancy of an ignorant savage. We have lectures on the evolution of the steam-engine, of the various sciences and of Revelation in the Sacred Scriptures. Indeed, evolution is driving the old words, progress, improvement, development, out of use and usurping their places. ”

“ Quite obviously this succession of life was antagonistic to the former views of a literal Creation; and only on this supposed fact as an outline has the modern theory of biological evolution been built up. For if geology cannot furnish the most unquestionable proof that life has occurred in a very definite and invariable order, what is the use of talking about the development of one form of life into another by a gradual process of evolution? ”