CREATION BY EVOLUTION
to a relatively complex form. Development is not the unfolding of an infolded organism; it is the formation of new structures and functions by combinations and transformations of the relatively simple structures and functions of the germ cells. If anything in the world is natural, this process of development from an egg is natural; but nothing in the world is more wonderful. And yet this process of development is according to nature — a natural development and not a supernatural creation. Religious faith has been able to survive the knowledge of the fact that every human being in the world has come into existence by a process of development. Why should it be supposed that the recognition of an equally natural development of groups of individuals or species would be destructive of religion?
Ontogeny, or the origin of individuals, and phylogeny, or the origin of races, are two aspects of one and the same thing, namely, organic development. There is a remarkable parallelism between the two, and in particular the factors or causes of development are essentially the same in both. Just as the earth rotates on its axis and revolves in its orbit and the whole solar system moves through space in accordance with the law of gravity, so organisms undergo development as embryos, as species, and as larger groups according to the law of organic evolution.
Although the word evolution is now used to specify the development of species and of larger groups of organisms, it was once applied also to the development of individuals, and it could still be so applied, for evolution means only the transormatton of an earlier into a later stage according to natural laws. In short, evolution is trans-formation rather than new-formation, natural development rather than supernatural creation, whether we are considering the origin of individuals or of species or larger groups.
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