Kings and queens reign "by
the Grace of God," but a sweet, docile, pious disposition, such as is
born in some children and grows up with them,--that congenital gift which
good Bishop Hall would look for in a wife,--is attributed to "Nature."
In fact "Nature" and "Grace," as handled by the scholastics, are nothing
more nor less than two hostile Divinities in the Pantheon of
post-classical polytheism.
What is the secret of the profound interest which "Darwinism" has excited
in the minds and hearts of more persons than dare to confess their doubts
and hopes? It is because it restores "Nature" to its place as a true
divine manifestation. It is that it removes the traditional curse from
that helpless infant lying in its mother's arms. It is that it lifts
from the shoulders of man the responsibility for the fact of death. It
is that, if it is true, woman can no longer be taunted with having
brought down on herself the pangs which make her sex a martyrdom. If
development upward is the general law of the race; if we have grown by
natural evolution out of the cave-man, and even less human forms of life,
we have everything to hope from the future. That the question can be
discussed without offence shows that we are entering on a new era, a
Revival greater than that of Letters, the Revival of Humanity.
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