Note 367 — Chapter VIII · THE PROVIDENCE OF GOD IN HUMAN HISTORY.

The statement of the text will remain unaffected by any theory as to the derivation of the material organism of the primitive man. If the hypothesis be true that "man is the descendant of some pre-existent generic type, the which, if it were now living, we would probably call an ape," this can only be affirmed of the body of man, and the statement is still correct that "God formed man of the dust of the earth." The body of the ape and the body of man are formed of the same materials. But, as Prof. Cope, a thorough-going Evolutionist, remarks, this material nature can not bear or be "the image of God," for "God is a spirit," and "a spirit hath not flesh and bones" (Luke xxiv. 39). The image of God must inhere in that spiritual nature which was inbreathed by God, and consists in reason, conscience, and moral liberty. (See Cope, "On the Hypothesis of Evolution," pp. 33, 34.) This theory as to the descent of man's material organism from some pre-existent generic type does not by any means involve the conclusion of Sir J. Lubbock that "the primitive condition of mankind was one of utter barbarism." We may grant that the primitive condition of man was one of childhood ignorance and inexperience, a state in which his intellectual and moral nature was undeveloped; but this is not "Savagism." Barbarism is the lapse and deterioration of man. Even if it could be shown that primeval man was destitute of the industrious arts, "it would not afford the slightest presumption that he was also ignorant of duty or ignorant of God" ("Primeval Man," by the Duke of Argyll, p. 132). "Whenever we can trace back a religion to its first beginnings, we find it free from many blemishes that affect it in its later stages" (Max Müller, "Chips from a German Workshop," vol. i., preface). The most ancient form of religion was the Monotheistic (Grimm, "Deutsche Mythologie," p. xliv. 3d ed.). See also "Les Origines Indo-Européennes," vol. ii. p. 720, by M. Adolphe Pictet.