Benjamin Kidd, in a masterful work, entitled, “The Science of Power,” points out how Darwinism furnished Nietzsche with a scientific basis for his godless system of philosophy and is demoralizing industry.

He also quotes eminent English scientists to support the last charge in the indictment, namely, that Darwinism robs the reformer of hope.  Its plan of operation is to improve the race by “scientific breeding” on a purely physical basis.  A few hundred years may be required—­possibly a few thousand—­but what is time to one who carries eons in his quiver and envelopes his opponents in the “Mist of Ages”?

Kidd would substitute the “Emotion of the Ideal” for scientific breeding and thus shorten the time necessary for the triumph of a social reform.  He counts one or two generations as sufficient.  This is an enormous advance over Darwin’s doctrine, but Christ’s plan is still more encouraging.  A man can be born again; the springs of life can be cleansed instantly so that the heart loves the things that it formerly hated and hates the things that it once loved.  If this is true of one, it can be true of any number.  Thus, a nation can be born in a day if the ideals of the people can be changed.

Many have tried to harmonize Darwinism with the Bible, but these efforts, while honest and sometimes even agonizing, have not been successful.  How could they be when the natural and inevitable tendency of Darwinism is to exalt the mind at the expense of the heart, to overestimate the reliability of the reason as compared with faith and to impair confidence in the Bible.  The mind is a machine; it has no morals.  It obeys its owner as willingly when he plots to kill as when he plans for service.

The Theistic evolutionist who tries to occupy a middle ground between those who accept the Bible account of creation and those who reject God entirely reminds one of a traveller in the mountains, who, having fallen half-way down a steep slope, catches hold of a frail bush.  It takes so much of his strength to keep from going lower that he is useless as an aid to others.  Those who have accepted evolution in the belief that it was not anti-Christian may well revise their conclusions in view of the accumulating evidence of its baneful influence.

Darwinism discredits the things that are supernatural and encourages the worship of the intellect—­an idolatry as deadly to spiritual progress as the worship of images made by human hands.  The injury that it does would be even greater than it is but for the moral momentum acquired by the student before he comes under the blighting influence of the doctrine.

Many instances could be cited to show how the theory that man descended from the brute has, when deliberately adopted, driven reverence from the heart and made young Christians agnostics and sometimes atheists—­depriving them of the joy, and society of the service, that come from altruistic effort inspired by religion.