Lehi calls special attention to what he now is about to say. He is speaking of the existence of God, the creation, the fall of man, free agency and the atonement.
There is a God. Only a “fool”—that is, one who is deficient in moral qualities (see Psalm 14:1) That is his wish, his desire.
Such an individual may, perhaps, find comfort in the conclusion of Kant, that the existence of God, a First Cause, cannot be proved by any argument known to logic, since every cause seems to require a previous cause to account for it, wherefore a First Cause can never be located. But St. Paul does not agree with this conclusion. His assertion is that all that which can be known by mortal man concerning God has been made manifest by our Lord himself, for “God has showed it unto them.” Paul is also of the opinion that his eternal power and Godhead “are clearly seen in the creation.” (20) The Hebrew poet expresses the same thought:
"The heavens declare the Glory of God,
And the firmament showeth his handiwork.
Day unto day poureth forth speech,
And night unto night showeth knowledge.
There is no speech nor language;
Their voice cannot be heard.
Their sound is gone out through all the earth,
And their words to the end of the World."
There is absolutely no excuse for the assertion that there is no God, even in the form of a wish.
He hath created all things. Not only is there a God, but he has created all things. All that human senses can contact and human understanding can comprehend; all that divine revelation can unveil to a soul quickened by the Holy Spirit—all is created, and God is the Creator.
As is well known, after the publication of the Darwinian hypothesis of natural selection and “Origin of Species” during the years 1858 and 1859, the theory of evolution became fashionable as a substitute for the doctrine of creation. It was hailed by many as a new discovery and as the very key of the universe.
But this attitude toward it has begun to undergo a notable change.
It is being recalled that surmises regarding evolution are not new; that, in fact, some ancient Greek philosophers in the dim past dreamed of evolution, and that Descartes, the famous French mathematician (1596-1650), and after him Leibnitz, considered it possible that higher forms of existences had originated in lower. Stripped of its assumed character of an ultra-modern scientific discovery, the theory has lost some of its prestige.
The soundness of it is also being doubted, notwithstanding the seemingly strong support of intellectual giants, such as Kant (1724-1804), La Place (1749-1829), Lyell (1830) and many others. Dr. Henry Fairfield Osborn has been quoted in a magazine, May 15, 1932, as having made the sweeping statement, that man lived on the earth not 50,000 years ago, as Darwinists assume, but at least 50 million years ago, and that he was never anything but a man.
Shortly afterwards Dr. Austin H. Clark, of the U.S. National Museum, Washington, is said to have declared, by the same publication:
“Applying our knowledge of embryology, we may assume without possibility of contradiction that all major groups of animals were formed at the same time. There is no evidence which leads us to suppose that any major group was derived from another.”
The argument for evolution which compares that process with the growth of a plant from the seed may be ornamental, but it is not logical. The development of plants from the seed, one generation after another of the same kind, is a wonderful illustration of the resurrection (Mark 4:28) compares the kingdom of God with a plant that bears fruit, “first the blade, then the ear, then the full corn in the ear,” he is not speaking of evolution, for no plant evolves from the blade, it grows, blade and all, from the seed (vv. 26, 27). The plant thus illustrates the gradual growth of the kingdom from a small beginning, but not evolution.
The arguments for evolution which at one time seemed justified by the Mendelian law have been shattered by the discovery that hybrids return to their original characteristics after two or three generations, if not subject to special care. Here, again, nature presents to our view the wonderful picture of a circular movement, from seed to seed, but not evolution.
The gravest indictment against the Darwinian theory is its tendency to develop agnosticism, or even infidelity. Darwin himself became an agnostic. He rejected the Bible’s conception of God and of Christ, and said, as quoted by his son: “I for one must be content to remain an Agnostic.” (Quoted by Wm. Jennings Bryan in his great speech before the judge in the Scopes’ trial, July 21, 1925.) That the theory of evolution leads to infidelity is admitted by the best informed evolutionists. Arthur Cushman McGiffert, in his, “The Rise of Modern Religious Thought,” declares that it has had this effect upon “many,” but he finds comfort in the fact that it has given us the idea of the immanence of God in everything as a substitute—a poor compensation, I must say, for the loss of the personal God of the Revelations, the Father and Governor of us all!
If we are justified in judging of the attributes of a tree from the quality of the fruit, we must conclude that a theory that produces infidelity cannot be true, not from God.