I’ve read The Everlasting Man before. Probably on a couple of occasions. I just read it again, and I’m glad I did. As Christians, and especially as Catholic Christians, we must always be on our guard. It’s surprisingly easy how the seeds of heathenry, at least the unhealthy forms of the heathen, can creep into our minds; even without our consent. Or maybe we simply forget that we did, in fact, consent.
I love documentaries, so I watch a lot of the numerous Discovery Channels. I honestly cannot find anything on TV, ever, so I just flip constantly when I could be doing more fruitful things. But regardless, I usually end up on the Discovery or the History channel. They normally walk on the fighting side of me. They speak of theories as fact, and speak of facts as relative. Evolution is their religion and a nonexistent Ape-Man is their god.
Evolution is unnatural, especially materialistic evolution. Whether or not God invented the turtle from the rib of the frog is a matter for theologians and philosophers. I am absolutely certain, though, that when Eve awoke at the side of Adam she awoke starring at a human; and not a missing link.
The evolutionary evidence is scant. A skull fragment here, a tooth there. Chesterton was correct in saying that sometimes the professor with his bone is as dangerous as the dog with his bone. I have often wondered why things are not still evolving, at least if they are I, for one, cannot tell it.
The Cave Man may or may not have been a savage, he was certainly a man. He was certainly as similar to the cave as he was similar to the monkey.
Simply because we share a large amount of that strange potion Scientists call DNA with the Ape doesn’t necessitate that we are the retarded spawn of their mating. We share our hair with all the mammals. Both men and fish have bones. I have even shared a meal with a dog. I did not, however, make the scientific mistake of calling him Grandpa. I cannot see the connection between the hypothesis and the conclusion.
If certain bodily chemicals are shared across several species I cannot see how that happenstance, or that inevitability, means that we must share a common ancestor; even when the evidence looks as if we certainly did not.
Man may well have once shared his coat of fur with the orangatun , but only because he speared and skinned it. The man in the cave may not have played Dungeons and Dragons or traveled the interstates; but he did eventually. His Apely neighbors lived in trees then, and they still dwell there. What are they waiting for?
The Man in the Cave drew pictures on the wall. He went on to build empires, if for no other reason than to destroy them. The Ape has never even attempted to design a bird’s nest, let alone a building; or even a brick.
If man is an animal, he is a severally disfigured and strange creature. Seeming almost to be a stranger to his own home and certainly a betrayer of his brethren animals. We may or may not have many microscopic cells in common, but if we do it is probably because those cells are vital to life on earth. A man and an ape must have somethings in common. After all, they both live, die, and eat bananas. But I submit that the line of brotherhood should end somewhere near there.
Anyway, that’s what I have come to believe. Of course The Everlasting Man follows this line of reasoning, and Chesterton is at his finest and sharpest in defending common sense.
The book gives a sweeping history of the world; from cave men to French men. He deals handily with scientific experts and oriental mystics. He sympathizes with all that was good in paganism, and goes on to show that while it may have been good, it was never good enough. Just because it sufficed did not make it sufficient. He shows how Christianity showed up in a dying world, turned that world upside down, and shook the common sense of mankind out of the grave; like a man dumping out a bucket of bones only to see those bones assemble and run off.
Read the book. Think about it’s implications on your worldview. It was this book that lead a determined atheist named C.S. Lewis to embrace Christianity. Lewis called it the finest book of Christian apologetics that he’d ever read. And while Chesterton does defend Catholicism brilliantly in the book, that was not the books purpose. The book was written in answer to H.G. Wells’ work entitled The Outline of History, which completely ignored the difference between man and beast and Christ and man. A history that ignores historicity is really no history at all. I believe that Wells and Chesterton were friends, and I’m sure after reading The Everlasting Man, Mr. Wells gave his chum a pat on the back and whispered, “Nice job, but I’ll get you back.” As far as I know, Mr. Wells never did. I have never read a more probable or commonsensical theory of history. I’d even go so far as to call Mr. Chesterton’s book… True.
