4. The followbig section was prepared for this Cy- clopndia by the late Dr. Harbaugh just before his death. We print it as he left it, though it hivolves a UtUe repetition of what has been given above.
-Oewfopmsrrf.— This word, related primarily to the sphere of organic life in the natural world, has also come to perform important service in science, especial- ly in psychology, philosophy, theology, and history. In the earlier stages of science generally, the data and
phenomena were classified and arranged according to the outvard peculiarities which they presented. In time, however, and especially under the influence of Christianity, as the key to the deepest life of the world, scientific thinking felt itself urged to a deeper appre- hension of all kinds of phenomena. The mechanical and outward in systematizing accordingly had to give way to the determining power of mere inward princi- ples.
Thus it has come to pass that while science, so tex as it has been apprehended and advanced by non- Christian thinking, has been, for the most part, satis- fied with the word progress^ science grounded in the distinctively Christian principle has found the word development indispensable. The word, as thus used, presupposes a distinctive theory of the essence of Christianity, and so also of the Church, its history and its dogmas, as well as of affiliated sciences, such as psychology and philosophy. It finds inadequate the view of the essence of Christianity which resolves it into the idea of doctrine^ as in Supranaturalism ; so also the view which makes it only an ethical force, law, or rtde of life, as set forth in the school of Kant and by Rationalism ; and so, moreover, the concep- tion that it is, in its essential character, a mere power of redemption operative in the ^Jtere of religious feel" inff, according to Schleiermacher and the Mystics. Admitting and appreciating all these as secondary and dependent, it holds that Christianity is primarily and essentially a l»/e— the divine-human life of its founder, Jesus Christ— which becomes the deepest life of renew- ed humanity, of history, and of science (see UUman, DisHncHee Character and Essence of Christianity), Life being essentially organic, it must have the word development to indicate that unfolding from a germ- like inward principle which is the distinctive charac- teristic of organic life. To the genetic processes in- volved in the activities of life it applies the word de- velopment. " This idea of an or^^mic, steadily im- proving development of humanity, according to a wise, unalterable plan of Providence, is properly as old as Christianity, meets us in many passages of the New TesUment (Matt, xiii, 81, 82; Ephes. iv, 12-16; Co- loss, ii, 19 ; 2 Pet. iii, 18), and in occasional remarks of the early fathers, such as Tertullian and Augustine ; and was brought out in the 18th century with peculiar emphasis and (freshness by the genial Herder, in his *■ Ideas on the Philosophy of the History of Humanity' (784), so highly valued by the gifted historian of Swit- zerland, John von MCdler" (see Herder's SdmmtGche Werhe, eur PhU. und Gesch. TheU iii, § 74 sq.). " The more mature and philosophical conception of it, how- ever, and the impulse which it gave to a deeper and a livelier study of history, are due especially to the phi- losophy of ScheUing, and, still more, of Begel. With He^ all life and thought is properly development, or a process of organic growth, which he calls Aufhe- bung~4hat is, in the threefold sense of this philosoph- ical term so much uesd by him, (1.) an abolition of the previous imperfect form (an aufheben, in the sense of ioUere) ; (2.) a preservation of the essence (conser- vare) ; and (8.) an elevation of it to a higher stage of existence (elevarey (Dr. SchaflTs History qfthe Apost, Church, p. 90, 91).
The conception of development has, however, also been carried out of its proper Christian sense, and per- verted to the service of anti- Christian systems of thought. Thus Pantheism, layhig hold upon some in- sufficiently guarded point in tiie Hegelian theory, has employed it in its scheme. The one school of Hegel, denying with him the existence of a personal God, as the creator of all principles of created life, proposes to account for all animated existence by a theory of de- velopment starting in matter, ideas, or thought (all of which, however, it leaves vague and floating), holding that nature through successive upward gradations ul- timately reaches self-consciousness in the human spir-
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it, and thus also God himself comes to exist in the form of the general human consciousness, th^ world- idea, the self-manifestation of the idea of God, "who is at once the manifestation and the moment of the process of the development and actualization of his substance as the absolute spirit" (Herzog, Real-Encjf-' Idop, V, 629). Nor has Rationalism failed to seize upon and pervert the Christian conception of development for its use. Leaving out of view and ignoring the nature of Christianity as a life, it acknowledges no lile-princi- ple in Christianity ; consequently breaks with all ge- netic, traditionary, or historical processes, and proposes a prepress of moral enlightenment which shall ad- vance beyond Christ, the Churcli, and Revelation. Its processes and progress, which it calls development, starting in revolution, can present only a history of deterioration and corruption. The Christian idea of development, properly used, leaves no room for such- like revolution and negative progress. Substantially into this snare Prof. Bush lias faUen, in the otherwise just and valuable discussion by which he introduces his work on the Resurrection (^AnatUuit^ the Introduo' Hon, p. 18-29). The Roman Catholic convert, John Henry Newman^ has also a theory of development, which, however, seems to be rather a development in the sphere of ideas than of facts — of life ; hence it is rather mechanical and philosophical than organic and Christian. It moves more in the region of subjective mental processes tlian in the objective essential life of Cliristianity. It is consequently of little actual ac- count either as a polemic against the Protestant idea of development, or as fixing on a firmer and more con- sistent basis the dogmas of the Roman fiiith, over into which he passed while his work (which actually mark- ed his transition) was going tlirou^^ the press (JEttay en the Development ofChrittian Doctrine), The Roman theory can conceive of no development except in the way of progress that needs as such to be outwardly measured by referring itself to an outward infallible authority in the pope. But ** such development requires no * infiillible earthly head' for its direction and con- duct, just as little as a living oak needs to be built up by line and compass. An authority of this sort, sup- posed to supersede the free working of the intelligence and will of the Church itself^ would be the source of petrifaction and stagnation only, not of development. This implies f^«edom, ethical activity, life poised upon itself as a principle and centre. It is just the stability system which in every shape turns into mechanism and leads to popery*' (Kevin, Mercenburg Remewy i, 518, 514).