A plea for synthesis of the scientific and the theological point of view of evolution, by a contemporary French Jesuit thinker. First in a projected series of his works.

Introduction / Sir Julian Huxley -- Preface -- Foreword : Seeing -- Book one : Before life came. The stuff of the universe -- The within of things -- The earth in its early stages -- Book two : Life. The advent of life -- The expansion of life -- Demeter -- Book three : thought -- The birth of thought -- The deployment of the noosphere -- The modern earth -- Book four : Survival -- The collective issue -- Beyond the collective : the hyper-personal -- The ultimate earth -- The Christian phenomenon -- The essence of the phenomenon of man --Appendix : Some remarks on the place and part of evil in a world in evolution.