of matter.

How is it accounted for? By the simple terms of this passage of revealed truth. The Spirit of God came down on this inert mass of material elements, and moved upon it; the omnipotent power of God, guided and directed by his infinite wisdom, operated on this chaos of particles, and designed and effected all the combinations and arrangements of them, which the human intellect in its happiest efforts can but partially know,-can do little more than guess at. But it may be asked, "Has this writer never heard of the laws of nature which have most evidently conduced to the present state of material being? Has he never considered the effects of gravity, concretion, chemical affinity, magnetism, electricity, and various other natural agencies which are now, and have from the beginning been, in operation?" Yes; he has carefully considered all these, and asks in return, Whence did they arise? Are they not all indubitable witnesses of the truth of this text? Do they not all attest the agency of the Spirit of God in creation? Let science display all the wonders of nature, let her testimony be implicitly received; but let the truth of revelation be at the same time granted, and we are necessarily conducted to this important conclusion, that the mysterious agencies which have been referred to, with all that are usually called "the laws of nature," are but records of what the Holy Ghost, in the beginning, imprinted on the passive elements of matter. And if the human mind faints in the attempt to follow these in their ordinary operation, need we wonder that we cannot unravel the mysteries which they produced when called into the most energetic action by the word of His power, when instinct with the omnipotent energy of the Spirit of God? Yet how wonderful is the fact, that, so far as the researches of physical science extend, it appears that the means which the wisdom and power of Jehovah employed in building up our world, are left by him as the great conservative principles of this terrestrial fabric; and through these natural laws and agencies. nature proclaims, in all her works, the being, the wisdom, and the power of God!

The next important point in the narrative which demands. attention, is the creation of light, and its alternation with darkness. We will not dwell on the simple, but intensely sublime, language in which this fact is announced. "Darkness was upon the face of the deep. And God said, Light be: and light was." (Gen. i. 2, 3.) There have not been wanting men who would persuade us that, as Moses wrote at a time when the physical sciences were unknown, we must regard his language with the greatest kindness and consideration: as if God who made the world could not teach his servant to give a proper account of its origin! This passage, of itself, justly exposes all such ridiculous assumption. Moses here speaks of the creation of light as being antecedent to the existence of the sun. For many ages after he wrote, the possibility of this was unknown to the philosophy of this world, although now it is recognised and believed.

"And God divided the light from the darkness." (Gen. i. 4.) We do not know how this could have been done but by means of the diurnal rotation of the earth; and it does not appear improbable that, from this event, time began. The darkness previously existed. God created the light. And to divide the light from the darkness, and to afford this world a rotation of day and night, the daily revolution of the earth was given to it: "And the evening and the morning were the first day." (Verse 5.)

Second Day." And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament. And the evening and the

morning were the second day." (Gen. i. 6—8.)

In this passage we have only the subject of the firmament calling for particular notice. Respecting this, much misconception has prevailed. The meaning of Moses is evident. The term signifies "an expanse," any thing stretched or spread out; and with peculiar force and propriety applies to the atmosphere which is spread over our earth, and encompasses it as a garment. Light had been called into being,

G

and now air succeeds as the next essential material in the garniture of the earth.

It is important to observe the special purpose which this atmosphere is here said to be appointed to serve: "to divide the waters from the waters." The account appears

to teach, that, at first, the whole earth was encompassed with water, and that, when the atmosphere was created, a portion of the water was taken up and suspended on it. The portion so raised and suspended must have been very large, to justify the language of the text. It is, we know, generally supposed that but a small quantity of water, comparatively, is sustained in aqueous vapour in the air; but whatever may be the quantity so sustained now, we are not aware that any reason exists which would prevent us from believing that a very large proportion of the waters of the ocean might be raised and suspended in the atmosphere without the violation of any natural law.

Third Day." And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear and it was so. And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas and God saw that it was good. And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the third day." (Gen. i. 9-13.)

The first operation of this day was to constitute this world a terraqueous globe, by gathering the waters together, and bringing the dry land into appearance. So far as our knowledge extends, the only way in which this could have been done was to cause some parts of the solid surface of the earth to sink, and the others to become elevated, and thus to form a natural receptacle for the waters. It seems extremely probable that this actually took place, not merely from the appearance of the earth, but also

from the general tenor of the language employed. After a part of the waters had been placed above the firmament, we are not told that the quantity which remained was either increased or diminished: they were simply "gathered together."

After this, we have the creation of the vegetable kingdom. This was a grand manifestation of Divine Power. The creation of vegetables was the formation of living organized beings, with spontaneous internal powers, but without locomotion. We will not dwell on their endless variety, their exquisite beauty, or the astonishing adaptation and design so strikingly apparent in every part of this creation; although each of these presents an inviting subject of inquiry. We therefore simply observe, Moses does not tell us that God spoke trees, shrubs, and flowers into existence, as he did the light and the air: he caused them to grow. He said, "Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit-tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth." (Verse 11.) We have here a striking illustration of the sentiment advanced in a preceding page. The vegetable kingdom was called. into being as vegetables now rise into being: they grew out of the earth. "And it was so." The grass, the herbs, the trees, grew in one day; they rose up into such perfect being, that God saw that it was good. If this does not teach that results which now, in the ordinary operations of nature, require a considerable time for their production, were then, by the power of God, produced in the same manner, but in the short space of a day, we candidly confess we can attach no meaning to the language.

Fourth Day." And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth and it was so. And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the hea

ven to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness and God saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day." (Verses 14-19.)

Moses has already informed us, that light was created on the first day; and here he teaches, that the sun and moon were formed on the fourth. This has been urged as one of the most serious objections to the scripture narrative, on the supposition that the sun, being the fountain of light, must have been created before light could exist. Such, for ages, was the commonly-received opinion. But now "no truth in philosophy seems to be more clearly ascertained, than that light has a distinct existence, separate and independent of the sun. The progress of philosophical knowledge has, in this particular, fully justified the Mosaic account. This circumstance is very important. The sacred historian is frequently represented as having written according to the external appearance of physical objects; and it is therefore supposed that, as we obtain a more correct knowledge of natural science, his language will be found to some extent inapplicable to the true state of things. But what is the fact, in the case before us? According to appearance, light emanates from the sun. The idea of the existence of light independent of the sun, could never have been popular. Yet we find Moses speaking of this separate existence, and declaring that light was created three days before the sun. How is this to be accounted for? What does it involve? Undoubtedly, that Moses wrote under the influence of that knowledge which was intimately acquainted with the origin and constitution of all physical being; and that, therefore, any apparent discrepancy between the scripture account, and the discoveries of science, instead of reflecting discredit upon the former, ought rather to teach us that in those respects our philosophical knowledge is imperfect,-that, as yet, we have not hit upon the true key to natural pheno

mena.

* SHARON TURNER'S "Sacred History," vol. i. p. 91.