torial regions, conclude that the sun must have been created for the special purpose of furnishing the extraordinary quantity of light and heat required at the poles under those circumstances, and proceed to establish his inference by referring to the fossil remains of those regions, specifying, as to the plants, their extreme dimensions, luxuriance of growth, and other particulars, and, as to the animals, from the minutest families of indusiæ to the largest mammalia, the fact that they had eyes as well as stomachs; and should he go on to infer, that the sun, having performed this important office during countless ages, and supplied all the light and heat which were necessary during the long nights of his absence, as well as during the alternate periods of his visibility in the respective polar circles, till "the great year of geology" had elapsed, was shorn of his superfluous beams, and restricted in his office, when, for the reception and accommodation of man, the earth was reconstructed, and brought into that improved and felicitous condition which it now enjoys, with its congealed arctics, its frigid and torrid zones, and the storms, vicissitudes, and uncertainties of its temperate latitudes; he would but exemplify the spirit of that theory, which, under the intoxicating influence of novel discoveries and incomprehensible facts, and in all the affectation and pride of science, seeks to make the earth its own interpreter, disregarding or postponing all consideration of the inspired volume; he would but exhibit the spirit of that philosophy which discerns more light in the phosphorescence of a lizard's bones, than in the orb of day-more meaning in a fossil shell, than in the sacred oracle. The most stupendous fact, within the cognizance of man, in the whole field of his observation and research, is the existence of that volume which discloses to us all that we know of the invisible; all that we know, or can divine, of the final causes, reasons, purposes, designs, of the creation, of the earth and its inhabitants, and of the changes they have undergone, or are yet to undergo. When regardless of this source of information, the philosopher of a fallen race, worn to a skeleton by the labour of his physical researches, and mentally subdued by the hallucination of a single idea, sets himself to account for the facts which he discovers, reasoning from an infinite variety of details to the reasons and causes of them, we need not wonder at his credulity, his presumption, his monstrous theories, his dogmatism, his intolerance, his skepticism. When he puts that volume aside for teaching what he does not like, or because he deems it too modern, too unphilosophical, or too obscure, to throw any light upon his science, he turns away from its author, fixes his gaze upon a world of creatures, unassociated with any direct or certain connection with the power or wisdom of a Creator, and plunges into the dark charnel-house of petrifactions, and the illimitable vortex of duration. Science, indeed, helps him in the discovery of facts; but, in reasoning on them, he exhibits only the blindness and imbecility of those unassisted faculties, which he employs in that process. Were he content to abstain from theorizing, from attempts to be wise in what is far beyond his sphere; content with the discovery and disclosure of facts without affect ing to account for them, he would deserve respect and applause for the toil he undergoes, the patience, the self-denial, the diligence, the skill, the perseverance, evinced by his researches, and for the practical utility of his labours. But when he treats the Book of Divine revelation with contempt, and sets up his wisdom in its place, it is quite too much for him to claim or receive the sympathy and homage of any Doctors of Divinity, or other "professed friends," whose regard for that Book exceeds their ambition to be thought learned in physical science, and who would not purchase the reputation, by swallowing, blindfold, any dose prepared for them. CHAPTER X. A brief notice of the opinions of the geological writers, as to the inadequacy of the Noachian Deluge to account for the changes which have taken place on the surface of the earth, or any considerable portion of them, is subjoined, not with a view to suggest or support any theory of the effects of that catastrophe, as to their extent, or the mode of operation by which they were produced. The Scripture narrative is delivered in such terms as to authorize the belief that the effects of that visitation, were as extensive as the object and reason of it can, to any one, appear to have required. The narrative gives it all the characters of an extraordinary visitation of Divine Providence. It was a curse upon the earth and its inhabitants. "God looked upon the earth, and behold it was corrupt for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. And God said unto Noah, the end of all flesh is come before me: for the earth is filled with violence through them: and behold, I will destroy them with the earth. And behold I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven and every thing that is in the earth shall die. And all flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creep : |