Chapter XIII: Appendix: A Bishop Horsley on the double sense of Prophecy 257 (9)

5. But then, though you are entreated not to have recourse to the notes of others, you are as strongly advised to make brief memoranda of your own: and the briefer the better. Construct _your own_ table of the Patriarchs,--_your own_ analysis of the Law,--_your own_ descent of the Kings,--_your own_ enumeration of the Miracles. A pedigree full of faults, made by yourself, will do you more good than the most accurate table drawn up by another: but if you are at all attentive and clever, _it will not be_ full of faults.--_You_ will perhaps make the parables 56 instead of 30: you will have gained 26 by your honest industry. Nay, keep a record of your difficulties, if you please; or of anything which strikes you, and which you would be sorry to forget. But, as a rule, it is well to write little, and to give your time and thought to the record before you.

6. Above all, is it indispensable that your reading of the Bible should be strictly consecutive; and on no account may any one pretend to begin such a study of that book as I am here recommending, except at _the first Chapter of Genesis_. It is a great mistake, (though one of the commonest of all,) for a man to imagine that he knows the beginning of the Bible pretty well. I say it advisedly, that it would be easy to write down twelve interesting questions on that first chapter, of which none of the younger men present would be able to answer three,--and yet, they should all be questions of such a sort that a labouring man's child with an open Bible would be able infallibly to answer them every one.

7. It will follow from what has been offered, that you are invited to read every book in the Bible in the order in which it actually stands,--never, of course, skipping a chapter; much less a Book. In every mere catalogue of names, be resolved to find edification. Feel persuaded that details, seemingly the driest, are full of GOD. Remember that the difference between every syllable of Scripture and all other books in the world is, not a difference of _degree_, but of _kind_. All books but one, are _human_: that one book is _Divine_!

Now, you will perceive that the kind of study of the Bible here recommended, is somewhat different from what is commonly pursued. I contemplate the continued exercise of a most curious and prying, as well as a most vigilant and observing eye. _No_ difficulty is to be neglected; _no_ peculiarity of expression is to be disregarded; _no_ minute detail is to be overlooked. The hint let fall in an earlier chapter is to be compared with a hint let fall in the later place. Do they tally or not? and what follows? The chronological details spontaneously evolved by the narrative, are to be unerringly discovered by the student _for himself_. The course of every journey is to be attentively noted. Things omitted are to be spied out as carefully as things set down; and whatever can possibly be gathered in the way of necessary inference, is to be industriously ascertained. The imagination is not to slumber either, because no pains are taken by the sacred writer to move the feelings or melt the heart.

How _soon_ will any one who takes the trouble to read the Bible after this fashion, be struck with a hundred things which he never knew before,--indeed, which are not commonly known! How will he be for ever eliciting unsuspected facts,--detecting undreamed of coincidences, but which are as important as they are true,--accumulating materials of value quite inestimable for future study in Divine things! However unpromising a certain collection of references may be, he is careful to extend it,--convinced, like a wise householder, that there will come an use for it after many days. His whole aim is to _master thoroughly_ the record which he has undertaken to study.

Let me not be misunderstood if it is added that the Bible should be read,--I do not say _in the same manner_,--that is, in the same temper and spirit,--but at least _with the same attention_, as is bestowed upon a merely human work. In truth, it should be read with much more attention. But _that_ diligence which a student commonly bestows on a difficult moral treatise, or an obscure drama, or a perplexed history,--analyzing it, comparing passage with passage, and learning a great deal of it by heart,--I am quite at a loss to understand why a student of the Bible should be a stranger to.--"I do much condemn," (says Lord Bacon), "I do much condemn that Interpretation of the Scripture which is only after the manner as men use to interpret a profane book." So do I. Scripture is to be approached and handled in quite a different spirit from a common history. The mind, the heart rather, must bow down before its revelations, in the most suppliant fashion imaginable. The book should ever be approached with prayer:--"LORD, open Thou mine eyes that I may see the wondrous things of Thy Law!" The very printed pages should be handled with reverence, in consideration of the message they contain. But what I am saying is, that none of the methods which diligence and zeal have ever invented to secure a complete mastery of the contents of any merely _human_ performance, may be overlooked by a student of _the Bible_.

To what has gone before I will add one caution, and will trouble you with one only. It would be easy to multiply cautions: but I am talking to highly intelligent men; and there is only one rock which I am really fearful of your running against.

It was the advice of a great and good man, (to his clergy, I suspect,) that they should read the Bible _with a special object_: and an excellent recent writer has repeated the same advice; namely that men should "read with a view to some particular inquiry, with purpose to clear up some peculiar question of interest, which," (says he,) "you may create for yourselves[257]." I entreat _you_ to do nothing of the kind. Whatever advantages may result to an advanced student from adopting this practice, to _you_ it _must_ be fraught with unmingled evil. You will be tempted to overrate the importance of everything you discover which suits your present purpose: you will disregard all that looks in a different direction: you will be disappointed if you meet with nothing _ad rem_: you will get a habit of slurring over many chapters, many whole books of the Bible. A very little reflection will convince you that it must be as I say. _Who_, for example, could be expected to find delight and edification in the calendar of the Deluge, who had determined to read Genesis with a view to discovering what knowledge existed in the patriarchal age of a future life? No. Your wisdom will be to divest your minds, as much as possible, of _any_ preconceived notion as to what the Bible contains, or was intended to teach you. You should wish to find there nothing so much as the authentic evidence of _what_ Divine Wisdom hath seen fit to communicate to man. Read it therefore, if you are wise, with unaffected curiosity: settling down upon every flower, in order to find out, if you can, _where_ the honey _is_: clinging to it rather, _until you have found_ the honey. Say to yourself,--"It cannot be that all these details of months and days should be given in vain[258]. I _must_ find out the reason of it." And, at last, you will find,--what you will find.--"Very strange," (you will learn to say to yourself,) "that the history of nearly 1600 years should be curdled into one short chapter[259]; and yet that three verses of the Bible should be devoted to the history of a man's losing his way in a field, and then finding it again[260]!" The subject may be worth thinking about. You are perhaps naturally disposed to take what you are pleased to call "a common sense view" of the meaning of Holy Scripture; and to interpret it after a very dry unlovely fashion of your own: to evacuate its deeper sayings, and to doubt the mysterious significancy of its historical details. You will speedily perceive, however, that the Apostles and Evangelists of CHRIST,--as many as were moved by the HOLY SPIRIT of GOD, and spoke not their own words but _His_,--that all these are against you: and the effect of this discovery on an honest and good heart, reading not in order to be confirmed in some preconceived opinion, but with a sincere desire of enlightenment in Divine things,--may be anticipated. Bishop Horsley relates that by a yet simpler process he became disabused of a favourite fancy with which he set out,--namely, that prophecy must of necessity carry a single meaning[261].--The attitude of mind which I so strongly recommend you to assume, (and it depends on an act of the Will, whether you assume it or not,) is very exactly represented by the cry of the child Samuel,--"Speak LORD, for Thy servant heareth!"

It seems right, in the fewest words, to state what we _do_,--and what we do _not_,--expect to result from such a study of the Bible as this; in other words, to assign the office of unassisted Biblical study. I would not willingly have my meaning mistaken _here_.

It is not implied then, for a moment, that a man is either at liberty, or able, to gather his own Religion for himself out of the Bible. The very thought were monstrous. But it is a widely different thing for one of yourselves to read his Bible patiently, and humbly, and laboriously, through,--without prejudice or theory,--unmolested by critical notes, undistracted by human comments, uninfluenced by party views:--all this, I say, is a widely different thing from a man's inventing his own system of Divinity. Members of the Catholic Church,--born in a Christian country,--educated amid the choicest influences for good,--_you_ are by no means so left to yourselves. THE BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER is your sufficient safeguard. The framework of the Faith,--the conditions under which you may lawfully speculate about Divine mysteries,--are all prescribed for you: and within those limits you cannot well go wrong.

On the other hand, the outlines of _Moral Theology_, (as it may be called), you are fully competent to detect for yourselves. GOD'S strictness in punishing sin, as in the case of Moses[262];--the efficacy of repentance, as in the case of Ahab[263];--the sure answer to prayer, (to _forgotten_ prayer, it may be!) as in the case of Zacharias[264];--the seemingly roundabout methods of GOD'S providence, (as in the case of Abraham,) yet conducting inevitably to a blessed issue at the last;--the rewards of obedience[265];--the faithfulness of the Divine promises;--the boundless wealth of the Divine contrivance, which, on man's repentance, is able to convert even a curse into a blessing, as in the case of Levi[266];--the peace and joy surely in reserve for those who fear GOD, as in the case of Joseph;--the extent to which things seemingly trivial are noticed by the Ancient of Days, as every page of the Bible shows;--these, and a hundred points like these, not only a man can gather for himself out of the Book of God's Law, but no one else can do the work for him. He _must_ discover all such matters for himself.

And need I point out, for a minute, the immense advantage with which a mind so stored with Divine knowledge will approach the Ministry; and finally take in hand the actual oversight of the flock? It is really not to be expressed. The Bishop's examination for Orders will become nothing but an agreeable exercise, instead of an object of dread. You are quite sure of a few approving words in _that_ quarter. But, (what is a thousand times more important,) you yourself feel safe and strong. You begin to read some treatise on Divinity; and you find yourself in some degree competent to test the writer's statements, to endorse or to suspect his conclusions, because you are familiar with the Rule of Faith which he himself employed. It becomes your turn at last to instruct others,--from the pulpit for example; and instead of timid truisms, and vague generalities, you are able to draw a bold clear outline round almost any department of Christian doctrine. You can explain with authority.--You are not afraid to catechize before the congregation: for although your Theological attainments are but slender after all, yet, you know your Bible well; and even if an absurdly wrong answer is given you, you know how to single out from the hank the golden thread of Truth, and to display it before the eyes of men and Angels. And let me tell you, by way of ending the subject, we should hear less about dull sermons, and inattentive congregations, and badly filled churches,--as well as about the astounding ignorance of many among the upper classes, in Divine things,--if our younger Clergy knew the Bible a great deal better than they do.--Aye, and we should not have so many unsound remarks about Holy Scripture either,--so many mistaken views of doctrine,--so many crude remarks about Inspiration,--made _by persons who ought to know better_.

You will perceive that I am saying all this, (except the last few words,) _at_ you, (the younger men present;) because in _you_ I see many of the future Clergy of England. And I say it, because, (for the last time,) I do entreat you, one and all, to follow the advice I have been giving you; and to set about such a careful study of the Bible, _at once_. Do not put it off for a single day. Begin it tomorrow morning. You will then have mastered Genesis this term, finishing the last chapter on Sunday the 10th of December; and on Monday, the 11th, you will have to read the first chapter of Exodus. I am confident that you will remember _this_ day and hour with gratitude to the end of your lives, if you will but make the experiment and persevere.

And just one word to those who aspire, (and all _should_ aspire,) to University honours. You will not find what I have been recommending any hindrance to you at all. But even supposing you _do_, now and then, find the inexorable daily half-hour stand in the way of something else,--shall not the very thought of Him whose Voice you have deliberately resolved to hear daily at that fixed time, make you full amends? Shall you resolve to pluck so freely of the Tree of Knowledge, and yet begrudge the approach once a day to the _Tree of Life_, which grows in the midst of the Paradise of GOD? Shall ample time be found for works of fiction,--for the Review, and the Magazine, and the newspaper,--yet half an hour a day be deemed too much to be given to the Word of GOD? What? room for everything and everybody; yet still "no room in the Inn" for _CHRIST_!... I have, (I speak honestly,) I have far too high an opinion of your instincts for good, to think it possible. You have plenty of faults,--(_God_ knoweth!),--but I am very much deceived indeed if there be not a spirit stirring among the young men of this place, overflowing with promise; a real inclination, (obscured at times, but still very energetic,) for whatever things are pure, and lovely, and of good report.

Of course, it is implied by what goes before, that you will read _no_ work _of Divinity_ just at present. Be counselled, on no account, to read any. Above all, shun the partial, ill-digested pamphlet,--and the one-sided review,--and the controversial letter,--and the Essay which seems to have been written in order to prove nothing. Be content, for the next three years, to study no book of Divinity but the Bible.

And the study of _that_ Book, I repeat, you will find no hindrance, no impediment, no burthen to you at all. On the contrary. It will render you a very singular service,--let your classical and logical studies be as severe as they will; (and they cannot well be too severe, too engrossing,--for this is your golden opportunity which never will, never _can_, come back again!) The undersong of "Siloa's brook that flows, fast by the oracle of GOD," will many a time soothe and refresh your else dry and weary spirit. What was begun as a task will soon come to be regarded as a privilege. _That_ jealously-guarded half-hour will be found to be the one green spot in the whole day,--like Gideon's fleece, fresh with the dew of the early morning, when it is "dry upon all the earth beside." Your secret study of that Book of Books, I say, will render you a very singular service. The contrast between the Divine and Human method will strike you with ever-recurring power. Unlike every other History, the Bible removes the veil, and discovers the causes of things,--including the First Great Cause of all, who dwelleth in Light unapproachable, but who yet humbleth Himself to behold, and to controul, and to overrule for good, the things which are done in Heaven and on Earth. And thus, it is not too much to say that the Bible, to one who reads its pages aright, is a certain clue to every other History,--as well as a perpetual commentary on every other Book. It informs the judgment, and cleanses the eye, throughout the whole department of Morals: and as for History, what is it all, but the evidence of GOD in the world,--"traces of _His_ iron rod, or of _His_ Shepherd's staff[267]?"

Profoundly sensible am I, that these have been very unintellectual, and somewhat common-place remarks: but I would rather, a hundred times, be of use to the younger men present; I would rather, a hundred times, succeed in persuading one of _them_, to adopt that method of reading the Bible which I have been recommending;--than try to say something which might be thought fine and clever.... Let me only, in conclusion, faithfully remind them, that the _true_ office of the study of Divine things is not, by any means, that which, for obvious reasons, I have been rather dwelling and enlarging upon. It is _not_ merely to inform the understanding, that Holy Scripture is to be read with such consummate attention, and studied with such exceeding care. It is _not_ for the illustration of History, or in order that it may be made a test of the value of other systems of Morals. _Not_, by any means, in order to facilitate admission into Holy Orders, (for which only some of you are destined;)--or to render a man's pulpit-addresses attractive and agreeable;--or even to enable a parish priest to teach with confidence and authority;--is he entreated now to "prevent the night watches," if need be, that he may be occupied (like one of old time[268],) with GOD'S Word. O no! It is,--in order that his inner life may be made conformable to that outer Law[269]: that his aims may be ennobled, and his motives purified, and his earthly hopes made consistent with the winning of an imperishable crown! It is in order that when he wavers between Right and Wrong, the unutterable Canon of GOD'S _Law_ may suggest itself to him as a constraining motive. Its aim, and purpose, and real function, is, that the fiery hour of temptation may find the Christian soldier armed with "the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of GOD[270]:"--that the dark season of Adversity may find his soul anchored on the Rock of Ages,--which alone can prove his soul's sufficient strength and stay.... Of a truth, as Life goes on, Men will find the blessedness of their Hope; if they have not found it out already. Under every form of trial,--and under every strange vicissitude;--in sickness,--and in perplexity,--and in bereavement,--and in the hour of death;--"LORD,--to _whom_ shall we go? Thou,--_Thou_ hast the words of Eternal Life!"

FOOTNOTES:

[243] Preached in Christ-Church Cathedral, Oct. 21st, 1860.

[244] =tên synagôgên=,--from which it would appear that there was but _one_. See Bishop Middleton on St. Luke vii. 5.

[245] Rom. i. 16.

[246] Heb. iv. 12.

[247] St. Matth. xxiv. 35, &c.

[248] St. John xii. 48.

[249] St. John i. 1, &c.

[250] Ibid. vii. 40-43.

[251] Ibid. i. 45, 46.

[252] St. Luke ii. 48.

[253] Is. vii. 14.

[254] St. Mark vi. 3.

[255] Our Lord's words in St. John viii. 47 are so cited by Archbishop Whately in the Appendix of his Logic.--(App. II. No. 12, p. 418.)

[256] Consider all such places as St. John xi. 45, 46.

[257] Blunt's _Duties of a Parish Priest_,--p. 81.

[258] Gen. vii. 4 to viii. 14.

[259] Ibid. v.

[260] Ibid. xxxvii. 15, 16, 17.

[261] See Appendix A.

[262] Deut. iii. 25, 26.

[263] 1 Kings xxi. 27-29.

[264] St. Luke i. 13.

[265] Jerem. xxxv. 18, 19.

[266] Comp. Gen. xlix. 5-7, with Exod. xxxii. 26-28, (alluded to in Deut. xxxiii. 9,) and finally Numb. iii. 9 and 45, and Josh. xxi. 3-8.

[267] The Rev. C. Marriott's _Sermons_,--vol. I. p. 441.

[268] Ps. cxix. 148.

[269] Not so _Essays and Reviews_, pp. 36 and 45.

[270] Eph. vi. 17.

SERMON II.[271]

* * * * *

NATURAL SCIENCE AND THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE.

* * * * *

HEBREWS xi. 3.

_Through Faith, we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of GOD._

St. Paul, in a famous and familiar chapter of his Epistle to the Hebrews, having declared "what Faith is," proceeds, (as the heading of the chapter expresses it), to note "the worthy fruits thereof in the Fathers of old time." The Book of Genesis was obviously in his hands, or in his heart, while he wrote: for he appeals to the transactions there recorded, in the very order, and often in the very words, of Moses. The HOLY GHOST, I say, directs our attention to what is contained in the ivth,--vth,--vith,--xiith,--xviith,--xxiind,--xxviith,--xlviiith,--and lth chapters of Genesis. But He begins with a yet earlier chapter. _He begins with the first._ Abel,--Enoch,--Noah,--Abraham,--Sarah,--Isaac, --Jacob,--Joseph;--these stand forward as samples of God's faithful ones. But with them, the HOLY GHOST proposes to associate _us_. Moreover, He gives _us_ the place of honour. Before mentioning one of _their_ acts of Faith, He mentions one of _ours_. We come first,--then they. And the particular field in which _we_ shine out so conspicuously,--the special province which is assigned to _us_,--that portion of the inspired Narrative wherein _you and I_ are supposed to shew a degree of undoubting faith which entitles us to rank with those "Fathers of old time,"--is found to be _the first chapter of the Book of Genesis_. "Through Faith _we_ understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God." An honourable place, and an honourable function truly! I would to GOD that it might be as gratifying to every one of the congregation, as it is to the preacher, to discover that _this_ is the special stand-point which has been reserved for him and for them.

Since, however, it is impossible to forget that we have sometimes seen heads, which are supposed to be very much indeed in advance of the age, shaken ominously at the very chapter which the text bequeaths and commends to the special acceptance of you and me,--I propose that, in the very briefest manner, we now review the contents of that chapter; in order that we may discover what is the special absurdity, or impossibility, or improbability, or by whatever other name the thing is to be called,--which makes it quite out of the question that you or I should undertake the act of Faith here assigned us.

I read then, that "In the beginning, GOD created the Heaven and the Earth:"--by which I understand, that, at some remote period,--which may or may not baffle human Arithmetic[272],--it was the pleasure of GOD the FATHER, GOD the SON, GOD the HOLY GHOST,--_three_ Persons, coeternal and coequal,--_one_ GOD,--out of nothing, to create the entire Universe. "All things that are in Heaven, and that are in Earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers: all things were created by Him[273];" and they were created out of nothing. The word in the original does not indeed necessarily imply as much: but since there is _no_ word in Hebrew, (any more than there is in Greek, Latin, or English,) peculiarly expressive of the notion of creating out of nothing, it need not excite our surprise that Moses does not employ such a word to describe what God did "in the beginning."--_Then_ it was, in the grey of that far distant morning I mean, that all those glittering orbs which sow the vault of Heaven with brightness and with beauty, flashed into sudden being. "Thou, even Thou, art LORD alone: Thou hast made Heaven, the Heaven of Heavens, _with all their host[274]_." Suns, the centres of systems, many of them so distant from this globe of ours, that sun and system scarce shew so bright as a single lesser star: suns, I say, with their marvellous equipage of attendant bodies,--_our_ sun among the rest, with all those wandering fires which speed their unwearied courses round it: suns, and planets with their moons, bathed once and for ever in the fountain of that Light which GOD inhabited from all Eternity, then marshalled themselves in mysterious order, according to "the counsel of His will[275]:" yea, and with their furniture, unimagined and unimaginable, went careering through the untrodden realms of space, each on its several errand of glory, because of obedience to its Maker's sovereign Law[276]. "By the Word of the LORD," (as it is written,) "were the Heavens made; and all the hosts of them by the breath of His mouth[277]!"

Now, it is reserved to the geologist,--(Nature's High-priest!)--to guess at the condition of this Earth of ours throughout all the long period of unchronicled ages which immediately succeeded the birthday of Time. It is for _him_ to guess at the successive changes which this globe of ours underwent; and the progressive cycles of Creation of which it was the theatre; and the many strange races of creatures which, one after another, moved upon its surface,--walking the dry, or inhabiting the moist. _He_ shall guess; and _I_ will sit at his feet and listen, with unfeigned gratitude, wonder, and delight, while he reports to me his guesses: (for the really great man is eager to assure me that they are no more.)--But when his tale of perplexity is ended, and the last 6,000 years of this world's History have to be discussed, the geologist's function is at an end. I bid him, in GOD'S Name, be silent; for now it is GOD that speaketh. If any question be moved as to how _that actual system of things to which Man belongs_, began,--I bid him come down, and take the learner's place; for now _I_ mean to assume his vacant chair. _This_ time, there shall at least be no guess-work. GOD is now the Speaker: and what GOD revealeth unto _me_, _that_ I promise faithfully to report to _him_.

There was a time, then,--and it was certainly less than 6,000 years ago,--when "the Earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep." What catastrophe it was which had caused that the fountains of the abyss should be broken up, and the solid Earth submerged, I am not concerned to explain:--nor how it had come to pass that from a world of seas and continents, it had become a watery ball, wrapped about with superincumbent vapour:--nor how the blessed sunlight had suffered dire eclipse;--so that the Earth revolved in a horror of great darkness. _My faith_ however is not troubled,--nor even perplexed,--by the strangeness of these things. Shall I think it a mere matter of course that one little flaw in a pipe shall, in a second of time, transform the orderly well-compacted seats of a goodly Church to one unsightly mass of shapeless and disordered ruin[278]; and shall I pretend to stand aghast at the strangeness of a similar overthrow of this Earth's furniture at the mere fiat of the Most High?... Behold, "He measureth the waters in the hollow of His Hand, and weigheth the mountains in scales[279]." What if the Creator of the earth and the sea shall bid them of a sudden change places? Think you that they would hesitate to obey Him? Or what if He "calleth for the waters of the Sea, and _poureth them out upon the face of the Earth_[280]?"--Then further, if I believe, (as I do believe,) that when the Jews crucified the LORD of Glory "there was darkness over all the land" from the sixth hour unto the ninth[281];--nay, that when "Moses stretched forth his hand toward Heaven, there was a thick darkness in all the land of Egypt," even darkness which might be felt, for three whole days[282]:--more than _that_; if I believe, (as I _do_ believe,) the solemn prediction of my LORD, that at the consummation of all things, "The Sun shall be darkened, and the Moon shall not give her light, and the Stars shall fall from Heaven[283]:"--shall it move me to incredulity, if God tells me, that six thousand years ago it was His Divine pleasure that the same phenomenon should prevail for a season? Surely,--(I say to myself,)--surely this is He "which removeth the mountains, and they know not: which shaketh the Earth out of her place, and the pillars thereof tremble. _Which commandeth the Sun, and it riseth not; and sealeth up the Stars[284]!_"

1. But it was now GOD'S pleasure to bring Beauty out of Chaos, and to establish a fresh order of things upon the surface of our Earth. And, as the first step thereto, "the SPIRIT of GOD moved upon the face of the waters." The Hebrew phrase implies no less than the tremulous brooding as of a bird,--causing the dreary waste to heave and swell with coming life. "And GOD said, Let there be Light. And there was Light." "He spake and it was done[285]." From Himself, who is "the true Light," (not from the Sun, which,--like the rest of the orbs of Heaven,--is but a lamp of His kindling);--from Himself, I say, a ray of Light went forth; and _that_ is why He was pleased to praise it. Look through the chapter, and you will find that it is the only one of His creatures of which it is specially said that "GOD saw that it was good[286]." ... Thus, one hemisphere was illumined,--whereby "GOD divided the light from the darkness;" and when the Earth had completed a single revolution, there had been a Day and there had been a Night,--so named by the Word of GOD: "and the evening and the morning were the first Day[287]." ... Do you see any impossibility so far? I, certainly, see none. It does not seem to me absurd that "the Light of the world[288]," "dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto[289]," should cause "the light to shine out of darkness[290]." We shall perhaps come upon the absurdity by and by. Let us hasten forward.

2. "And GOD said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters." The Hebrew word (_an expansion_), and the context, shew plainly enough what is meant. The atmosphere was now created,--whereupon the watery particles either subsided into sea, or rose aloft in the form of clouds. "And the evening and the morning were the second Day,"--which is the only day of which it is not said that GOD saw that it was good.

3. "And GOD said, Let the waters under the Heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear." Then it was that these continents were upheaved,--other than those which had been continents before; and the sea sank into the cavities which had been ordained for its reception. _Then_, "GOD saw that it was good." The sentence of approval which had been withheld from the work of yesterday, because that work, (namely, of dividing the waters from the waters,) was incomplete,--is freely bestowed to-day. And it may have been to teach us that no incomplete work is "good," in GOD'S sight.--Next, the Creator called into being every extant form of vegetable life. So that, instead of a world of waters, which was all that was to be seen yesterday,--not only cliffs, and mountains, and bays,--but green hills, and fertile valleys, and grassy meadows had come to view,--with lakes, and rivers, and fountains, and falls of water. Again it is written, concerning Earth's green furniture, "GOD saw that it was good." "And the evening and the morning were the third Day."

4. "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 for years." And so it was. Sun, moon, and stars, came to view[291]; and this globe of ours, no longer illumined, as, for three days, it had been, rejoiced in the sun's genial light by day,--and by night in the splendours of the paler planet. And thus was also gained an easy measure for marking time,--the succession of months and years, as well as of days. "And GOD saw that it was good." "And the evening and the morning were the fourth Day."

5. "And GOD said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life." Thus the inhabitants of the sea and of the air were called into existence; and it was from the sea that GOD seems to have commanded that they should derive their being. He saw that it was good, and He blessed the fish and the winged fowl; "and the evening and the morning were the fifth Day."

6. It remained only to provide for the dry land its occupants; and the Earth was accordingly commanded to bring forth the living creature after his kind,--beast and cattle and creeping thing. Unlike that first Creation which was of all things out of nothing, the work of the six days was a creation of new things out of old.--To the Creation of Man, His crowning work, GOD is declared to have come with deliberation; as well as to have announced His purpose with significant solemnity of allusion. "Let us make Man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle." "And the LORD GOD formed Man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and Man became a living soul."--Transferred to the Garden of GOD'S planting in Eden, to dress it and to keep it, (for inactivity is no part of bliss!)--and brought into solemn covenant with GOD,--to Adam, GOD brings the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, of set purpose that GOD may "see _what he will call them_:" a wondrous tribute, truly, to the perfection of understanding in which Man had been created!... "And the LORD GOD caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and He took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof; and the rib which the LORD GOD had taken from man, made He a woman, and brought her unto the man. And Adam said, This is now bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called woman, because she was taken out of man. Therefore shall a Man leave his Father and his Mother, and shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh." ... Man's creation was the crowning wonder, to which all else had, in a manner, tended.... Truly when we think of him,--newly made in GOD'S image,--surveying this world, yet fresh with the dew of its birth, and beautiful as it came from the Hands of its Maker,--it seems scarcely the language of poetry that then "the morning stars sang together and all the sons of GOD shouted for joy[292]."

I have preferred thus to complete the history of Man's Creation; which presents us with the primal institution of all,--that, namely, of Marriage.--"On the seventh Day, GOD rested from all His work which He had made; and blessed the seventh Day, and sanctified it; because that in it He had rested from all His work."--This then is the other great primæval institution; more ancient than the Fall,--the Law of the Sabbath;--which in the sacred record is brought into such august prominence. And never do we ponder over that record, without apprehension at what may be the possible results of relaxing the stringency of enactments which would seem to be, to our nature, as the very twin pillars of the Temple,--its establishment and its strength[293].

Now, on a review of all this wondrous History, I profess myself at a loss to see what special note of impracticability it presents that I should hesitate to embrace it, in the plain natural sense of the words, with both the arms of my heart. That it is not such an account of the manner of the Creation as you or I should have ourselves invented, or anticipated, or on questionable testimony have felt disposed to accept,--is very little to the purpose. Apart from Revelation, we could really have known nothing at all about the works of the Days of the first Great Week. Ejaculations therefore concerning the strangeness of the record, and cavils at the phraseology in which it is propounded, are simply irrelevant.

There exists however a vague suspicion after all that the beginning of Genesis is a vision, or an allegory, or a parable,--or anything you please, except true History. It is hard to imagine _why_. If there be a book in the whole Bible which purports to be a plain historical narrative of actual events, _that_ book is the book of Genesis. In nine-tenths of its details, it is as _human_, and as matter of fact, as any book of Biography or History that ever was penned. _Why_ the first page of it is to be torn out, treated as a myth or an allegory, and in short explained away,--I am utterly at a loss to discover. There is no difference in the style. Long since has the theory that Genesis is composed of distinguishable fragments, been exploded[294]. There is no pretence for calling this first chapter poetry, and treating it by a distinct set of canons. It is a pure _Revelation_, I admit: but I have yet to learn why the revelation of things intelligible, where the method of speech is not such as to challenge a figurative interpretation, is not to be taken literally: unless indeed it has been discovered that a narrative must of necessity be fabulous if the transactions referred to are unusually remote and extraordinary. The events recorded are unique in their character,--true. But this happens from the very necessity of the case. The creation of a world, to the inhabitants of that world is an unique event.

But we are assured that some of the statements in this first chapter of Genesis are palpably untrue;--as when it is said that the Sun, Moon, and Stars were created on the fourth Day,--which, it is urged, is a physical impossibility: for what forces else sustained, and kept this world a sphere? The phenomena of Geology again prove to demonstration, it is said, that the structure of the earth is infinitely more ancient than the Mosaic record states: and also that there must have been Light, and sunshine too, at that remote epoch,--which fostered each various form of animal and vegetable life.--Further, we are assured that it is unphilosophical to speak of the creation of Light before the creation of the Sun.--Then, the simplicity of the language is objected to:--"the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night:"--"dividing the light from the darkness:"--"waters above the firmament:" and so forth. The very ascription of speech to GOD, gives offence.--Again, some raw conceit of the advanced state of the human intellect rejects with scorn the notion of Adam oracularly bestowing names on GOD'S creatures. Finally, the creation of Eve, moulded by GOD from the side of the Protoplast, is declared to savour so plainly of the mythical, allegorical, or figurative; that the narrative must be allowed to be altogether unworthy of such wits as ours.

But we have seen that _the creation_ of Sun, Moon, and Stars is _not_ assigned to the fourth day--but to "_the beginning_"--The antiquity of this Earth we affirm to be a circumstance left wholly untouched by the Mosaic record: or, if touched, it is rather confirmed; for, before beginning to describe the work of the first Day, Moses describes the state of "the Earth" by two Hebrew words of most rare occurrence[295], which denote that it had become waste and empty: while "the deep" is spoken of as being already in existence.--There is nothing at all unphilosophical in speaking of Light as existing apart from the Sun. Rather would it be unphilosophical to speak of the Sun as the source and centre of Light.--I see nothing more childish again in the mention of "the greater and the lesser light," than in the talk of "sun-rise" and "sun-set,"--which is to this hour the language of the Observatory.--As for attributing speech to GOD, I am content to remind you of Hooker's explanation of the design of Moses therein, throughout the present Chapter. "Was this only his intent," (he asks,) "to signify the infinite greatness of GOD'S power by the easiness of His accomplishing such effects without travail, pain, or labour? Surely it seemeth that Moses had herein besides this a further purpose; namely, first to teach that GOD did not work as a necessary, but a voluntary agent, intending beforehand and decreeing with Himself that which did outwardly proceed from Him; secondly, to shew that GOD did then institute a Law natural to be observed by Creatures, and therefore according to the manner of laws, the institution thereof is described, as being established by solemn injunction. His commanding those things to be which are, and to be in such sort as they are, to keep that tenure and course which they do, importeth _the establishment of Nature's Law_.... And as it cometh to pass in a kingdom rightly ordered, that after a Law is once published, it presently takes effect far and wide, all states framing themselves thereunto; even so let us think that it fareth in the natural course of the world. Since the time that GOD did first proclaim the edicts of His Law upon it, Heaven and Earth have hearkened unto His voice, and their labour hath been to do His will[296]."--"_He spake the word_, and they were made: He commanded and they were created. He hath made them fast for ever and ever. _He hath given them a law which shall not be broken[297]._"

Whether or no South overestimated Adam's knowledge, I will not pretend to decide: but I am _convinced_ the truth lies more with him than with certain modern wits, when he says concerning our first Father:--"He came into the world a philosopher; which sufficiently appeared by his writing the nature of things upon their names.... His understanding could almost pierce into future contingents; his conjectures improving even to prophecy, or the certainties of prediction. Till his Fall, he was ignorant of nothing but sin.... There was then no struggling with memory, no straining for invention. His faculties were ready upon the first summons.... We may collect the excellency of the understanding _then_, by the glorious remainders of it now: and guess at the stateliness of the building by the magnificence of its ruins.... And certainly that must _needs_ have been very glorious, the decays of which are so admirable. He that is comely when old and decrepit, surely was _very_ beautiful when he was young! An Aristotle was but the rubbish of an Adam; and Athens but the rudiments of Paradise[298]."

And lastly, as for so much of the Divine narrative as concerns the Creation of the first human pair, I am content to remind you of a circumstance which in addressing believers ought to be of overwhelming weight: namely, that our SAVIOUR and His Apostles, again and again, refer to the narrative before us in a manner which precludes the notion of its being anything but severest History. Our SAVIOUR CHRIST even resyllables the words spoken by the Protoplast in Paradise; and therein finds a sanction for the indissoluble nature of the marriage bond[299].

I take leave to add that even the respectful attempt to make Genesis accommodate itself to the supposed requirements of Geology, by boldly assuming that the days of Creation were each a thousand years long,--seems inadmissible. Even were such an hypothesis allowed, nothing would be gained: for _Geology_ does not by any means require us to believe that after a thousand years of misty light, there came a thousand years of ocean deposit: and again, a thousand years of moist and dry, during which vegetable life alone prevailed: and then a thousand years of sun, moon, and stars. The very notion seems absurd[300].--But, what is more to the purpose, such an interpretation seems to stultify the whole narrative. A _week_ is described. _Days_ are spoken of,--each made up of an evening and a morning. GOD'S cessation from the work of Creation on the Seventh Day is emphatically adduced as the reason of the Fourth Commandment,--the mysterious precedent for _our_ observance of one day of rest at the end of every six days of toil,--"_for_ in six days" (it is declared,) "the LORD made Heaven and Earth[301]." You may not play tricks with language plain as this, and elongate a week until it shall more than embrace the span of all recorded Time.

Neither am I able to see what would be gained by proposing to prolong the Days of Creation indefinitely, so as to consider them as representing vast and unequal periods; (though I am far from presuming to speak of _any_ pious conjecture with disrespect.) My inveterate objection to this scheme is again twofold. (1) The best-ascertained requirements of Geology are _not satisfied_ by a _sixfold_ division of phenomena corresponding with what is recorded in Genesis of the Six Days of Creation. (2) This method does even greater violence to the letter of the inspired narrative than the scheme of reconcilement last hinted at.

I dare not believe that what has been spoken will altogether meet the requirements of minds of a certain stamp. A gentleman, who certainly has the advantage of appearing in good company, has lately favoured the world with the information that the first chapter of Genesis is the uninspired speculation of a Hebrew astronomer, who was bent on giving "the best and most probable account that could be then given of GOD'S universe[302]." The Hebrew writer asserts indeed "solemnly and unhesitatingly that for which he must have known that he had no authority[303];" but we need not therefore "attribute to him wilful misrepresentation, or consciousness of asserting that which he knew not to be true[304]." If this "early speculator" "asserted as facts what he knew in reality only as probabilities," it was because he was not harassed by the scruples which result "from our modern habits of thought, and from the modesty of assertion which the spirit of true science has taught us[305]." The history of this important discovery and of others of a similar nature, (which, by the way, are one and all announced with the same "modesty of assertion" as what goes before,) would appear to be this.--Natural science has lately woke up from her long slumber of well nigh sixty ages; and with that immodesty for which youth and inexperience have ever been proverbial, she is impatient to measure her crude theories against the sure revelation of GOD'S Word. Where the two differ, she assumes that of course the inspired Oracles are wrong, and her own wild guesses right. She is even indecent in her eagerness to invalidate the testimony of that Book which has been the confidence and stay of GOD'S Servants in all ages. On any evidence, or on none, she is prepared to hurl to the winds the august record of Creation. Inconveniently enough for the enemies of GOD'S Word, every advance in Geological Science does but serve to corroborate the record that the Creation _of Man_ is not to be referred to a remoter period than some six thousand years ago. But of this important fact we hear but little. On the other hand, no trumpet is thought loud enough to bruit about _a suspicion_ that Man may be a creature of yet remoter date. Thus, fragments of burnt brick found fifty feet below the surface of the banks of the Nile, were hailed as establishing Man's existence in Egypt more than 13,000 years; until it was unhappily remembered that _burnt_ brick in Egypt belongs to the period of the Roman dominion.--More recently, implements of chipped flint found, with some bones, in a bed of gravel, have been eagerly appealed to as a sufficient indication that the Creation of Man is to be referred to a period at least 10,000 years more remote than is fixed by the Chronology of the Bible.... Brick and flint! a precious fulcrum, truly, for a theory which is to upset the World!

But I shall be told,--with that patronizing air of conscious intellectual superiority which a certain class of gentlemen habitually assume on such occasions,--that I mistake the case completely: that no wish is entertained in any quarter to invalidate the truth of Revelation, or to shake Men's confidence in the Bible as the Word of GOD: that it has been the way of narrow-minded bigots in all ages, and is so in this, to raise an outcry of the Bible being in danger, and so to rouse the prejudices of mankind: that the error lies in claiming for the Bible an office which it nowhere claims for itself, and which it was never meant to fulfil: that the harmony between the Bible and Nature is complete, but that it is not _such_ a harmony as is sometimes imagined: that the Bible is not a scientific book, and was never meant to teach Natural Science: that it was designed to inculcate moral goodness, and is clearly full of unscientific statements, which it is the office of Science to correct; and, if need be, to remove. All this, and much beside, I shall be told. Such fallacious platitudes have been put forth by men who are neither Divines nor Philosophers, _ad nauseam_, within the last forty or fifty years.

Now, in reply, we have a few words to say. The profession of faithfulness we hail with pleasure: the imputation of imbecility we accept with unconcern. But when gentlemen tell us that the Bible was never meant to teach Science; and that wherever its statements are opposed to the clear inductions of reason, they must give way; and so forth: we take the liberty of retaliating their charge. We inform them that _they_ really mistake the case entirely. When they go on to tell us that they believe in the truth of the Bible as sincerely as ourselves: that its harmonies are complete, but not such as we imagine; and so forth;--we venture to add that they really know not what they assert. In plain language, they talk nonsense. Of a simple unbeliever we know at least what to think. But what is to be thought of persons who disbelieve just whatever they dislike, and yet profess to be just as hearty believers as you or I?

That the Mosaic record of Creation has been thought at variance with certain deductions of modern observation, is not surprising: seeing that the deductions of each fresh period have been at variance with the deductions of that which went before; and seeing that the theory of one existing school is inconsistent with the theory of another.--That the Bible is not, in any sense, _a scientific treatise_ again, is simply a truism: (who ever supposed that it was?). Moses writes "the history of the Human Race as regards Sin and Salvation: not a cosmical survey of all the successive phenomena of the globe[306]." Further, that he employs popular phraseology when speaking of natural phenomena, is a statement altogether undeniable. But such remarks are a gross fallacy, and a mere deceit, if it be meant that the statements in the Bible partake of the imperfection of knowledge incident to a rude and primitive state of society. To revive an old illustration,--Is a philosopher therefore a child, because, in addressing children, he uses language adapted to their age and capacity? GOD speaks in the First Chapter of Genesis,--_hath_ spoken for three and thirty hundred years,--as unto children: but there is no risk therefore that in what He saith, He either hath deceived, or will deceive mankind.