Chapter I: Preface (1)

"You have not allowed for the wind, Hubert," said Locksley, in "Ivanhoe;" "or that had been a better shot."

I remember, when I was in Newfoundland, some five-and-twenty years ago, the disastrous wreck of the brig _Elizabeth_, which belonged to the firm in which I was a clerk. The master had made a good observation the day before, which had determined his latitude some miles north of Cape St. Francis. A thick fog coming on, he sailed boldly by compass, knowing that, according to his latitude, he could well weather that promontory. But lo! about midnight the ship plunged right against the cliffs of Ferryland, thirty miles to the south, crushing in her bows to the windlass; and presently went down, the crew barely saving their lives. The captain _had not allowed for the polar current_, which was setting, like a sluice, to the southward, between the Grand Bank and the land.

When it was satisfactorily ascertained that the heavenly body, now known as Uranus, was a planet, its normal path was soon laid down according to the recognised law of gravitation. But it would not take this path. There were deviations and anomalies in its observed course, which could in nowise be referred to the operation of any known principle. Astronomers were sorely puzzled to explain the irregularities, and to reconcile facts with laws. Various hypotheses were proposed: some denied the facts; that is, the observed places of the planet, boldly assuming that the observers had been in error: others suggested that perhaps the physical laws, which had been supposed to govern the whole celestial machinery, did not reach so far as Uranus's orbit. The secret is now known: _they had not allowed for the disturbances produced by Neptune_.

In each of these cases the conclusions were legitimately deduced from the recognised premises. Hubert's skilled eye had calculated the distance; his experience had taught him the requisite angle at which to shoot, the exact amount of force necessary, and every other element proper to insure the desired result, _except one_. There was an element which he had overlooked; and it spoiled his calculations. _He had forgotten the wind._

The master of the ill-fated brig had calculated his latitude correctly; he knew the rate of his vessel's speed; the compass had showed him the parallel on which to steer. These premises ought to have secured a safe conclusion; and so they would, but for an unrecognised power that vitiated all; he was not aware of the silent and secret current, that was every hour setting him to the south of his supposed latitude.

The path of Uranus had been calculated by the astronomers with scrupulous care, and every known element of disturbance had been considered; not by one, but by many. But for the fact that the planet had been previously seen in positions quite inconsistent with such a path, it would have been set down as beyond controversy correct. Stubborn fact, however, would not give way; and hence the dilemma, till Le Verrier suggested the unseen antagonist.

I venture to suggest in the following pages an element, hitherto overlooked, which disturbs the conclusions of geologists respecting the antiquity of the earth. Their calculations are sound on the recognised premises; _but they have not allowed for the Law of Prochronism in Creation_.

The enunciation of this principle will lie in a nut-shell; the reader will find it at p.124; or p.347. All the rest of the book is illustration.

I do not claim originality for the thought which I have here endeavoured to work out. It was suggested to me by a Tract, which I met with some dozen years ago, or more; the title of which I have forgotten: I am pretty sure it was anonymous, but it was published by Campbell, of 1, Warwick Square. Whether it is still in print I do not know; I never saw another copy. If the author is alive, and if he should happen to cast his eye on this volume, he will doubtless recognise his own bantling, and accept this my acknowledgment.

The germ of the argument, however, I have found, since these pages were written, in "The Mineral and Mosaical Geologies," of Granville Penn (1822). The state of physical science when he wrote did not enable him to press the argument to a demonstration, as I have endeavoured to do; for he could not refer to structural peculiarities as sensible records of past processes, _inseparable from newly created organisms_.

I would not be considered as an opponent of geologists; but rather as a co-searcher with them after that which they value as highly as I do, TRUTH. The path which I have pursued has led me to a conclusion at variance with theirs. I have a right to expect that it be weighed; let it not be imputed to vanity if I hope that it may be accepted.

But what I much more ardently desire is, that the thousands of thinking persons, who are scarcely satisfied with the extant reconciliations of Scriptural statements and Geological deductions,--who are silenced but not convinced,--may find, in the principle set forth in this volume, a stable resting-place. I have written it in the constant prayer that the God of Truth will deign so to use it; and if He do, to Him be all the glory!

P. H. G.

MARYCHURCH, TORQUAY,

_October, 1857_.

CONTENTS.

I

THE CAUSE.

Evidence of the Senses often delusive--Deductions of Reason
fallible--Essentials sometimes overlooked--Discrepancy
between Scripture and Geological Conclusions--Painful
Dilemma--Efforts to escape from it--Supremacy of
Truth--Various Attempts at Reconciliation--Denouncers--Opinions
of Brown--Blackwood--Macbrair--Ure--Penn--Young--Cockburn--
Miller--Sedgwick--Turner--Sumner--Chalmers--Harris--Gray--
Conybeare--Hitchcock--Pye Smith--"Protoplast"--Babbage--
Powell--"Vestiges"--Amplitude of Choice _Page_ 1-29

II.

THE WITNESS FOR THE MACRO-CHRONOLOGY.

A Court of Inquiry--The Witnesses--Testimony of One--Strata
of Thames Tunnel--of Hertfordshire--of Yorkshire--of the
Globe--Granite--Granitic Strata--Organic Remains--Silurian
System--Corals--Trilobites--Mollusks--Devonian System--Old
Red Sandstone--Its Formation--Fishes--Carboniferous
System--Coral Limestone--Millstone Grit--Coal--Predominance
of Carbonic Acid--Extent and Thickness of
Coal-Fields--Formation of Coal--Conjecture as to its
Age--Antediluvian Theory untenable--Sauroid Fishes--Earliest
Reptiles--Footprints of Frogs 30-53

III.

THE SAME--(_continued_.)

Disturbances of Strata--Internal Heat--Changes of Land and
Sea--New Red Sandstone--Footprints--Labyrinthodon--Lias
Formation--Crinoids--Ammonites--Belemnites--Fishes--Marine
Reptiles--Ichthyosaur--Plesiosaur--European
Archipelago--Oolitic Formation--Cycads--Megalosaur--
Bat-Lizards--Iguanodon--Hylæosaur--Earliest
Mammal--Chalk Formation--Infusoria--Diatomaceæ--Their
Minuteness and Numbers--Chambered Cephalopods--Mosasaur--End
of Secondary Formations--Convulsions--Basalt--Uprearing of
Mountain Chains--London Clay--Plants and
Animals--Fishes--Reptiles--Birds--Mammals--Anoplotherium--Condition
of Europe--Dinotherium--Mastodon--Mammoth--Trees--Crag
Formation--Tertiary Fauna--Bone Caves--Kirkdale--Erratic
Blocks--Glaciers--Sloths--Marsupials--Birds--Raised
Beaches--Human Period--Moho--Present Cosmical
Operations--River Deltas--Coral Beefs--Volcanoes--Changes of
Level--Earthy Deposits--Stalagmite--Shells--Recapitulation. 54-101

IV.

THE CROSS-EXAMINATION.

Grandeur of the Evidence--Proposed Line of Objection--It is
but circumstantial--Example of Confusion of
Thought--Analysis of the Reasoning---Dependent on the
exhaustive Power of Observation--Relation of Precedence and
Sequence--Of Cause and Effect--Force of my Position. 102-109

V.

POSTULATES.

The Creation of Matter--The Persistence of Species. 110-112

VI.

LAWS.

The Course of Nature a Circle--Illustrations--Scarlet
Runner--Lady-fern--Hawkmoth--Plumularia--Cow--Universality
of the Law--Creation an Irruption into a Circle--False
Witness to Past Processes--Prochronism and
Diachronism--Phenomena illusory--Recapitulation 113-126

VII.

PARALLELS AND PRECEDENTS.

(_Plants._)

Ideal Tour on Creation-Day--Chronological
Investigations--Queried Age of a Tree-fern--Data for the
Inquiry--Development of the Leaves--Leaf-scars--Report--Its
manifest Error--Selaginella--Bamboo--
Couch-grass--Screw-pine--Pashiuba--Sugar
Palm--Areca--Rattan--Agave--Traveller's Tree--Butterfly
Flower--Orchis--Gladiolus--Grass-tree--White
Lily--Testudinaria--Caffer-Bread--Fig--Banyan--Euphorbia--
Tulip-tree--Bignonia--Loranthus--Prickly
Pear--Mangrove--Silk-cotton-tree--Locust-tree--Restriction
of the Inquiry--Uniform Testimony to Untruth 127-181

VIII.

PARALLELS AND PRECEDENTS.

(_Invertebrate Animals._)

Resumption of the Examination--SeaPen--Millepore--
Madrepore--Organ-pipe--Medusa--Sea-urchin--Feather-star--
Tapeworm--Serpula--Terebella--White-ant--Goliath-beetle--
Gnat--Case-fly--Melicerta--Julus--Buprestis--Shore-crab--
Barnacle--Lepralia--Botryllus--Clavagella--Prickly
Venus--Scorpion Stromb--Tiger Cowry--Thorny Murex--Pearly
Nautilus--Cuttlefish 182-239

IX.

PARALLELS AND PRECEDENTS.

(_Vertebrate Animals._)

Examination of the Vertebrata--Sword-fish--Gilt-head--
Laminæ of Scales--Shark--Arrangement of Teeth--Their
Structure--Tree-frog--Metamorphosis--Rattlesnake--
Crocodile--Tortoise--Laminæ of Plates--Skull of
Cassowary--Peacock--Humming-bird--Trogon--Structure and
Growth of Feathers--Whalebone of Whale--Horn of Ibex--Horn
of Stag--Teeth of Horse--Of Babiroussa--Of
Hippopotamus--Tusk of Elephant--Molars of Elephant 240-273

X.

PARALLELS AND PRECEDENTS.

(_Man._)

Examination of Primal Man--Blood--Its Formation--Its
Oxygenation--Nails--Hair--Bones--Teeth--All formed by
successive Processes--Stature--Thyroid
Cartilage--Beard--Development of Teeth--Proportion of
Bloods--Condition of Skeleton--Navel--False Conclusion 274-291

XI.

PARALLELS AND PRECEDENTS.

(_Germs._)

Assumption of adult Development at Creation--Its
Reasonableness--The Position waived--Assumption of the
Germ-Hypothesis--Double Cocoa-nut--Coral
Tree--Tulip--Earth-pea--Mangrove--Medusa--Connexion of Germs
with Parent--In Echinoderms--In Annelids--In Insects--Egg of
Butterfly--Of Nut Weevil--Of Bots--Of Ichneumon--Of Pill
Chafer--Of Gall-fly--Of Lace-fly--Of Spider--Of Gipsy
Moth--Of Coccus--Of Saw-fly--Of Cockroach--Of
Dirt-dauber--Metamorphosis of Star-fish--Eggs attached to
Brachionus--Viviparous Progeny of Rotifer--Of Asplanchna--Of
Daphnia--Egg-purse of Shark--Economy of Surinam Toad--Egg of
Fowl--Foetus of Kangaroo--Umbilicus 292-334

XII.

THE CONCLUSION.

Uniformity of Results--Prochronism of Organic
Nature--Phenomena inadequate to settle Chronology--Historic
Testimony alone oracular--Familiar Illustration--Objections
met--Analogy between an Organism and a World--Illustration
from a Tree--Analogy between the Life of a Species and that
of an Individual--History Divinely Projected--Grand Plan of
Nature--Diachronic Existence not necessary--Deceptive
Phenomena inseparable from Created Organisms--Illustrations
abundant--Hypothesis of the Life-history of the
Globe--Supposition of 1857 being the Era of Creation--What
its State?--Minuteness and Verity of Proofs of Life present
no Difficulty--Coprolites--Fæcal Residua in newly-created
Animals--_Cyclical_ not _Organic_ Condition the Test of
Prochronism--Illustrations from the inorganic
World--Rivers--Ocean Currents--Celestial Bodies--Velocity of
Light--Records of Entities actually passed--"No Tree has
Leaves"--Plates of Testudinaria--Leaf-scars of Palm--Column
of Nerita--Spines of Murex--Madreporic Plate of
Cribella--Hilum of Seed--Navel of Mammal--Argument of "Great
and Small"--Old Hypothesis of _Lusus Naturæ_--Demonstration
of a Law--Effect of this Principle on the Study of
Geology--Summing up 335-372

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

PAGE

Geological Section of Yorkshire 35 Calymene Blumenbachii 41 Cephalaspis 44 Labyrinthodon 57 Snake-necked Marine Lizards 59 Megalosaurus Bucklandi 61 Bat-lizards 62 Hylæosaurus armatus 63 Mammoth 74 Moho 84 Germination of Scarlet-runner 114 Diagram of Bean 116 " Fern 117 " Hawkmoth 119 " Polype 120 " Cow 121 Leaf-scars of Tree-fern 132 Roots of Iriartea 139 Traveller's Tree 148 Corm of Gladiolus 153 Section of Lily-bulb 157 Testudinaria 159 Encephalartos 162 Twig of Tulip-tree 167 Young Plant of Loranthus 171 Silk-cotton Tree 175 Section of Exogenous Tree 179 Muricated Madrepore 185 Organ-pipe 187 Comatula and Young 194 Serpula 200 Goliath Beetle and Pupa case 206 Larva of Case-fly 209 Melicerta 210 Lepas 218 Botryllus 224 Clavagella 226 Dione Veneris 228 Murex tenuispina 233 Scale of Gilt-head 242 Plates of Tortoise 251 Growth of a Feather 254 Horns of Stag 258 Skull of Babiroussa 262 Skull of Hippopotamus 265 Skull of Elephant 267 Growth of Hair 278 Section of Human Tooth 282 Garden Tulip 298 Germination of Earth-pea 300 Seed of Mangrove 303 Lace-fly and Eggs 312 Brachionus with Eggs 322 Pregnant Asplanchna 323 Hen's Egg 329 Gyroceras 371

[Greek: HO OMPHALOS.]

I.

THE CAUSE.

"Is there not a cause?"--1 SAM. xvii. 29.

An eminent philosopher has observed that "nothing can be more common or frequent than to appeal to the evidence of the senses as the most unerring test of physical effects. It is by the organs of sense, and by these alone, that we can acquire any knowledge of the qualities of external objects, and of their mutual effects when brought to act one upon another, whether mechanically, physically, or chemically; and it might, therefore, not unreasonably be supposed, that what is called the evidence of the senses must be admitted to be conclusive, as to all the phenomena developed by such reciprocal action.

"Nevertheless, the fallacies are numberless into which those are led who take what they consider the immediate results of sensible impressions, without submitting them to the severe control and disciplined analysis of the understanding."[1]

If this verdict is confessedly true with regard to many observations which we make on things immediately present to our senses, much more likely is it to be true with respect to conclusions which are not "the immediate results of sensible impressions," but are merely deduced by a process of reasoning from such impressions. And if the direct evidence of our senses is to be received with a prudent reserve, because of this possibility of error, even when we have no evidence of an opposing character, still more necessary is the exercise of caution in judging of facts assumed to have occurred at a period far removed from our own experience, and which stand in contradiction (at least apparent, _primâ facie_, contradiction) to credible historic testimony. Nay, the caveat acquires a greatly intensified force, when the testimony with which the assumed facts are, or seem to be, at variance, is no less a testimony than His who ordained the "facts," who made the objects of investigation; the testimony of the Creator of all things; the testimony of Him who is, from eternity to eternity, "[Greek: HO APSEUDÊS THEOS]"!

I hope I shall not be deemed censorious in stating my fear that those who cultivate the physical sciences are not always sufficiently mindful of the "_Humanum est errare_." What we have investigated with no little labour and patience, what we have seen with our eyes many many times, in many aspects, and under many circumstances, we naturally believe firmly; and we are very prone to attach the same assurance of certainty to the inferences we have, _bonâ fide_, and with scrupulous care to eliminate error, deduced from our observations, as to the observations themselves; and we are apt to forget that some element of error may have crept into our actual investigations, and still more probably into our deductions. Even if our observations be so simple, so patent, so numerous, as _almost_ to preclude the possibility of mistake in them, and our process of reasoning from them be without a flaw, still we may have overlooked a principle, which, though perhaps not very obvious, ought to enter into the investigation, and which, if recognised, would greatly modify our conclusions.

In this volume I venture to suggest such a principle to the consideration of geologists. It will not be denied that Geology is a science that stands peculiarly in need of being cultivated with that salutary self-distrust that I have above alluded to. Though a strong and healthy child, it is as yet but an infant. The objects on which its senses have been exercised, its [Greek: ta blepomena], are indeed plain enough and numerous enough, when once discovered; but the inferences drawn from them, its [Greek: bebaia], find their sphere in the most venerably remote antiquity,--an antiquity mensurable not by years or centuries, but by _secula seculorum_. And the dicta, which its votaries rest on as certitudes, are at variance with the simple literal sense of the words of God.

I am not assuming here that the Inspired Word has been rightly read; I merely say that the plain straightforward meaning, the meaning that lies manifestly on the face of the passages in question, is in opposition with the conclusions which geologists have formed, as to the antiquity and the genesis of the globe on which we live.

Perhaps the simple, superficial sense of the Word is not the correct one; but it is at least that which its readers, learned and unlearned, had been generally content with before; and which would, I suppose, scarcely have been questioned, but for what appeared the exigencies of geological facts.

Now while there are, unhappily, not a few infidels, professed or concealed, who eagerly seize on any apparent discrepancy between the works and the Word of God, in order that they may invalidate the truth of the latter, there are, especially in this country, many names of the highest rank in physical (and, among other branches, in geological) science, to whom the veracity of God is as dear as life. They cannot bear to see it impugned; they know that it cannot be overthrown; they are assured that He who gave the Word, and He who made the worlds, is One Jehovah, who cannot be inconsistent with Himself. But they cannot shut their eyes to the startling fact, that the records which _seem_ legibly written on His created works do flatly contradict the statements which _seem_ to be plainly expressed in His word.

Here is a dilemma. A most painful one to the reverent mind! And many reverent minds have laboured hard and long to escape from it. It is unfair and dishonest to class our men of science with the infidel and atheist. They did not rejoice in the dilemma; they saw it at first dimly, and hoped to avoid it.[2] At first they believed that the mighty processes which are recorded on the "everlasting mountains" might not only be harmonized with, but might afford beautiful and convincing demonstrations of Holy Scripture. They thought that the deluge of Noah would explain the stratification, and the antediluvian era account for the organic fossils.

As the "stone book" was further read, this mode of explanation appeared to many untenable; and they retracted their adherence to it. To a mind rightly constituted, Truth is above every thing: there is no such thing as a pious fraud; the very idea is an impious lie: God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all; and that religion which can be maintained only by dissembling or denying truth, cannot proceed from "Him that is Holy, Him that is True," but from him who "is a liar, and the father of it."

Many upright and ardent cultivators of the young science felt that truth would be compromised by a persistence in those explanations which had hitherto passed current. The discrepancy between the readings in Science and the hitherto unchallenged readings in Scripture, became manifest. Partisans began to array themselves on either side; some, jealous for the honour of God, knew little of science, and rushed into the field ill-prepared for the conflict; some, jealous for science, but little conversant with Scripture, and caring less for it, were willing to throw overboard its authority altogether: others, who knew that the writings were from the same Hand, knew therefore that there must be some way of reconciling them, and set themselves to find it out.

Have they succeeded? If I thought so, I would not publish this book. Many, I doubt not, have been convinced by each of the schemes by which the discrepant statements have been sought to be harmonized. Each of them has had sufficient plausibility to convince its propounder; and, probably, others too. And some of them have attained a large measure of public confidence. Yet if any one of them is true, it certainly has not commanded universal assent. Let us examine how far they agree among themselves, who propose to reconcile Scripture and Science, "the Mosaic and the Mineral Geologies."

And first, it is, perhaps, right to represent the opinions of those who stand by the literal acceptation of the Divine Word. There have been some, indeed, who refuse to entertain the question of reconciliation, taking the high ground that, as the Word of God is and must be true, it is impious to set any evidence in competition with it. I cannot but say, my sympathies are far more with these than with those who, at the opposite pole of the argument, would make scientific deduction paramount, and make the Word go to the wall. But, then, we ought to be quite sure that we have got the very Word of God; and, so far from being impious, it seems highly proper and right, when conflicting evidence appears to flow out of what is indubitably God's _work_, to examine afresh the witnesses on both sides, that we may not make either testify what it does not.

Those good men who merely _denounce_ Geology and geologists, I do not quote. There are the facts, "written and engraven in stones," and that by the finger of God. How can they be accounted for?

Some have recourse to the assumption that the natural processes by which changes in the earth's surface are now going on, may have operated in antediluvian times with a rapidity and power of which we can form little conception from what we are cognisant of. The Rev. J. Mellor Brown takes this ground, adducing the analogies of steam-power and electricity, as effecting in a few moments or hours, what formerly would have required several days or weeks to accomplish.

"God's most tremendous agencies may have been employed in the beginning of his works. If, for instance, it should be conceded that the granitic or basaltic strata were once in a state of fusion, there is no reason why we should not call in the aid of supposition to produce a _rapid_ refrigeration. We may surround the globe with an atmosphere (not as yet warmed by the rays of the newly kindled sun) more intensely cold than that of Saturn. The degree of cold may have been such as to cool down the liquid granite and basalt in a few hours, and render it congenial to animal and vegetable life; while the gelid air around the globe may have been mollified by the abstracted caloric."[3]

A writer in Blackwood (xli. 181; xlii. 690), in like manner, adheres to the literal sense of Genesis and the Decalogue, and alludes to "the great agencies--the magnetic, electrical, and ethereal influences--probably instrumental in all the phenomena of nature," as being far more powerful than is generally suspected.

Mr. Macbrair--who does not, however, appear, from the amount of his acquaintance with science, competent to judge of the physical evidence--supposes stratification to have proceeded with immense rapidity, because limestone is now deposited in some waters at the rate of six inches per annum. Because a mass of timber, ten miles in length, was collected in the Mississippi, in thirty-eight years, he considers that a "capital coal field" might be formed in a single century. Alluvial strata are mud lavas ejected from volcanoes. The whole difficulty of fossil remains is got rid of by ignoring the distinctions of species, and assuming that the ancient animals and the recent ones are identical. The Pterodactyle and the Plesiosaurus he does not allude to.[4]

According to Dr. Ure,--"The demiurgic week ... is manifestly composed of six working days like our own, and a day of rest, each of equal length, and, therefore, containing an evening and a morning, measured by the rotation of the earth round its axis.... Neither reason nor revelation will justify us in extending the origin of the material system beyond six thousand years from our own days. The world then received its substance, form, and motions from the volition of the Omnipotent."

His theory of the stratification extends over the whole antediluvian era. He supposes that successive irruptions of the central heat broke up the primitive strata and deposited the secondary and tertiary. "The basaltic or trap phenomena lead to the conclusion that such upheavings and subversions were not confined to one epoch of the antediluvian world, but that, coeval with its birth, they pervaded the whole period of its duration.... The Deluge--that universal transflux of the ocean--was the last and greatest of these terraqueous convulsions."[5]

Another class of this school of interpreters refers the stratification of the earth, either to the deluge alone, or to that convulsion conjoined with the one which is considered to have taken place on the third day of the Mosaic narrative. Perhaps the most eminent writer of this class is Mr. Granville Penn, whose opinions may be thus condensed.

He supposes that this globe has undergone only two revolutions. The first was the violent rupture and depression of the surface to become the bed of the sea, and the simultaneous elevation of the other portion to become dry land,--the theatre of terrestrial existence. This first revolution took place before the creation of any organized beings. The second revolution was at the Noachic Flood, when the former bed of the sea was elevated to become the dry land, with all its organic accumulations of sixteen centuries, while the former land was correspondingly depressed and overflowed. "The earth must, therefore, necessarily exhibit manifest and universal evidences of the vast apparent ruin occasioned by its first violent disruption and depression; of the presence and operation of the marine fluid, during the long interval which succeeded; and of the action and effects of that fluid in its ultimate retreat."[6]

Mr. Fairholme[7] so nearly agrees with the above, that I need not quote his opinions in detail.

Another class, represented by Dr. Young and the Rev. Sir W. Cockburn, Dean of York, have maintained with considerable power, backed by no mean geological knowledge, that the deluge is a sufficient _vera causa_ for the stratification of the globe, and for the fossilization of the organic remains.

Dr. Young supposes that an equable climate prevailed all over the globe in the antediluvian period. "Were the highest mountains transferred to the equatorial regions, the most extensive oceans removed towards the poles, and fringed with a border of archipelago,--while lands of moderate height occupied most of the intermediate spaces, between these archipelagos and the equatorial mountains; then a temperature, almost uniform, would prevail throughout the world." This "perpetual summer" would account for the prodigious quantities of animal and vegetable remains:--every region teemed with life.

At the Flood, "the bed of the ocean must have been elevated, and the dry land at the same time depressed," an expansive force acting from below to heave up the ocean's bed. To this agency are attributed the vast masses of granite, gneiss, basalt, and other rocks of igneous origin, which seem to have been forced upwards in a state of fusion, into their present lofty stations. The ancient bed of the ocean may have consisted of numerous layers of sand, clay, lime, and other substances, including corals and marine shells,--to a certain degree consolidated into rocks. By the progressive rising of the waters and the currents so made, fresh materials would be conveyed to the depths of the ocean, so that the magnesian limestone, the saliferous beds, the lias, &c., would be deposited.[8]

The Dean of York, in like manner, considers that the convulsions produced by the Deluge, are sufficient to account for all the stratification and fossil remains. That the gradual rise of the waters, and their penetration into the recesses of the rocks, would cause successive volcanic eruptions; the earlier of which would inclose marine fishes and reptiles; then others in turn, the pachyderms and great reptiles of the plains; and, finally, the creatures more exclusively terrestrial. That these repeated heavings of mighty volcanoes raised great part of what had been the bottom of the sea, above its level, and that hence the present land had been for sixteen centuries under water. That the animals which entered the ark, were not selected till after many species had already perished in the earlier convulsions, and hence the number of extinct species now exhumed.[9]

My reader will kindly bear in mind that I am not examining these opinions; I adduce them as examples of the diversity of judgment that still prevails on a question which some affect to consider as settled beyond the approach of doubt.

A totally different solution of the difficulty has been sought in the hypothesis, that the six "days" of the Inspired Record signify six successive periods of immense though of undefined duration. This opinion is as old as the Fathers at least,[10] and not a few able maintainers of it belong to our own times. It has been put forth, however, with most power, by a late lamented geologist, whose wonderful vigour of description and felicity of illustration, have done, perhaps, more than the efforts of any other living man, to render his favourite science popular.

Perhaps I can scarcely set his views in a more striking light than he himself has done in his own peculiarly graphic report of a conversation, which he sustained with some humble inquirers in the Paleontological Gallery of the British Museum.

"I last passed," says Mr. Hugh Miller, "through this wonderful gallery at the time when the attraction of the Great Exhibition had filled London with curious visitors from all parts of the empire; and a group of intelligent mechanics, fresh from some manufacturing town in the midland counties, were sauntering on through its chambers immediately before me. They stood amazed beneath the dragons of the Oolite and Lias; and, with more than the admiration and wonder of the disciples of old, when contemplating the huge stones of the Temple, they turned to say, in almost the old words, 'Lo! master, what manner of great beasts are these?' 'These are,' I replied, 'the sea-monsters and creeping things of the second great period of organic existence.' The reply seemed satisfactory, and we passed on together to the terminal apartments of the range appropriated to the tertiary organisms. And there, before the enormous mammals, the mechanics again stood in wonder, and turned to inquire. Anticipating the query, I said, 'And these are the huge beasts of the earth, and the cattle of the third great period of organic existence; and yonder in the same apartment, you see, but at its farther end, is the famous fossil Man of Guadaloupe, locked up by the petrifactive agencies in a slab of limestone.' The mechanics again seemed satisfied; and, of course, had I encountered them in the first chamber of the suite, and had they questioned me respecting the organisms with which _it_ is occupied, I would have told them that they were the remains of the herbs and trees of the _first_ great period of organic existence. But in the chamber of the mammals we parted, and I saw them no more."[11]

A large and influential section of the students of Geology regard this hypothesis as untenable. Generally they may be described as holding that the history which is recorded in the igneous and fossiliferous strata does not come into the sacred narrative in any shape. As, however, that narrative commences with "the beginning," and comes down to historic times, the facts so recorded must find their chronology within its bounds. Their place is accordingly fixed by this school of interpretation between the actual primordial creation (Gen. i. 1), and the chaotic state (ver. 2).

Let us hear an able and eloquent geologist, Professor Sedgwick, on the hypothesis just mentioned of the elongation of the six days:--

"They [certain excellent Christian writers on the subject of Geology] have not denied the facts established by this science, nor have they confounded the nature of physical and moral evidence; but they have prematurely (and, therefore, without an adequate knowledge of all the facts essential to the argument) endeavoured to bring the natural history of the earth into a literal accordance with the Book of Genesis; first, by greatly extending the periods of time implied by the six days of creation; and secondly, by endeavouring to show that under this new interpretation of its words, the narrative of Moses may be supposed to comprehend, and to describe in order, the successive epochs of Geology. It is to be feared that truth may, in this way, receive a double injury; and I am certain that the argument just alluded to has been unsuccessful."--"We must consider the old strata of the earth as monuments of a date long anterior to the existence of man, and to the times contemplated in the moral records of his creation."[12]

Many able theologians, who, though well acquainted with natural science, can scarcely be considered as geologists, have been satisfied with this solution of the problem.

Thus Sharon Turner:--

"What interval occurred between the first creation of the material substance of our globe, and the mandate for light to descend upon it, whether months, years, or ages, is not in the slightest degree noticed [in the Sacred Record]. Geology may shorten or extend its duration, as it may find proper."[13]

Thus the present Archbishop of Canterbury:--

"We are not called upon to deny the possible existence of previous worlds, from the wreck of which our globe was organized, and the ruins of which are now furnishing matter for our curiosity."[14]

Thus Dr. Chalmers:--

"The present economy of terrestrial things was raised about six thousand years ago on the basis of an earth then without form and void; while, for aught of information we have in the Bible, the earth itself may before this time have been the theatre of many lengthened processes, the dwelling-place of older economies that have now gone by, but whereof the vestiges subsist even to the present day, both to the needless alarm of those who befriend Christianity, and the unwarrantable triumph of those who have assailed it."[15]

Thus Dr. Harris:--

"The first verse of Genesis was designed to announce the absolute origination of the material universe by the Almighty Creator; and, passing by an indefinite interval, the second verse describes the state of our planet immediately prior to the Adamic creation; and the third verse begins the account of the six days' work."[16]

Thus Mr. Gray:--

"That an antecedent state of the earth existed before the recorded Mosaical epoch, will clearly come out to view by the consideration of the terms used in the second verse. There was at that period, according to the express Mosaic record, anterior to the six days' reduction into order, _existing earth_ and _existing water_."[17]

Probably the majority of our ablest geologists, men who have devoted their lives to the study and elucidation of geological phenomena, are to be found among those who advocate this scheme of reconciling those phenomena with the statements of the Holy Scriptures. Thus one of the earliest cultivators of the science, the Rev. Dr. Conybeare:--

"I regard Gen. i. 1 as an universal proposition, intended to contradict all the heathen systems which supposed the eternity of matter or polytheism; and ver. 2 I regard as proceeding to take up our planet in a state of ruin from a former condition, and describing a succession of phenomena effected in part by the laws of nature (which are no more than our expression of God's observed method of working), and in part by the immediate exercise of Divine power in directing and creating."[18]

Dr. Hitchcock, President of Amherst College, U.S., gives in his adhesion to this principle. After summing up the evidence in favour of the earth's high antiquity, he inquires, "Who will hesitate to say that it ought to settle the interpretation of the first verse of Genesis, in favour of that meaning which allows an intervening period between the creation of matter and the creation of light? This interpretation of Genesis is entirely sufficient to remove all apparent collision between Geology and revelation. It gives the geologist full scope for his largest speculations concerning the age of the world. It permits him to maintain that its first condition was as unlike to the present as possible, and allows him time enough for all the changes of mineral constitution and organic life which its strata reveal. It supposes that all these are passed over in silence by the sacred writers, because irrelevant to the object of revelation; but full of interest and instruction to the men of science who should afterwards take pleasure in exploring the works of God.

"It supposes the six days' work of creation to have been confined entirely to the fitting up the world in its present condition, and furnishing it with its present inhabitants. Thus, while it gives the widest scope to the geologist, it does not encroach upon the literalities of the Bible; and hence it is not strange that it should be almost universally adopted by geologists, as well as by many eminent divines."[19]

Dr. Pye Smith, accepting the immense undefined interval between the event of the first verse, and the condition chronicled in the second, held the somewhat remarkable opinion that the term "earth" in that verse, and throughout the whole description of the six days, is "designed to express the part of our world which God was adapting for the dwelling of man and the animals connected with him." And that portion he conceived to have been "a part of Asia, lying between the Caucasian ridge, the Caspian Sea, and Tartary on the north, the Persian and Indian Seas on the south, and the high mountain ridges which run at considerable distances on the eastern and western flank."

The whole of the six days' creation was confined, on this hypothesis, to the re-stocking, with plants and animals, of this limited region after an inundation caused by its subsidence. The flood of Noah was nothing more than a second overflowing of the same region, by "an elevation of the bed of the Persian and Indian Seas, or a subsidence of the inhabited land towards the south."[20]

The author of "The Protoplast" has made the very original suggestion, that the geological periods may have occurred during the paradisaical condition of man, which he thinks was of an indefinitely protracted duration, human chronology commencing at the Fall.

"We have no data in Scripture from which to gather certain information, and Adam may have lived unfallen _one day_, or _millions of years_." The years of the first man's mortal life began to be reckoned when his immortality ceased. He was nine hundred and thirty years _old_:[21] he had been nine hundred and thirty years gradually decaying, slowly dying.

"It may, indeed, be said that no man could have survived those convulsions of nature, of which traces have been discovered in the earth's crust. I would reply to this;--First, that we have no reason to suppose that these changes affected the whole globe _at once_; they may have been _partial and successive_; and the world's Eden may have been a spot peculiarly exempted from their influence. Secondly, that Adam's body before the fall was not constituted as ours now are; it was incorruptible and immortal: physical phenomena could have had no deleterious effect upon him." "Why should we find any difficulty in supposing that the geological changes which appear to have passed upon the globe, _after_ its creation, and _before_ its curse, were to the first man sources of ever-renewing admiration, delight, and advantage?

"Inclining to the belief that both the animal fell and the animal curse were considerably antecedent to the sin of Adam, I see no difficulty in the admission, that animal death may also have prevailed prior to that event."[22]

While all those writers whose opinions I have cited, feel it more or less incumbent on them to seek a reconciliation between the words of Inspiration and the phenomena of Geology, there are not a few who decline the task altogether. Some eminent in science seem, by their entire avoidance of the question, to allow judgment to go by default. Others more boldly deny that the two can be accommodated.

Mr. Babbage appears to think the archaic Hebrew so insuperably obscure a language, that no confidence can be put in our constructions of its statements; an opinion which, if true, would make the revelation of God to us, with all its glorious types, and promises, and prophecies, more dubious than the readings of Egyptian papyri, or the decipherment of Assyrian cuneiforms.

On this notion, however, Dr. Pye Smith observes:--"All competent scholars, of whatever opinions and parties they may be in other respects, will agree to reject any imputation of uncertainty with respect to the means of ascertaining the sense of the language."

Others find no difficulty in understanding the Hebrew, but in believing it.

Professor Baden Powell sees in the plain, unvarnished narrative of the Holy Spirit, only myth and poetry: it "was not intended for an historical narrative" at all; and he thinks (I hope incorrectly), that there is a pretty general agreement with his views.

"Most rational persons," he says, "now acknowledge the failure of the various attempts to reconcile the difficulty [between Geology and Scripture] by any kind of verbal interpretation; they have learnt to see that the 'six days of thousands of years' have, after all, no more correspondence with anything in Geology than with any sane interpretation of the text. And that the 'immense period at the beginning,' followed by a recent literal great catastrophe, and final reconstruction in a week, is, if possible, more strangely at variance with science, Scripture, and common sense. Yet while they [viz. the 'rational persons,'] thus view the labours of the Bible-geologists as fruitless attempts, they often do not see--," &c. &c.[23]

Of course this gives up the authority of Scripture altogether; and, consistently enough, the author is severe upon the prevalent "indiscriminate and unthinking Bibliolatry." "If in any instance the letter of the narrative or form of expression may be found _irreconcilably at variance with physical truth_,[24] we may allow, to those who prefer it, the alternative of understanding them either as religious truths, represented under sensible images, or as descriptions of events according to the preconceptions of the writers, or the traditions of the age."

The author of "Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation" propounds a theory of organic origin much more worthy of God, than that "mean view," which supposes Him "to come in on frequent occasions with new fiats or special interferences." Coolly bowing aside His authority, this writer has hatched a scheme, by which the immediate ancestor of Adam was a Chimpanzee, and his remote ancestor a Maggot!

* * * * *

In reviewing this array of opinions, is there not sufficient ground for regarding with caution the claim to certainty which has been boldly put forth for the conclusions of Geology? It cannot be denied that there is here room for a very considerable amplitude of choice among discordant hypotheses. All cannot be true, unless on the principle which was claimed for the Church by the Council of Trent--"_Cum enim ecclesia duarum expositionum ubertate gaudeat, non esse eam ad unius penuriam restrigendam!_" I do not for a moment intend to put all these hypotheses and assumptions on the same level. They vary widely as to their tenableness, and as to their prevalence. But if we leave out of view the fears of those who, from insufficient acquaintance with science, are not competent to adjudicate on its positions, and those who despise or decline Biblical authority altogether on this subject, we have still a somewhat wide range to choose from. Shall we accept the _antediluvian_, or the _diluvian_ stratification? the six _ages_ or the six _days_ of creation? the irruptions of internal fire that occurred chiliads _before Man was made_--those during his protracted _paradisaic state_, or those at the time _of the Flood_?--the extension of the Mosaic record _to universal nature_, or its limitation to a region of _south-western Asia_?

I am not blaming, far less despising, the efforts that have been made for harmonizing the teachings of Scripture and science. I heartily sympathise with them. What else could good men do? They could not shut their eyes to the facts which Geology reveals: to have said they were not facts would have been simply absurd. Granting that the whole truth was before them--the whole evidence--they could not arrive at other conclusions than those just recorded; and, therefore, I do not blame their discrepancy _inter se_. _The true key has not as yet been applied to the wards._ Until it be, you may force the lock, but you cannot open it. Whether the key offered in the following pages will open the lock, remains to be seen.

II.

THE WITNESS FOR THE MACRO-CHRONOLOGY.

"You shall well and truly try, and a true deliverance
make,... and a true verdict give, according to the
evidence."--(_Jury Oath._)

A High Court of Inquiry has been sitting now for a good many years, whose object is to determine a chronological question of much interest. It is no less than the age of the globe on which we live. Counsel have been heard on both sides, and witnesses have been called, and most of the judges have considered that an overwhelming preponderance of testimony is in favour of an immeasurably vast antiquity. A single Witness on the other side, however, has deposed in a contrary sense: and, though he has said but little, some of those who have heard the cause attach such weight to his testimony, that they do not feel satisfied to let it be overborne. Counsel on the former side have, indeed, cross-examined the Witness, and dissected his testimony with much skill, and they contend that what he said has been misunderstood by the minority; and that, as his words may at least bear a sense which would not contradict those of the opposing witness, the clear, copious, and unvarying deposition previously made, ought to command the verdict of the Court.

The minority are silenced, but not satisfied; they know not how to give up the Witness on whose veracity they have been wont to rely; but they are unable to answer the arguments brought against him.

Counsel for the Brachy-chronology speaks. "We respectfully ask the Court for another hearing. Will our learned brother permit his witness briefly to recapitulate his testimony, and we will endeavour to examine it once more; for we think we shall be able to detect some flaw in it?" Rule granted.

WITNESS FOR THE MACRO-CHRONOLOGY.

The following, then, is the substance of what the witness deposes. He is not a living witness; his testimony, therefore, is not oral, but written--lithographed, in fact. It consists of a number of documents, which are couched in a language and character not to be understood without some previous study, but yet very capable of translation--very clear and unmistakeable. The following, I say, is a condensed summary of the leading points.

If a curious person had watched the process of making the excavations that were preliminary to the boring of the Thames Tunnel, he would have observed that the labourers exposed successive layers of earth, differing much in colour, consistency, and general character. First, an accumulation of soil, consisting of decayed vegetable and animal matter, mingled with broken pottery, and other rubbish of man's production, was removed; then a layer of sand, gravel, and river mud; then a bed of reddish clay; then a layer of clay, mixed with silt or fine sandy mud; then a thin layer of silt, much filled with shells; then a stratum of stiff blue clay; then a layer of clay of more mottled character, containing a portion of silt, and some shells; then a stratum of very firm clay, so solid that it required to be broken with wedges; then a bed of gravel and sand of a green colour; and finally, a similar layer, but of a coarser texture.

In the course of the hundred feet or so of perpendicular depth thus exposed, he would have seen a succession of layers, apparently deposited upon one another. But as yet he would have formed a very inadequate notion of the stratification of the earth's crust.

With the knowledge thus gained, however, let him now make a little excursion into Hertfordshire; we will suppose at the time when the cuttings for the Great Northern Railway were being made. When he came near Cheshunt, he would see that the London clay, which he found underlying the Thames, crops out, or disappears by the stratum coming obliquely to the surface. He would see, however, another bed of clay--the plastic clay--beneath this, which now forms the superficial stratum, and continues to do so, till he gets beyond Hertford. There this stratum crops out; and the chalk, which for some time he has seen to underlie the plastic clay, now comes to the surface.

Business or pleasure calls him to Bridlington on the Yorkshire coast; and he determines to make a pedestrian tour across the diameter of England to Whitehaven. He soon recognises the chalk, which constitutes the Wolds, and rises to about 800 feet above the sea level. Below its escarpment he traces the Kimmeridge clay, the uppermost of a series of strata more than 2,000 feet in thickness, that constitute the Oolitic system--including, among others, the coralline oolite, the calcareous grit, the cornbrash, thin, but rich in fossils; the lower sandstone and coal of the Cleveland hills, the alum shale, the marlstone, and the lower lias shale.

Then comes a stratum of the saliferous system or the new red sandstone, with the red marls, perhaps not much short of a thousand feet deep. Below them the observer finds the strata of the magnesian limestone formation, for nearly 400 feet, resting on the great coal formations of vast depth. Of these the coal field of the West Riding is not less than 4,000 feet in depth, and beneath it lie the millstone grit, and the mountain limestone, 2,500 feet more, the latter displayed in noble grandeur on the faces of those wall-like precipices that inclose the romantic dales of the Swale and the Ure, and that subsequently tower in magnificent altitude on the sides of Pennygant and Ingleborough.

On the western escarpment of the Pennine ridge, just as the traveller is entering Westmoreland, he would detect the bottom of the limestone; and here he would have an opportunity of seeing, what is rare in these parts, a stratum of the old red sandstone, lying between the former and the slaty rocks of the Cumbrian formations. And here at length, in the wild and magnificent scenery of these mountains, he sees the primitive and transition series, the greenstone, the sienite, and the granite, each of which is discernible in succession on the face of one or other of the lofty Fells of Cumberland.

Our traveller now comes home, and, musing on what he has seen, counts up some thirty or more distinct strata lying in regular succession one on another. But he has not seen all the world, nor even all England; but he reads the results of many independent observations, and finds that while, for the most part, the strata which he has seen are common to the whole surface of the globe, and while the order of their superposition is invariable everywhere, others are in some parts added, while perhaps some of those which he has observed are locally absent. Thus he is able to form a more distinct idea of the stratification of the earth's crust as a whole. It is composed of about forty distinct formations, generally increasing in thickness as we go downwards, so that the whole cannot be much less than ten miles in depth, supposing them in any locality to be all present, and to be lying in the horizontal plane.

Mathematicians have satisfactorily determined that the mean density of the globe is about five-and-a-half times that of water, or about twice that of granite, a fact inconsistent with any other supposition than that the interior is occupied by substances maintained in a fluid state by intense heat. The lowest point that has yet been patent to human observation is occupied by the granite, a compound rock, which bears evident marks of having been once in a state of fusion, and of having cooled slowly, and that under immense pressure, contracting and crystallizing as it parted with its heat. There is every reason to believe that the granite is not defined at its inferior surface, but that it merges into the molten mass, probably still solidifying.

After the outer portion of the granite had cooled sufficiently to become solid, there is evidence that it was covered by water, agitated by powerful currents, and probably in a heated state. The action of these currents disintegrated the rock, and deposited the constituent substances at the bottom of the sea--on the surface, and in the hollows, of the granite. For there is reason to think that the contraction of the primitive rock in the process of cooling, produced irregular undulations or crumplings of the surface, and frequent fractures and dislocations, elevating some parts and depressing others. The gneiss, the mica-schist, and the clay-slate, which are found immediately overlying the granitic rock in strata of vast thickness, are but the components of granite, separated and rearranged. "If we imagine common granite coarsely pounded, and thrown into a vessel of water, it will arrange itself at the bottom of the vessel in a condition very much like that of gneiss, which is indeed nothing else than stratified granite. If the water in which the pounded rock is thrown is moving along at a slow rate, and the clayey portion of the granite, called _felspar_, happens to be somewhat decomposed, as it often is, then the felspar (which is so truly _clay_ that it makes the best possible material for the use of the potteries) and the thin shining plates of mica, will be carried further by the water than the lumps of white quartz or flint sand, which, with the other two ingredients, made up the granite; and the two former will be deposited in layers, which, by passing a galvanic current through them, would in time become mica-schist. If the mica were absent, or if the clay were deposited without it, owing to any cause, then a similar galvanic current would turn the deposit into something like clay-slate."[25]

The deposition of these strata, being formed out of granite, supposes the pre-existence of that rock; and as they occur in vast thicknesses, even of many thousand feet, then separation, deposition, and reconsolidation must have occupied, however rapidly we may suppose the processes to have been accomplished, considerable periods of time.

In these lower rocks, no trace of organic remains has been found. The shoreless ocean that covered the cooling surface of the earth's crust, harboured no polype or sponge, no rhizopod or infusorium, and the angles and clefts of the granite were fringed by no fucus, or conferva: all was waste and void. And if certain parts were elevated above the waters, the bleak and barren points were not clothed with grass, or moss, or even a lichen, and no animal wandered over their ridges. Or, if such did exist, either in land or water, all vestiges of their presence have been destroyed by the agency of the intense heat that subsequently prevailed.