Ni:W CHAPTERS IN THE WARFARE OF SCIENCE. 435 



there sundry theologians of larger mind attempted to give a more 

 spiritual view regarding some parts of the creative work, and of 

 these St. Augustine was chief. Ready as he was to bend his pow- 

 erful mind to meet the literal text of Scripture, he revolted 

 against the material conception of a creation of the visible uni- 

 verse by the hands and fingers of a Supreme Being, and in this he 

 was followed by Bede and a few others ; but the more material 

 conceptions prevailed, and we find them taking shape not only in 

 the sculptures and stained glass of cathedrals, and in the illumina- 

 tions of missals and psalters, but later, at the close of the middle 

 ages, in the pictured Bibles and in general literature. 



Into the Anglo-Saxon mind this ancient material conception 

 of the creation was riveted by two poets whose works appealed 

 especially to the deeper religious feelings. In the seventh century 

 Ceedmon paraphrased the account given in Genesis, bringing out 

 this material conception in the most literal form ; and a thousand 

 years later Milton developed out of the various statements in the 

 Old Testament, mingled with a theology regarding " the creative 

 word " which had been drawn from the New, his description of the 

 creation by the second person in the Trinity, than which nothing 

 could be more literal and material.* 



" He took the golden compasses, prepared 

 In God's eternal store, to circumscribe 

 This universe and all created things. 

 One foot he centered, and the other turned 

 Round through the vast profundity obscure, 

 And said, ' Thus far extend, thus far thy bounds : 

 This be thy just circumference, world! ' 



But as the evolution of theology proceeded, two new points 

 in this materialistic view were especially developed. The first of 

 these was that no material substance existed before the creation 

 of the material universe that "God created everything out of 

 nothing." Some venturesome thinkers, basing their reasoning 

 upon the first verses of Genesis, hinted at a different view name- 

 ly, that the mass, "without form and void," existed before the 

 universe ; but this doctrine was soon swept out of sight. The vast 

 majority of the fathers were explicit on this point. Tertullian 

 especially was very severe against those who took any other view 

 than that generally accepted as orthodox; he declared that, if 

 there had been any pre-existing matter out of which the world 

 was formed. Scripture would have mentioned it ; that by not men- 

 tioning it God has given us a clear proof that there was no such 

 thing ; and he threatens Hermogenes, who takes tlie opposite view, 



* For Csedmon, see Bouterwek's edition, Gutersloh, 1854, vol. i ; for Milton, see Para- 

 dise Lost, book vii, pp. 225-230. 



