THE PROBABLE AGE OF THE WORLD. 657 



laws which have been imposed upon its motions. And this seems 

 entirely to exclude the idea that the various bodies of the system 

 could have been created at different times or brought together from 

 different parts of infinite space. We may then safely conclude that 

 the solar system is absolutely isolated in space, and is collectively the 

 result, of one act of creation. To the solar system, therefore, our in- 

 quiry is exclusively confined. 



Although the received chronology of the world has for ages rested 

 upon the supposed authority of the Bible, the sacred text really says 

 nothing at all upon the subject. But, though the assertions which 

 were so long made upon its supposed authority are not really con- 

 tained in the Pentateuch, it is curious to observe how exactly the 

 words of Moses appear to fit the most recent discoveries of science. 

 No one has supposed that we were intended to learn science from the 

 Bible ; it is, therefore, an unexpected advantage to find that its short 

 but pregnant sentences directly support the interpretation put by 

 modern research upon the hieroglyphics of Nature. Moses teaches, 

 just as modern science teaches, that the starry heavens existed far 

 back in past duration, before the creation of the earth. He describes 

 in majestic words the " emptiness " of chaos, and the condition of 

 affairs from which light arose. He describes the formation of the sun, 

 and its gradual condensation into a " light-holder" to give light upon 

 the earth, in terms that almost seem to anticipate Herschel and La- 

 place. Far from assigning any date to the Creation, he is content to 

 refer it to " former duration." No date is either mentioned or implied. 



The so-called chronology was derived from two lists, one extend- 

 ing from Adam to Noah, the other from Noah to Abraham. These 

 lists purport to give the direct line of descent from father to son, and 

 the age of each individual member of the genealogy at the time when 

 the next in succession was born. As Adam was supposed to have 

 been created six days after the commencement of the Creation, it was 

 simple work to add up the sum and fix the age of the world. As long 

 as the progress of physical science showed no necessity for supposing 

 a lengthened period to elapse between the creation of the world and 

 the creation of man, it was taken for granted, almost without discus- 

 sion, that when God had created the heavens and the earth in the 

 beginning, he at once set about the work of arranging them for the 

 use of man; that he distributed this work over six ordinary days, 

 and at the close of the sixth day introduced our first parent on the 

 scene. 



Nowadays, all divines, English and foreign, agree that the word 

 employed by Moses, and translated in our Bible by " the beginning," 

 expresses duration or time previous to creation. JReshith, the He- 

 brew word for beginning, is in the original used without the definite 

 article. The article was expressly omitted in order to exclude the 

 application of the word to the order of creation, and to make it signify 

 vol. ix. 42 



