255 



REVIEWS. 



Art. I. Catalogue of Works on Natural History, lately published, 

 with some Notice of those considered the most interesting to British 

 Naturalists. 



Fairholme, George : A General View of the Geology of Scrip- 

 ture, &c. 8vo, 500 pages. London, 1833. 145. 



When science, forsaking the vague hypotheses and theories 

 of the schools, began to rest on experiment and observation, 

 the progress of discovery was rapid, until the ignorant and the 

 interested, who had long kept the human mind in bondage, 

 became alarmed for their authority. Galileo was confined in 

 the prisons of the Inquisition, for maintaining the motion of 

 the earth ; and, at a still later period, the doctrines supported 

 by Sir Isaac Newton, in his Principia, were pronounced by 

 the Jesuits to be false and heretical, and directly opposed to 

 the records of revelation. These bigots did not or would not 

 perceive that the great object of the sacred historians was the 

 moral and religious improvement of mankind, and not to teach 

 systems of natural philosophy. Had Moses spoken to the 

 Israelites of the earth moving round its axis, it would have 

 appeared so contrary to their own experience of its stability, 

 that he would have been regarded as a fool or a madman, 

 and no attention whatever would have been paid to his doc- 

 trines. Moses, therefore, described the earth, and natural 

 phenomena, as they appeared to the senses of a rude, " stiff- 

 necked, and hard-hearted people;" for such he frequently 

 calls them. In the literal language of Scripture, the earth is 

 an extended plane, " stretching out to the furthermost ends 

 thereof, and resting on foundations that shall never be moved." 

 Heaven is situated above the clouds, and the abode of the 

 departed beneath the surface of the earth. That such is the 

 literal exposition of Scripture, no one can deny ; and yet, we 

 believe, in the present age, no advocate could be found who 

 would be hardy enough so say that the astronomer is com- 

 pelled to receive this as the true system of the world. 



But, while a liberal code of interpretation is allowed to the 

 astronomer, there are persons who would compel the geologist 

 to receive the sacred text literally, and to mould his system 

 upon it, in defiance of the most convincing proofs that such 



