and on the Origin of the Valleys of Auvergne. 205 



with scientific research, instead of involving, as Vohaire rashly 

 asserted, a physical impossibihty ; and thus, if not directly con- 

 firming the Mosaic history on this particular point, removing at 

 least those obstacles to its reception that might exist, if we con- 

 sidered the event related as out of the course of nature, and on- 

 ly to be explained by the instrumentahty of causes unknown to 

 U9 at present, and which had disappeared without leaving any 

 traces of their existence behind them. 



It is, however, far from my intention to excite a prejudice 

 against any attempt that may be made to explain the phenomena 

 in question on different principles, by insinuating the inconsistency 

 of such other conclusions with the Mosaic records. Nothing, I 

 conceive, can be more unfair than such a mode of attack, or 

 more likely to do injury to the cause it professes to serve. But 

 though a doctrine in science may be true, although involving 

 conclusions that cannot be reconciled, at the time, to the state- 

 ments of Scripture, it will be allowed to be somewhat more pro- 

 bable when in conformity to them ; and, in the present instance, 

 considering, as I should wish to do, the question in the same light 

 as one in which the veracity of profane history alone was at 

 stake *, we shall be inclined to regard it as a recommendation 

 to the view taken, that it confirms and accounts for an event 

 which has reached us through such a variety of distinct chan- 

 nels, that few probably would feel themselves justified in reject- 

 ing the fact of its occurrence, however much they may be dis- 

 posed to differ as to its details. 



It is not, however, my intention to controvert the opinions of 

 Mr Lyell on this point, but only to show that more might be 

 attributed to the effect of sudden catastrophes than he appears 



• I make this concession, in order to prevent the possibility of my being 

 accused of having mixed up a question of theology with one of science. The 

 mode in which thevdeluge might have taken place, the causes which produced 

 it, its universality, and other points of the same description, cannot, I admit, 

 be decided by the words of Scripture, the writers of which describe merely 

 appearances and effects, and need not be supposed to have been enlight^ied 

 with respect to their physical causes. This, however, is quite foreign from 

 the question, whether, in balancing the rival pretensions of two scientific 

 theories, we should be justified in throwing out of the scale the evidence de- 

 rived from a fact so circumstantially related in the earliest of known records, 

 and confirmed, in the main, by the traditions of other nations ? 



