THE WEEK OF SEVEN DAYS. 393 



that it is nowhere hinted that Adam had the knowledge imputed to 

 him. The hints of something resembling the knowledge in patriarchal 

 times have been already noticed, but these may very well be explained 

 by reference to the natural growth of human knowledge, rather than 

 to the hypothesis of a primeval tradition. 



Having laid the foundations which are to be found in the previous 

 part of this paper, I now address myself to the consideration of the 

 week as we find it in the opening of the book of Genesis. 



I propose to argue that the week did not take its rise from the 

 sacred history, but that, contrariwise, the form in which that history 

 was cast depended upon the knowledge possessed by the writer of the 

 division of time by weeks, and of the institution of the Sabbath. 



It will probably be admitted by all that the account of the crea- 

 tion given in the book of Genesis was not the result of scientific 

 investigation. I am not wishing to raise the old question how far 

 the account is consistent with scientific truth — this question does not 

 now concern us — but am only asserting that the creative history can 

 not be regarded in the same manner as that in which we regard a 

 scientific treatise. It is either a speculation, or a poetical picture, or 

 the record of a vision accorded to some gifted seer. Whichever it be, 

 when the author of the written document which we possess came to 

 put down in words his speculation, or his poem, or his vision, he 

 would have to consider, or rather he would instinctively know, what 

 kind of framework he should adopt in order to convey his thoughts to 

 others. Compare the case of Moses, or the author of the original 

 document which Moses used, with that of St. John the Divine. In 

 the Apocalypse St. John speaks of things which he saw in his vision : 

 there were candlesticks, and thrones, and choirs clothed in white gar- 

 ments, and the city of Jerusalem, etc. ; all these were things with 

 which he was familiar, and so his vision adapted itself to and formed 

 itself upon these familiar things. No one will for one moment main- 

 tain the objective existence of these earthly things in that heaven into 

 which St. John was permitted to peep through the open door ; the 

 vision was, in fact, of necessity to a great extent subjective ; it is of 

 the very nature of visions that this should be so. If, therefore, a 

 vision of so absolutely transcendental an event as the creation of the 

 universe be permitted to the mental eye of mortal man, that vision, 

 when imparted to others, must clothe itself in such knowledge as the 

 man himself possesses. And as the man, when he comes to record his 

 vision, will instinctively use his own language — Hebrew, Greek, Latin, 

 whatever it may be — to express himself, so also all other furniture of 

 his mind will be naturally put into requisition in order to describe 

 what he has seen. 



This being conceded, let us suppose Moses himself to have been 

 the speculator, poet, or seer to whom the vision of creation was for 

 the first time vouchsafed, and let us suppose that the division of time 



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