MR. GLADSTONE AND GENESIS. 795 



I think that I have now disposed of those parts of Mr. Gladstone's 

 defense in which I seem to discover a design to rescue his solemn 

 " plea for Revelation." But a great deal of the " Proem to Genesis " 

 remains which I would gladly pass over in silence, were such a course 

 consistent with the respect due to so distinguished a champion of the 

 " reconcilers." 



I hope that my clients — the people of average opinions — have by 

 this time some confidence in me ; for, when I tell them that, after all, 

 Mr. Gladstone is of opinion that the " Mosiac record " was meant to 

 give moral and not scientific instruction to those for whom it was 

 written, they may be disposed to think that I must be misleading 

 them. But let them listen further to what Mr. Gladstone says in a 

 compendious but not exactly correct statement respecting my opinions : 



He holds the writer responsible for scientific precision: I look for nothing 

 of the kind, but assign to him a statement general, which admits exceptions; 

 popular, which aims mainly at producing moral impression ; summary, which 

 can not but be open to more or less of criticism of detail. He thinks it is a 

 lecture. I think it is a sermon (p. 618). 



I note, incidentally, that Mr, Gladstone appears to consider that 

 the differentia between a lecture and a sermon is, that the former, so 

 far as it deals with matters of fact, may be taken seriously, as meaning 

 exactly what it says, while a sermon may not. 1 have quite enough 

 on ray hands without taking up the cudgels for the clergy, who will 

 probably find Mr. Gladstone's definition unflattering. 



But I am diverging from my proper business, which is to say that 

 I have given no ground for the ascription of these opinions, and that, 

 as a matter of fact, I do not hold them and never have held them. It 

 is Mr. Gladstone, and not I, who will have it that the Pentateuchal 

 cosmogony is to be taken as science. 



My belief, on the contrary, is, and long has been, that the Penta- 

 teuchal story of the creation is simply a myth. I suppose it to be an 

 hypothesis respecting the origin of the univei'se which some ancient 

 thinker found himself able to reconcile with his knowledge, or what he 

 thought was knowledge, of the nature of things, and therefore assumed 

 to be true. As such, I hold it to be not merely an interesting but a ven- 

 erable monument of a stage in the mental progress of mankind, and I 

 find it difficult to suppose that any one who is acquainted with the 

 cosmogonies of other nations — and especially with those of the Egyp- 

 tians and the Babylonians, with whom the Israelites were in such fre- 

 quent and intimate communication — should consider it to possess either 

 more or less scientific importance than may be allotted to these. 



Mr. Gladstone's definition of a sermon permits me to suspect that 

 he may not see much difference between that form of discourse and 

 what I call a myth ; and I hope it may be something more than the 

 slowness of apprehension, to which I have confessed, which leads me 



