COMMENTS BY PROFESSOR IIEXRY DRUMMOXD. 811 



secours surnaturel dont, comme cbretien, vous devez les croiro guides? Oil? 

 Dans Tesprit ubsolument nouveau qui anime lour narration, bien que la forme en 

 soit restee presque de tout point la m§rao quo chez les peuples voisins.* 



[Trans. — But if it is so, I may be asked, wbere, tben, do you see tbe divine 

 inspiration of tbe writers wbo made tbis arcbaaology, tbo supernatural aid by 

 ■whicb you, as a Cbristiun, must believe tbey were guided? "Wbere? In tbe 

 absolutely new spirit tbat animates tbeir narration, altbougb the form of it may 

 still be in almost every point tbo same as with tbe neighboring peoples.] 



A second principle is expressed with such appositeness to the pres- 

 ent purpose, by an English commentator, that his words may be given 

 at length : 



There is a principle frequently insisted on, scarcely denied by any, yet recog- 

 nized with sufficient clearness by few of the advocates of revelation, which, if 

 fully and practically recognized, would have saved themselves much perplexity 

 and vexation, and tbe cause they have at heart the disgrace with which it has 

 been covered by the futile attempts that have been made, through provisional 

 and shifting interpretations, to reconcile the Mosaic Genesis with the rapidly 

 advancing strides of physical science. The principle referred to is this: matters 

 whicb are discoverable by human reason, and the means of investigation which 

 God has put within tbe reach of man's faculties, are not the proper subjects of 

 Divine revelation ; and matters which do not concern morals, or bear on man's 

 spiritual relations toward God, are not within tbe province of revealed religion.! 



Here lies the whole matter. It is involved in the mere meaninsr of 

 revelation, and proved by its whole expression, that its subject-matter 

 is that which men could not find out for themselves. Men could find 

 out the order in which the world was made. What they could not 

 find out was, that God made it. To this day they have not found that 

 out. Even some of the wisest of our contemporaries, after trying to 

 find that out for half a lifetime, have been forced to give it up. Hence 

 the true function of revelation. Nature in Genesis has no link with 

 geology, seeks none and needs none : man has no link with biology, and 

 misses none. What he really needs and really misses — for he can get 

 it nowhere else — Genesis gives him ; it links Nature and man with 

 their Maker. And this is the one high sense in which Genesis can be 

 said to be scientific. The scientific man must go there to complete his 

 science, or it remains forever incomplete. Let him no longer resort 

 thither to attack what is not really there. What is really there he can 

 not attack, for he can not do without it. Nor let religion plant posi- 

 tions there which can only keep science out. Then only can the inter- 

 preters of Nature and the interpreters of Genesis understand each 

 other. — Xlneteen th Century. 



* " Les Oiigines de rilistoire," Pr^f., xviii. f Quarry, " Genesis," pp. 12, 13. 



