DAW^V OF CREATION AND OF WORSHIF. 



^7i 



tained by inquiry, what arc the contents of 

 the crust of the earth, than it could square 

 the circle, or annihilate a fact.* 



So stands the plea for a revelation of 

 truth from God, a plea only to be met by 

 questioning its possibility ; that is, as Dr. 

 Salmon f has observed with great force in a 

 recent work, by suggesting that a Being, 

 able to make man, is unable to communi- 

 cate with the creature lie has made. If, on 

 the other hand, the objector confine himself 

 to a merely negative position, and cast the 

 burden of proof on those who believe in 

 revelation, it is obvious to reply by a ref- 

 erence to the actual constitution of things. 

 Had that constitution been normal or mor- 

 ally undisturbed, it might have been held 

 that revelation as an adminiculum, an addi- 

 tion to our natural faculties, would itself 

 have been a disturbance. But the disturb- 

 ance has in truth been created in the other 

 scale of the balance by departure from the 

 Supreme Will, by the introduction of sin : 

 and revelation, as a special remedy for a 

 special evil, is a contribution toward sym- 

 metry, and toward restoration of the origi- 

 nal equilibrium. 



Thus far only the fourfold succession of 

 living orders has been noticed. But among 

 the persons of very high authority in nat- 

 ural science quoted by Dr. Reusch,:}: who 

 held the general accordance of the Mosaic 

 cosmogony with the results of modern 

 inquiry, are Cuvier and Sir John Herschel. 

 The words of Cuvier show he conceived 

 that " every day " fresh confirmation from 

 the purely human source accrued to the 

 credit of Scripture. And since his day, for 

 he can not now be called a recent authority, 

 this opinion appears to have received some 

 remarkable illustrations. 



Half a century ago. Dr. Whewell § dis- 



* In conversation with Miss Burney (" Diary," i, 

 5T6), Johnson, using language which sounds more 

 disparaging than it really is, declares that " Genius 

 is nothing more than knowing the use of tools ; but 

 then there must be tools for it to use." 



t " Introduction to the New Testament," p. is. 

 Murray, 13S5. 



♦ •• Bibel und Natur," pp. 2, 63. The words of 

 Cuvier are : " Moyses hat uns eine Kosmogonie 

 hinterlassen, dercn Genauigkeit mit jedem Tage in 

 einer bewunderungswurdigern Weise bestiitigt ist." 

 The declaration of Sir John Herschel was in 1864. 



§ Whewell's •'Astronomy and General Physics," 

 1S34, p. ISl seqq. 



cussed, under the name of the nebular hy- 

 pothesis, that theory of rotation which had 

 been indicated by Herschel, and more 

 largely taught by Laplace, as the probable 

 method through which the solar system has 

 taken its form. Carefully abstaining, at 

 that early date, from a formal judgment on 

 the hypothesis, he appears to discuss it 

 with favor ; and he shows that this hy- 

 pothesis, which assumes " a beginning of 

 the present state of things,"* is in no way 

 adverse to the Mosaic cosmogony. The 

 theory has received marked support from 

 opposite quarters. In the " Vestiges of 

 Creation " it is frankly adopted ; the very 

 curious experiment of Professor Plateau is 

 detailed at length on its behalf ; f and the 

 author considers, with Laplace, that the 

 zodiacal light, on which Humboldt in his 

 " Kosmos " has dwelt at large, may be 

 a remnant of the luminous atmosphere 

 originally diffused around the sun. Dr. 

 McCaul, in his very able argument on the 

 Mosaic record, quotes % Humboldt, Pfaff, 

 and Madler — a famous German astronomer 

 — as adhering to it. It appears on the 

 whole to be in possession of the field ; and 

 McCaul observes § that, " had it been de- 

 vised for the express purpose of removing 

 the supposed difficulties of the Mosaic rec- 

 ord, it could hardly have been more to the 

 purpose." Even if we conceive, with Dr. 

 Reville, that the " creation," the first gift 

 of separate existences to the planets, is 

 declared to have been subsequent to that of 

 the earth, there seems to be no known law 

 which excludes such a supposition, espe- 

 cially with respect to the larger and more 

 distant of their number. These, it is to be 

 noticed, are of great rarity as compared 

 with the earth. Why should it be declared 

 impossible that they should have taken a 

 longer time in condensation, like in this 

 point to the comets, which still continue in 

 a state of excessive rarity ? Want of space 

 forbids me to enter into further explana- 

 tion ; but it requires much more serious 

 efforts and objections than those of Dr. 

 Reville to confute the statement that the 

 extension of knowledge and of inquiry has 

 confirmed the Mosaic record. 



* WbewelL op. eit., p. 206. 

 t "Vestiges," etc., pp. 11-15. 

 t " Aids to Faith," p. 210. 



§ Ibid. 



