Arcliaia. 479 



on, or faithfully applied, as a canon of sacred criticism. It is the 

 canon which, to the universal satisfaction of the christian world, 

 has reconciled the statements of Scripture with the Copernican 

 theory and the final inductions of Astronomy. After mature re- 

 flection we are persuaded that it is the only canon by the 

 sober application of which the statements of Scripture can be 

 interpreted in perfect harmony with the facts and final determin- 

 ations of geology. When the inspired writer's speak of the heavens, 

 the stars, the planets, the clouds ; of storms, earthquakes and 

 volcanoes ; of mountains, valleys, seas and rivers ; they, to our 

 thinking, speak of them precisely as they appeared — their words 

 are descriptive of what they saw ; they give true evidence of 

 the facts which nature presented to their eyes ; they propound no 

 theories as to the secondary causes of things, but when they ad- 

 vert to causes at all they at once " rise from nature up to nature's 

 God." The Creator did not reveal to them mediate or secondary 

 causes, and he preserved them from speculating like philosophers 

 about them. If they had speculated the consequence would have 

 been that, destitute as they were of both revealed and scientific 

 knowledge of such things, they would have rendered the Bible 

 no more trustworthy than the Shastres or the Koran. 



Nor is there anything untrue or unscientific in the descriptions 

 of nature as it really appears to our eyes, or is apprehended 

 by our senses. That which we see of nature, however far short 

 it may come of all that may be known concerning its interior 

 properties, is yet an element of importance, and not unfrequently 

 the synthesis to which scientific analysis directly leads. The 

 language which describes things as they appear will always be 

 true in fact, whatever may be the laws upon which such appear- 

 ances depend. Back of these appearances there may, it is true, 

 be whole regions of unimagined wonders which the unaided eye 

 cannot see nor the ear hear, and which but fur the steady and re- 

 sistless march of scientific investigation would be all unknown to 

 man. But the discovery of the unseen does not invalidate the 

 truthfulness of that which is seen. This is still the visible out- 

 works and magnificent portals of the kingdom of nature. Seeing 

 therefore that it was not the purpose of the Creator to give re- 

 vealed anticipations of nature, but to leave nature as a field for 

 the exercise of human intelligence, we can conceive of no bet- 

 ter form in which allusions could be made to nature in the Bible 

 than that of a strict adherence to the language of appear- 

 ances. 



