compared with the Discoveries of the Modern Sciences. 245 
because they did not perceive the extent of its import, or 
because they could not understand it. 
The heavens, in the Bible, are the immense, infinite space, 
through which the nebulous matter, the universal source of 
all the celestial bodies, is diffused. They constitute the 
expansum or immensity, and not the frmamentumof St Jerome, 
nor the oregéwua of the Alexandrine interpreters, nor, finally, 
the eighth heaven of Aristotle and all the ancients, which 
they represent as firm, solid, crystalline, and incorruptible. 
Moses alone has distinguished the primitive light from 
that whose benefits we derive from the sun. He has repre- 
sented it. to us as an element independent of this luminary, 
and as anterior by three epochs to that when it received its 
brilliant atmospheres. This particular in the account of 
the creation, was long considered as irreconcilable with phy- 
sical facts. The distinction has brought many reproaches 
on the author of Genesis: those who uttered them, struck 
with the splendour of the great luminary which presides over 
the day, could not conceive that other sources of light existed 
both for the earth and for the rest of the universe. But the 
difficulties which have been felt, as to the accuracy of the 
Mosaic narration, have not kept their ground before the dis- 
coveries of science. In fact, an immense quantity of light is 
produced here below, and developed in an infinite variety of 
circumstances, altogether foreign from that we derive from 
the sun. Of this nature is the light emitted by volcanic fires ; 
also that accumulated on the surface of clouds, which is not 
an intermittent, but continuous light. This light, produced 
by their phosphorescence, was sufficiently bright, aided espe- 
cially by temperature, humidity, and electricity, all of which 
were more considerable in the first ages, to make vegetables 
grow, before the solar rays had caused their powerful in- 
fluence to be felt. 
Neither does Moses represent the light as created, as 
Biblical commentators have unreasonably supposed ; but he 
represents it as bursting forth at the voice of God. The 
author of Genesis, therefore, is rather in harmony with the 
theory of vibrations or undulations, generally adopted, than 
