Luminaries. 315 



have. The sun existed in some form all the time, 

 but it had not taken its place to mark the seasons. 

 Its heat was not needed as it is now, if it affected the 

 earth at all. Of the necessity of its light, there is 

 not the same certainty. The earth still has its own 

 sources of light, in the aurora, and in its shooting 

 stars which give it scattered sparks of the same 

 light as gives the sun its glow. It is reasonable to 

 infe r that, from the intense action of its forces, the 

 earth in its early history had light enough for its 

 low type of vegetation. But if not, so far as there 

 was light from the sun, it was dim and diffused light 

 struggling through the dense vapors ; the sun itself 

 probably never appearing. 



Hut at the close of the coal period, the earth had 

 so far cooled, that condensation had probably, in a 

 measure, cleared the air ; and now was the time 

 when the sun could appear in the heavens ; and the 

 cooling earth began to be dependent upon him for 

 heat as well as light. And the moon began to give 

 borrowed light, and the stars to glitter in the hea- 

 vens, where they had been for ages, but not for the 

 earth. They all now had their relations established 

 and their work appointed for this earth, simply by 

 the changes in the earth itself. And when they 

 were thus ordained, this was their day. And the 

 evidence we have that they were thus brought into 

 action, at this time, is found in the nature of the 

 changes that then occurred, and the higher type of 

 life that then appeared. 



"And God said, Let the waters bring forth abund- 



