HOW LIFE APPEARED ON EARTH 125 



rounded and defined in the sky or could have been 

 visible from this earth as now we see it. "The 

 plants and trees composing the carboniferous 

 strata," believes John Smyth, "may have flourish- 

 ed luxuriously on the margin of shallow seas long 

 before the sun deserved the name of a great 

 light." 2 However this may be, since science can 

 but stammer and surmise, it is plainly admitted 

 and obvious in itself that life could have existed, 

 in the early twilight of our globe, before the full- 

 orbed glory of the sun shone bright upon it, and 

 while the young earth was still swathed in its 

 swaddling bands of vaporous mist. 



It is equally certain that the first simple forms 

 of life were of necessity vegetative. This is at 

 once clear from the fact that vegetation, in its 

 simplest forms at least, was required for what- 

 ever other life might still follow. Hence the 

 startling scientific correctness of the position occu- 

 pied by the origin of vegetation in the sacred 

 narrative. 



Yet here again a word of caution must be 

 spoken. It was certainly not the Divine purpose 

 to compose a scientific treatise. The Sacred 

 Scriptures were to have an equal appeal to the 

 primitive peoples for whom they were first com- 

 posed and the most highly cultivated nations 

 history should yet know. If it was then the Di- 

 vine plan to follow a strictly chronological order 



' "Genesis and Science," p. 40. 



