180 ME. GLADSTONE AND GENESIS v 



and a sermon is, that the former, so far as it deals 

 with matters of fact, may be taken seriously, as 

 meaning exactly what it says, while a sermon may 

 not. I have quite enough on my hands without 

 taking up the cudgels for the clergy, who will 

 probably find Mr. Gladstone's definition un- 

 flattering. 



But I am diverging from my proper business, 

 which is to say that I have given no ground for 

 the ascription of these opinions ; and that, as a 

 matter of fact, I do not hold them and never have 

 held them. It is Mr. Gladstone, and not I, who 

 will have it that the pentateuchal cosmogony is 

 to be taken as science. 



My belief, on the contrary, is, and long has 

 been, that the pentateuchal story of the creation 

 is simply a myth. I suppose it to be an hypo- 

 thesis respecting the origin of the universe which 

 some ancient ' thinker found himself able to re- 

 concile with his knowledge, or what he thought 

 was knowledge, of the nature of things, and 

 therefore assumed to be true. As such, I hold it 

 to be not merely an interesting, but a venerable, 

 monument of a stage in the mental progress of 

 mankind ; and I find it difficult to suppose that 

 any one who is acquainted with the cosmogonies 

 of other nations and especially with those of the 

 Egyptians and the Babylonians, with whom the 

 Israelites were in such frequent and intimate 

 communication should consider it to possess 



