LIFE OF JAMES DWIGHT DANA 



illustration of the utterances, then not uncommon, of in- 

 fluential teachers of religion. 



It should be remembered that in this controversy 

 Professor Dana's purpose was to defend the conclusions 

 he had reached respecting cosmology, and to vindicate 

 their consistency with the truths of revealed religion. 

 He was not by profession a biblical exegete, and his main 

 contention is quite separable from the special mode which 

 he favored of interpreting the narrative of the creation 

 in Genesis. The discussion attracted the attention of 

 many thoughtful men ; but a young naturalist or a young 

 theologian of the present time who may turn to those 

 forgotten pages will be surprised that such questions 

 could then have seemed so important. All theological 

 comments respecting the Bible and respecting the works 

 of creation are now on a very different plane. 



There is a large file of letters from men of mark, show- 

 ing how eagerly they read what Dana had said, and how 

 generally they concurred with his views. Perhaps the 

 most interesting of these letters is one from Professor 

 Agassiz, which will here be given. The entire series 

 would make an interesting chapter in the history of the 

 development of intellectual life in the United States, if 

 such a work should ever be written. 



FROM LOUIS AGASSIZ, THE NATURALIST 



" CAMBRIDGE, Jan. 30, 1856. 



" Many thanks, my dear Dana, for your very friendly 

 words and the pamphlet on Science and the Bible. I have 

 just read it through, and thank you heartily for it and for 

 your powerful vindication of science versus conceited 

 theology. I love the spirit which breathes in your pages, 

 and which has drawn me so near to you. Of course as 

 long as we learn we shall differ on more points from one 

 another, as we differ from ourselves of yesterday if to-day 

 has brought us one step forward ; but when the aim is the 

 same, when the spirit that moves is not self-glorification 



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