THE LAPSE OF THE. 



THE divergence of opinion between scientific and 

 unscientific persons is scarcely anywhere more con- 

 spicuous than in their measurements of the age of 

 the world we live in. A popular impression still pre- 

 vails that the old beldame earth, as Hotspur calls it, 

 is about six thousand years of age. A little margin 

 is sometimes allowed. By an exercise of heroic liber- 

 ality a period of ten or twelve thousand years is oc- 

 casionally conceded for the earth's existence. Any 

 chronology discontented with these ample limits comes 

 within the domain of rash and dangerous speculation. 

 Some, indeed, who would fain conciliate all parties, 

 are willing to extend the bounds on certain conditions. 

 They will grant a large extra slice of time, provided 

 that during that period the earth was a shapeless un- 

 inhabited lump, or if inhabited, not inhabited by men. 

 ' Come, now,' says the cheap-jack, ' I '11 tell you what 

 I '11 do with you ; I '11 throw you in another five 

 thousand years ; fifteen thousand years ! and take 

 the lot. What ! not do ? I '11 make it twenty thousand. 



