98 PIONEERS OF EVOLUTION PART 



equally elastic ; and that if the Mosaic narrative was 

 regarded as a poetic revelation of the general succes- 

 sion of phenomena, beginning with the development 

 of order out of chaos, and ending with the creation 

 of man, Scripture would be found to have anticipated 

 or revealed what science confirms. It was impossible, 

 so theologians argued, that there could be aught else 

 than harmony between the divine works and the 

 writings which were claimed to be of divine origin. 

 Science could not contradict revelation, and whatever 

 seemed contradictory was due to misapprehension 

 either of the natural fact, or to misreading of the 

 written word. But although the story of the creation 

 might be clothed, as so exalted and moving a theme 

 warranted, in poetic form, that of the fall of Adam and 

 of the drowning of his descendants, eight persons 

 excepted, must be taken in all its appalling literal- 

 ness. Confirmation of the Deluge story was found 

 in the fossil shells on high mountain tops ; while 

 as for the giants of antediluvian times, there were 

 the huge bones in proof. Some of these relics 

 of mastodon and mammoth were actually hung up 

 in churches as evidence that ' there were giants in 

 those days'! Geoffroy Saint -Hilaire tells of one 

 Henrion, who published a book in 1718 giving the 

 height of Adam as one hundred and twenty-three 

 feet nine inches, and of Eve as one hundred and 

 eighteen feet nine inches, Noah being of rather less 

 stature. But to parley with science is fatal to 

 theology. Moreover, arguments which involve the 

 cause they support in ridicule may be left to refute 

 themselves. And while theology was hesitating, as 

 in the amusing example supplied by Dr. William 



