16 THE CHRISTIAN NATURALIST. 



these attracted, though it serves also to shew the 

 lamentable proneness of human nature to lapse into 

 error and guilty superstition, and to pervert to sinful 

 purposes even those things which most clearly display 

 the eternal power and Godhead of the Creator. The 

 same may be said of that depraved fancy of the Greeks 

 and Romans, which imagined many of their favorite 

 heroes and kings to be transformed into stars and con- 

 stellations. But, surely, we are hardly less guilty if we 

 neglect these heavenly luminaries, which might, if 

 rightly studied, shed much light upon our souls, 

 and benefit us even far more than they can do by the 

 rays with which they enliven and adorn the night. 

 They were created, as the book of Genesis tells us, 

 among other purposes, for that of being signs ; signs, 

 not indeed of earthly events, as our superstitious 

 forefathers supposed, but rather of the Creator's bound- 

 less power and skill, who has placed them where they are 

 to raise our thoughts to Him as the " Father of lights, 

 from whom cometh down every good apd perfect gift.'* 

 Hence, as the Psalmist observes, ** The heavens 

 declare,'* (or, as the original implies,) " the heavens 

 are distinctly telling,"* i. e. in every star, the glory of 



* This is the exact meaning of the original, as the words 

 printed in italics in the ordinary version shew. 



