CREATION OF ANIMALS. 29 



are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I 

 saying? Blessing, and honour, and glory and power, 

 be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto 

 the Lamb for ever and ever" 1 Some interpreters 

 understand this passage as relating to those 

 men that were buried under the earth, or in the 

 sea, but admitting they were meant in the spirit, 

 the creatures in general are expressed in the 

 letter, and therefore the outward symbol must 

 have a real existence, as well as what it symbo- 

 lized. 



There is another place in scripture, which 

 though highly metaphorical, seems to me, to 

 point, if rightly interpreted, at subterranean ani- 

 mals, and even a particular description of them. 

 The passage I allude to is in the xlivth Psalm, 

 " Though thou hast sore broken us in the place of 

 dragons and covered us with the shadow of death." 2 

 In these words the place of dragons and the shadow 

 of death evidently mean the same thing ; and the 

 object of these metaphors is to express the lowest 

 degree of affliction, depression, and degradation ; 

 equivalent to being brought down to hell or hades 

 in other passages. The shadow of death, properly 

 speaking, is in the hidden or subterranean world. 

 This appears from the passage of Job before 

 quoted, in which the abyss, the gates of death, 

 and the gates of the shadow of death, are used as 



* Revel, v. 13. 2 Ps. xliv. 19. 



