DABWIiV A^s'-D HIS REVIEWERS. 131 



. EYen when the upholders of the former and more 

 popuL^r system mix np revelation with scientific dis- 

 cussion — which we decline to do — thej by no means 

 thereby render their view other than hypothetical. 

 Agreeing that plants and animals were produced by 

 Omnipotent fiat does not exclude the idea of natural 

 order and what we call secondary causes. The record 

 of the fiat — " Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb 

 yielding seed," etc., " and it was so ; " " let the earth 

 bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle and 

 creeping thing and beast of the earth after his kind, 

 and it was so " — seems even to imply them. Agi-eeing 

 that they were formed of " the dust of the ground," 

 and of thin air, onlv leads to the conclusion that the 

 pristine individuals were coi'poreally constituted like 

 existing individuals, produced through natural agen- 

 cies. To agree that they were created " after their 

 kinds" determines nothing as to what were the origi- 

 nal kinds, nor in what mode, during what time, and 

 in what connections it pleased the Almighty to intro- 

 duce the first individuals of each sort upon the earth. 

 Scientifically considered, the two opposing doctrines 

 are equally hypothetical. 



The two views very unequally divide the scientific 

 world; so that believers in "the divine right of 

 majorities " need not hesitate which side to take, at 

 least for the present. Up to a time quite within the 

 memory of a generation still on the stage, two hypoth- 

 eses about the nature of light very unequally divided 

 the scientific world. But the small minority has al- 

 ready prevailed : the emission theory has gone out ; 

 the undulatory or wave theory, after some fluctuation, 



