SEQUEL TO COPERNICUS. 425 



found that the ideas which it calls up, are quite 

 as reconcil cable as the former ones were, with the 

 soundest religious views. And the world then 

 looks back with surprize at the errour of those 

 who thought that the essence of Revelation was 

 involved in their own arbitrary version of some 

 collateral circumstance. At the present day we 

 can hardly conceive how reasonable men should 

 have imagined that religious reflections on the sta- 

 bility of the earth, and the beauty and use of the 

 luminaries which revolve round it, would be inter- 

 fered with by its being acknowledged that this rest 

 and motion are apparent only. 



In the next place, we may observe that those 

 who thus adhere tenaciously to the traditionary or 

 arbitrary mode of understanding Scriptural expres- 

 sions of physical events, are always strongly con- 

 demned by succeeding generations. They are looked 

 upon with contempt by the world at large, who 

 cannot enter into the obsolete difficulties with 

 which they encumbered themselves ; and with pity 

 by the more considerate and serious, who know 

 how much sagacity and right-mindedness are re- 

 quisite for the conduct of philosophers and religious 

 men on such occasions; but who know also how 

 weak and vain is the attempt to get rid of the 

 difficulty by merely denouncing the new tenets as 

 inconsistent with religious belief, and by visiting 

 the promulgators of them with severity such as the 

 state of opinions and institutions may allow. The 



