36 CONSISTENCY OP GEOLOGICAL, ETC. 



the Israelites against the Polytheism and idolatry of the 

 nations around them ; by announcing that all these mag- 

 nificient celestial bodies were no Gods, but the works of 

 One Almighty Creator, to whom alone the worship of man- 

 kind is due.* 



* Having tlius far ventured to enter into a series of explanations, whicii 

 I think will rceoncile even the letter of the text of Genesis witli the phe- 

 nomena of Geolog-y, I forbear to say more on this important subject, and 

 liave much satisfaction in beinf^ able to refer my readers to some admirable 

 articles in the Christian Observer (May, June, July, August, 1834) for a 

 very able and comprehensive summary of tlie present state of this ques- 

 tion ; explaining the difficulties with which it is surrounded, and offering 

 many temperate and judicious suggestions, as to the spirit in which in- 

 vestigations of this kind ouglit to be conducted. I would also refer to 

 Bishop Horsley's Sermons, Svo. 1816, vol. iii. ser. 39 ; to Bishop Bird 

 Sumner's Records of Creation, vol. ii. p. 356 ; Douglas's Errors regard- 

 ing Religion, 1830, p. 261-264, Higgins on the Mosaical and Mineral 

 Geologies, 1832; and more especially to Professor Sedwick's eloquent 

 and admirable discourse on the Studies of the University of Cambridge, 

 1833, in which he has most ably pointed out the relations which Geology 

 bears to natural religion, and thus sums up his valuable opinion as to the 

 kind of information we ought to look for in the Bible : " The Bible in- 

 structs us that man and other living things, have been placed but a few 

 years upon the earth; and the physical monuments of the world bear 

 witness to the same truth : if the astronomer tells us of myriads of worlds 

 not spoken of in the sacred records ; the geologist, in like manner, proves 

 (not by arguments from analogy, but by the incontrovertible evidence 

 of physical phenomen;;) that there were former conditions of our planet 

 separated from each other by vast intervals of time, during v.hieh man 

 and the other creatures of his own date, had not been called into being. 

 Periods such as these belong not, therefore, to tiie moral history of our 

 race, and come neither within the letter nor the spirit of revelation. 

 Between the first creation of the earth and that day in which it pleased 

 God to place man upon it, who shall dare to define the interval ? On this 

 (juestion scripture is silent, but that silence destroys not the meaning of 

 those physical monuments of his pov/er that God has put before our eyes, 

 giving us at the same time faculties whereby VvC may interpret them and 

 comprehend their meaning." 



