ANTIQUITY OF MAN. 91 



of this will appeal' in the sequel. In the mciintime we may observe that 

 the testimony of the earth coincides with that of the Bible, in repre- 

 senting man as the latest member of the animal kingdom, the last-born of 

 animals. 



" The most important point with reference to any parallelism between the 

 geological history of man as tabulated above and the Biblical record, is to 

 ascertain what absolute value in time can be assigned to the several ages 

 known as post-glacial and recent, or, in other words, how long ago it is since 

 the glacial period terminated. So vague are the data for any calculation of 

 this kind, that the estimates of the date of the glacial period have ranged 

 from hundreds of thousands of years down to a very few thousands. The 

 tendency of recent investigations has been to discard the higher estimates 

 and to bring the close of the glacial age constantly nearer to the present 

 time. The absence of any change in invertebrate life, the small amount of 

 erosion that has occurred since the glacial age, and many other considerations, 

 have been tending in this direction. I may refer to only one criterion, the 

 importance and availability of which were long ago recognised by Sir Charles 

 Lyell. This is the recession of the Falls of IS iagara from the shores; of 

 Lake Ontario to their present position. This recession is effected by the 

 cutting back of beds of limestone and shale ; and the resulting gorge, about 

 seven miles in length, cuts through the deposits of the glacial period, proving, 

 what on other grounds would be obvious, that the cutting began immediately 

 after the glacial age. "When Lyell estimated the time required, the rate of 

 recession of the Fall was supposed to be one foot per annum. It is found 

 however, by the results of actual surveys, to be three feet annually. Lyell's 

 estimate of the time required was thirty thousand years. The new measure- 

 ment reduced this to one-third, and further abatements are required by the 

 possibly easier cutting of the first part of the gorge, by the fact that a portion 

 of it of uncertain amount above the " whirlpool," had been cut at an earlier 

 period and needed only to be cleared out, and by the probability that, in the 

 early post-glacial period there was more water in the £^ iagara Eiver than at 

 present. We thus have physical proof that the close of the glacial sub- 

 mergence and re-elevation of the American land could not have occurred 

 more than about eight thousand years ago. It follows that the ordinarily 

 received chronology of about four or five thousand years for the post-diluvian 

 period, and two thousand or a little more for the ante-diluvian period, will 

 exhaust all the time that geology can allow for the possible existence of man, 

 at least in the temperate regions of the northern hemisphere. Facts recently 

 ascertained with reference to the delta of the Nile,* lead to similar con- 

 clusions for the oldest seats of human civilisation. Whatever demands 

 may be made by philologists, historians, or antiquaries, or by the necessities 

 of theories of evolution, must now be kept within the limits of facts such 

 as those above referred to, and which are furnished to us by physical geo- 

 graphy and geology. These facts must also lead to considerable revision 

 of the excessive uniformitarianism of one school of English geologists, and 

 to explanations more reasonable than some which have been current as to 

 the deposition and age of superficial gravels and similar deposits. When 

 all these points have been adjusted, it will be found that there is a sufli- 

 ciently precise accordance between science and Bible history with regard to 

 the antiquity and early history of man. 



The reader will find a fuller report of the results of the surveys of Niagara 

 Falls, and explanatory diagrams, at page 90 of volume xix. of the Victoria 

 Institute Journal. 



' Egypt and Syria," in Bypaths of Bible Knoiohdge, 



