32 The discoveries of Geology 



We had found it already stated in the 1st verse, that the heavens and 

 the earth were created in the beginning, antecedently to the work of 

 the six days, by which they were reduced to their present order, and 

 the earth was peopled with organized beings. It would seem an un- 

 warrantable interpretation to exclude the sun, moon, and stars from 

 among the objects expressed by the general terms, the heavens and 

 the earth. It is the most obvious interpretation, that they were then 

 created, and were lighted up on the first day, but that it was only 

 during the fourth epoch, that they were made, the greater light to 

 rule over the present day, and the lesser light to rule over the pres- 

 ent night, and to be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and for 

 years, according to the measures of time which we now find estab- 

 lished by them. This part of the history, then, when interpreted in 

 consistency with the 1st verse, and without any violence to the terms, 

 implies, in the common language of men, which, in all nations, refers 

 the diurnal and annual revolutions of the heavenly bodies to the mo- 

 lions of these bodies themselves, that the earth was, during this 

 epoch, finally brought into its present orbit. 



The work of the third epoch was the appearance of the dry land, 

 and the creation of the vegetable kingdom. The history of the 

 latter, in our common translation, is, v. 11, " God said, Let the earth 

 bring forth grass (in the margin tender grass), the herb yielding seed, 

 and the fruit-tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, 

 upon the earth: and it was so." V. 12, "And the earth brought 

 forth grass, and the herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree 

 yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind." The terms 

 grass (in Hebrew, deshe), herb (Hebrew, oeseb), and tree (Hebrew, 

 etz), are here all put disjunctively in the Hebrew ; there being only 

 one conjunction in the twelfth verse between herb and tree, which 

 does not affect the disjunctive character of the three terms, as it is a 

 common practice in the Hebrew writings to couple, in this manner, 

 the two last of a series of disjunctive terms, as, for example, the 

 names of the four kings in Genesis xiv. 1. In the two last of these 

 terms, herb and tree, we find a recognition of a remarkable natural 

 distinction among the vegetable tribes, and this very circumstance 

 would lead us to infer, that the first term, which has obviously pre- 

 sented a difficulty to our translators, since they have given two inter- 

 pretations of it, is intended to express some class or tribe of the 

 vegetable kingdom, naturally distinguished from herbs and trees, as 

 they are from one another. The term in question (deshe) is a noun 



