3j6 the history of creation. 



cealed beneath. The only Divine ' revelation which we 

 recognise as true, is written everywhere in nature, and to 

 every one with healthy senses and a healthy reason it is 

 given to participate in the unerring revelation of this holy 

 temple of nature, by his own inquiry and independent 

 discovery. 



If we, therefore, here disregard all objections to the Doc- 

 trine of Descent which may be raised by the priests of the 

 different religious faiths, we must nevertheless endeavour 

 to refute the most important of those objections which seem 

 more or less founded on science, and which we grant might, 

 at first sight, to a certain extent captivate us and deter us 

 from adopting the Doctrine of Descent. Many persons seem 

 to think the length of the periods of time required the most 

 important of these objections. We are not accustomed to 

 deal with such immense periods as are necessary for the 

 history of the creation. It has already been mentioned that 

 the periods, during which species originated by gradual J 

 transmutation, must not be calculated by single centuries, 

 but by hundreds and by millions of centuries. Even the 

 thickness ' of the stratified crust of the earth, the consider- 

 ation of the immense space of time which was requisite for 

 its deposition from water, taken together with the periods 

 of elevation between the periods of depression, indicate a 

 duration of time of the organic history of the earth which 

 the human intellect cannot realize. We are here in much 

 the same position as an astronomer in regard to infinite 

 space. In the same way as the distances between the 

 different planetary systems are not calculated by miles but 

 by Sirius- distances, each of which comprises millions 

 of miles, so the organic history of the earth must not be 



