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rying us back some four thousand years into the midst of the patri- 

 archal ages, yet breathes a spirit of no vulgar philosophy ; and when 

 it speaks of Him " who hangeth the earth upon nothing," who " maketh 

 a weight for the winds, and weigheth the waters by measure," might 

 tempt us to seek here, with Hutchinson, for the true system of the uni- 

 verse. In that book, I say, we have the first account of the creation of 

 the world, proceeding, as it were, from the mouth of the Creator him- 

 self. " The Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said. Where 

 wast thou M'hen I laid the foundations of the earth ? declare if thou 

 hast understanding. Who hath laid the measures thereof, or who hath 

 stretched the line upon it, whereupon are the foundations fastened, or 

 who laid the corner-stone, when the morning stars sang together, and 

 all the sons of God shouted for joy ?" " Or who shut up the sea with 

 doors, when it brake forth as if it had issued from the womb, when I 

 made the cloud the garment thereof, and thick darkness its swaddling 

 band, and brake up for it my decreed place, and set bars and doors, 

 and said hitherto shalt thou come, and no further, and here shall thy 

 proud waves be staid ?" 



Take, then, these " thoughts that breathe and words that burn," and 

 compress them if you can into some true or some fanciful system of 

 science ; teach us where to find " the house wherein darkness dwelleth," 

 to " bind the sweet influence of the Pleiades, and loose the bands of 

 Orion"; explain to us, with respect to one of God's creatures, what the 

 natural process is by which he " drinketh up a river and hasteneth 

 not "; and of another, how " his breath kindleth coals, and a flame go- 

 eth out of his mouth," and then take credit to yourself for vindicating 

 the truth of Scripture : and when you have thus illustrated a compo- 

 sition, by the side of which, till you touched it, the images of Homer 

 and Pindar seem but as prose, go on — instruct us how to interpret that 

 other most ancient book, recorded, it has been thought, by the very 

 same hand — take that passage of it which drew forth the admiration of 

 heathen antiquity — borrow for your purpose the deepest thoughts of 

 modern science — substitute, " Let there be ether, and there was ether" 

 for " Let there be light, and there was light." Why does this altered 

 expression fall so flat upon the ear ? it is not like the flood of harmoni- 

 ous sound which some of you may have heard from this Orchestra 

 responding to the words — it is not like the words themselves, which 

 pour upon the mind at once all the beautiful irradiation and delightful 

 perceptions of light : and yet. Gentlemen, after all, you have not even 

 thus perhaps presented a pure scientific view of the act of creation ; 

 for when you have conceived this empyreal ether, this boundless and 



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