370 On the Mosaic account of the Creation. 



The geologist, if he thus believe, will find, must ever find, 

 that the closest and the strictest search and inquiry into the 

 strata and phenomena of the earth, will lead him step by- 

 step through every difficulty and series of formations, to 

 trace out the author of the whole; until he will at length 

 arrive at that far distant and primitive epoch, when God 

 first gave laws to matter, and thus gave origin to geology. 



Thus will he again be led to see, and haply likewise to ac- 

 knowledge, the inseparability of geology and theology. For 

 it must be at once apparent to a believer that if the statements 

 of the Bible are correct, the climates and condition of our earth 

 must have undergone great changes for the worse since the 

 epoch of creation ; and great disturbances and dislocations of 

 strata must inevitably have been the consequences of the 

 great geological revolutions which are recorded by the histori- 

 an. Now as we are instructed that those general revolutions 

 were brought about for moral purposes, by the Divine will, 

 namely as a punishment to the crimes and depravity of the 

 human race, and likewise to serve as a warning for the future, 

 it is evident that they must hold an important place in the his- 

 tory of God^s dispensations to mankind, and consequently that 

 they come fairly and properly within the province of theology. 



Therefore as the moral effects were to be produced by 

 geological revolutions, and as both emanated from the will of 

 the Controller of events, we are clearly led to perceive a 

 strong and close connection between geology and theology, 

 inasmuch as the general revolutions of the one, have both 

 been the consequence of an express exertion of Divine power 

 on account of the sins of mankind, the discussion of which 

 falls properly within the sphere of the other. 



But the case is not much altered even in respect to those 

 who disbelieve the Bible; for they will build their system 

 solely on the appearances which the strata of the earth pre- 

 sent, and theorise until they lose themselves in the lapse of 

 ages ; yet still even they, with all their waste of years, must 



