334 SKETCHES OF CREATION. 



hands execute all the behests of your convenience." Had 

 chance formed the beds of coal under such a concurrence 

 of auspicious and beneficent conditions, chance would not 

 have brought it to our doors ; chance would not have res- 

 cued it from burial beneath the sediments of a thousand 

 following ages ; chance would not have laid by in the same 

 beds the ores of iron which the coal is fitted to reduce ; 

 chance would not have stored in the same relation the beds 

 of limestone, to be used as a flux in the reduction of the 

 iron ores by means of the mineral coal. See what provi- 

 dent Nature has done with other metals ! Was it accident 

 that enriched the upper peninsula of Michigan with her 

 wealth of native copper? Or has there been in existence 

 upon our earth any other being than man to whom these 

 riches possessed the least utility or interest ? The ores of 

 copper lie buried a mile beneath the sandstones of the 

 "Pictured Rocks." The sediments of unknown cycles of 

 years were gathered upon the beds of valuable ores. At 

 length, while the world was preparing for man, a fiery out- 

 burst threw the deep-buried treasures to the surface. It 

 did more. It reduced their refractory ores for the hand 

 of man, and enabled him to gather directly the native 

 metal. Still more. The same fiery outburst bent the flinty 

 rocks into the form of a huge trough, and Heaven sent 

 down water to fill it and float the steam-sped vessel to the 

 copper-bearing shore. And lastly, lest the manhood of our 

 race should be spent before the discovery of the treasure, 

 all-provident Nature broke up samples of cupriferous rock, 

 and strewed them along the shore, and along the river- 

 courses, so that, when man should find them, he might trace 

 the trail, as by a clew, to the original store-house of the na- 

 tive metal. And all these preparations, and provisions, and 

 utilities have no relations to any other terrestrial denizen 

 than man. 



