744 « COSMOGONY. 



mind by the Deity would take shape in that mind according to its 

 range of knowledge, modes of thought, and use of language, unless 

 it were at the same time supernaturally gifted with the profound 

 knowledge and wisdom adequate to their conception ; and even 

 then they could not be intelligibly expressed, for want of words to 

 represent them. 



The central thought of each step in the Scripture cosmogony — 

 for example, Light, — the dividing of the fluid earth from the fluid 

 around it, individualizing the earth, — the arrangement of its land 

 and water, — vegetation, — and so on — is brought out in the simple 

 and natural style of a sublime intellect, wise for its times, but un- 

 versed in the depths of science which the future was to reveal. 

 The idea of vegetation to such a one would be vegetation as he 

 knew it ; and so it is described. The idea of dividing the earth 

 from the fluid around it would take the form of a dividing from 

 the fluid above, in the imperfect conceptions of a mind unac- 

 quainted with the earth's sphericity and the true nature of the 

 firmament, — especially as the event was beyond the reach of all 

 ordinary thought. 



Objections are often made to the word "day," — as if its use limited the time 

 of each of the six periods to a day of twenty-four hours. But in the course 

 of the document this word "day" has various significations, and, among them, 

 all that are common to it in ordinary language. These are — (1) The light, — 

 " God called the light day," v. 5 ; (2) the " evening and the morning" before 

 the appearance of the sun ; (3) the " evening and the morning" after the ap- 

 pearance of the sun; (4) the hours of light in the twenty-four hours (as well as 

 the whole twenty-four hours), in verse 14 ; and (5) in the following chapter, at 

 the commencement of another record of creation, the whole period of creation 

 is called " a day." The proper meaning of " evening and morning," in a history 

 of creation, is beginning and completion; and, in this sense, darkness before 

 light is but a common metaphor. 



A Deity working in creation like a day -laborer by earth-days of twenty-four 

 hours, resting at night, is a belittling conception, and one probably never in the 

 mind of the sacred penman. In the plan of an infinite God, centuries are 

 required for the maturing of some of the plants with which the earth is 

 adorned. 



The order of events in the Scripture cosmogony corresponds 

 essentially with that which has been given. There was first a void 

 and formless earth : this was literally true of the " heavens and 

 the earth, " if they were in the condition of a gaseous fluid. The 

 succession is as follows : — 



(1.) Light. 



(2.) The dividing of the waters below from the waters above the 

 earth (the word translated waters may meanjluid). 



