22 THE WONDERS OF GEOLOGY. 



of Galileo, Kepler, and Newton, were regarded as inconsistent with 

 the Scriptures, and therefore heretical ; but although the discrepancy 

 of the literal meaning of the Bible with the real truths of Astronomy, 

 is still as great as ever, no one any longer hesitates to regard astro- 

 nomy as giving a just view of the stupendous mechanism of the 

 Universe; — all agree in understanding the language of the Scriptures 

 as being adapted to the appearances of the heavens, of which alone, 

 mankind in general can form any just conception, and with which 

 alone the Scriptures are concerned. The Bible, being designed as a 

 code of moral instruction, as a revelation of a future life, and 

 of the sanctions that belong to that momentous subject, contains 

 no systems of philosophy. Moral science, essentially contained in 

 the Scriptures, is not, even there, presented in a regular form, as in 

 human systems, but in modes more happily adapted to the actual 

 condition and capabilities of mankind. 



In relation to physics, the information contained in the Bible is 

 only incidental. God is declared to be the Creator of the heavens 

 and the earth, — the physical universe, — and throughout the sacred 

 volume there are innumerable allusions to, and illustrations of, his 

 character, as its Creator and Governor : but there is not even the 

 most general outline of any physical science. The creation of the 

 heavens and the earth, of the sun and the moon, are disposed of with 

 extreme brevity, while the allusions to the geological arrangements 

 of this planet are only such as are connected with the first appear- 

 ance of its organized beings, and the emergence of the land from 

 the original ocean. 



Instruction in the sciences was not the object of the Scriptures ; 

 the physical creation was left by its Divine Author for the de- 

 lightful exercise of our faculties, and to afford an inexhaustible 

 source of mental and moral pleasure ; — for application to use, to 

 increase the power and the comforts of man — an equally unfailing 

 fund of improvement, and for the additional illustration of the 

 character of God ; an exhaustless fountain of knowledge, mingling 

 its streams harmoniously with those of divine revelation. 



Erom the study of the physical creation, Man has, therefore, 

 drawn all the natural sciences, of which Astronomy is the most 

 sublime and splendid, while Geology yields, in this respect, only to 

 astronomy. Neither astronomy nor geology is, however, enunciated 

 in the Scriptures, but both are revealed in the book of Nature, and 



