462 CONSISTENCY OF GEOLOGY WITH SACRED HISTORY. 



and dignity to man, looked on, and in the beautiful and highly figura- 

 tive language of the history — "the morning stars sang together, and 

 all the sons of God shouted for joy." 



Before closing these remarks, we will respectfully submit a few sug- 

 gestions for the consideration of two very different descriptions of per- 

 sons, namely, those who deny, and those who defend, the truth of the 

 Mosaic history. 



To the former class, so far as they are geologists, we will say, that, 

 in relation to geology, any attempt to disprove the truth or genuine- 

 ness of the pentateuch, and of Genesis in particular, is wholly super- 

 fluous, and quite aside from any question that can, in this age, be at 

 issue between geologists. No geologist, at the present day, erects any 

 system upon the basis of the scripture history, or of any other history. 

 Still, historical coincidences with natural phenomena have always 

 been regarded as interesting, because they are mutually adjuvant and 

 confirmatory. The letter of Pliny, describing the death of his uncle, 

 would have been true, although Herculaneum and Pompeii had never 

 been discovered ; and it would have been true that those towns were 

 overwhelmed by a volcanic eruption, although the letter of Pliny had 

 never been written ; or being written, if it had been false as to the 

 main fact of the death of the elder Pliny, or of there having been an 

 eruption at the time assigned in that writing. But the existence of 

 the letter, and its coincidence with the facts revealed by the discov- 

 ery of the buried cities, flash conviction upon every mind, and aftbrd 

 some of those firm points of reliance upon which our confidence re- 

 poses with delight. Now if there is not sufficient proof in the appear- 

 ance of the earth, that it was for a long time covered by water, and 

 that the waters deposited, in the then forming strata and mountains, 

 those organic bodies, of aquatic origin, which we find entombed in 

 them, then no geologist of the present day would, on the authority of 

 the first chapter of Genesis alone, assume the fact of terrene submer- 

 sion, as the basis of his reasoning and as the foundation of a geolo- 

 gical system. , . . 



In the same manner, if he find on the face of the earth no proofs 

 of diluvial devastation ; if there be nothing to evince, that mighty 

 rushing waters have torn up and transported to a distance the move- 

 able materials of the surface ; then, as a geologist, he will never as- 

 sume the Mosaic account of the deluge as the basis of a system of dilu- 

 vial agency, any more than he will build similar conclusions upon the 

 poetry, fables and mythology, or even upon the history, of the ancients. 



