IN THE CU NATION STORY OF GENESIS. 



85 



space is scarcely philosopliical. It is the old story of tlie 

 " mathematical mill," the output of which depends upon wluit 

 is put into it. It leaves a gap in the argument which cannot 

 be bridged over by any speculation upon the heat-giving power 

 of radium and its congeners. If these are emlothcrmic entities, 

 whence the original heat which took part in the evolution of 

 their atoms ? — A. I. 



Siifplcincntari/ Note B. 



At the Secretary's request 1 otter a few remarks upon 77/ e 

 First Chapter of GeiiesU eompared witli Science and Critieimi, 

 by the Eev. D. M. Berry, M.A., published in Melbourne, but 

 undated. 



There is very little in this pamphlet wliicli is new to me. 

 Some good points seem to be made, but there are many 

 statements and assumptions wliich I should call in question. 

 It is vexatious to find the writer consistently misquoting by 

 writing " heavens " for the '•' heaven " of the K.A^, and generally 

 in the A.V, of chap. i. Mr. Berry still clings to the idea of 

 the waters " meaning the hydrosphere of the globe, and gets 

 (it seems to me) in some confusion in consequence over the first 

 appearance of light upon our planet. He would have got more 

 help from Hugh Capron's Conflict of Trnth than by quoting 

 fnmi Mr. Clodd, a rather " broken reed " to lean upon. His 

 whole conception of the " firmament " is vitiated by his over- 

 looking the fact that the proper word is " expanse " (RY.). In 

 making no reference to the spiral nelndcc he is not up to date ; 

 and he follows too blindly Lord Kelvhi's impossible hypothesis 

 as to vegetation supplying the atmosphere in the first instance 

 with O2 from COg, since oxygen is as necessary for the stimulus 

 of protoplasm in the living vegetable cell as in animals. ]\Ir. 

 Berry moreover quotes the existence of fjrcqjhite in tlie 

 Archaean rocks as evidence of vegetation. This, I niaintain, is 

 an exploded fallacy, as much so as the Eozdon Canadense since 

 Mobius' monograph appeared in 1880. (See A. Irving, " On 

 the Genesis of Diamond and Graphite/' Chern. and Fhi/s. 

 Studies, App. ii, note L ; also paper in the Chemiccd Neius, 

 No. 1505.) 



Nor is he up to date in the matter of Egyptian chronology ; 

 for he seems to be unacquainted with the recent advances made 

 in that department of research, as described by Prof. Flinders 

 Petrie in a lecture to the Victoria Institute. At the same time 

 I should be prepared to endorse some of his criticisms of tlie 

 views of Dr. Driver, whose strength as a Hebraist seems to bear 



