THE GENESIS OF NATURE. 



35 



methods of modern days. No one imagines that Moses, or David, 

 or Paul, were acquainted with the doctrines of evolution or the 

 laws of electricity. But for all that, it is not wise to forget 

 that the lUble has not only a human but a Divine side. If God 

 is indeed the actual Maker of Xature, He must have known all 

 about its true laws and methods, even if Moses did not ; nay, 

 even if possibly philosophers of the present day have not yet 

 quite fathomed them fully. And the Bible is the Word of God, 

 that is, it is inspired by the Author of Xature ; so it is not 

 quite safe for any man, however learned, to scout its science, or 

 to charge it with ignorance or misconception of natural facts ; 

 for it is quite possible that its simple statements may go further 

 down into the roots of knowledge than do the most recent 

 researches of current philosophy. Its words of truth, 

 unscientificallv stated, vet mav antedate the scientific uuveilincj 

 of the truths wliich they contain ; and the oftice of science may 

 be not to surpass the natural facts of the inspired record, but to 

 elucidate them and interpret their real unappreciated meaning. 

 What does the idea of inspiration imply ? To say the least, it 

 implies that the human authors were not the unaided authors 

 of what they wrote. To assert that they only wrote what they 

 themselves knew by their human learning is simply to rob 

 inspiration of its force. On the contrary, the set claim of the 

 Bible is that its authors did not themselves fully understand 

 " what things the Spirit of God which was in them did testify." 

 They sought, and sought in vain, to measure the ultimate meaning 

 of the words they uttered. Inspiration, apart from its methods, 

 is the assertion of the fact that God gave men His messages to 

 deliver to their fellow men. It does not indicate that His 

 messengers understood the message. Xor does it affect this 

 question whether the message was delivered in the words of the 

 Sender or of the ^Messenger. If the message was rightly delivered 

 (and that at least is implied by inspiration) it mu>t have carried 

 the Sender's meaning in whatever words the Messenger delivered 

 it. And therefore, it must be concluded that the assertions 

 of the Scripture are in themselves intrinsically true, in whatever 

 phraseology they may be clothed. Consequently the meaning of 

 statements given by inspiration is not to be measured by the 

 amount of knowledge which the writers of the Bible had, or may 

 be supposed to have had ; and to set up their personal knowledge 

 as a limitation to the scientific truth of what they wrote, is 

 to strike out the major factor in the equation of Scripture. 



But, after all, this suggested limitation does not affect our 

 immediate question. We are not at this stage of oar inquiry 



