Introduction, 



7 



a short passage in that Record, which it is mean to impugn, and 

 not the record itself, in the reverence of which the writer of 

 these pages has been educated. In the ancient patriarchal times, 

 men believed the sun went round the earth, in consequence of 

 the apparent motion of that luminary. It is stated in the Bible, 

 that Joshua commanded the sun to stand still, when he encom- 

 passed Gibeon ; and that " it stood still, and hasted not to go 

 down a whole day." In recording events of a miraculous 

 character, it is evident the historian spoke in such figures only 

 as could be understood. Had the sacred writer said, that Joshua 

 had commanded the earth to stand still, he would not have been 

 comprehended. The assertion perhaps would have been deemed 

 blasphemous, as contrary to God's laws. Connected with this 

 natural prejudice, the force of education had given an ancient 

 construction to the account in Genesis of the creation of the 

 world, the effect of which has been to put physical and moral 

 truths, apparently at variance with each other. But as truth 

 cannot conflict with itself, we must look for the cause of this dis- 

 crepancy in human errors. 



It is not with a view to state how utterly hopeless it is to look 

 for explanations of physical phenomena in pages consecrated to 

 moral instruction; or how equally hopeless, and reprehensible too, 

 it would be, to rashly look into revelation by the light of 

 geology, that a recurrence to this passage in Genesis, will here 

 be made ; but rather to reconcile the theologian to a very sim- 

 ple construction of the passage alluded to, and which is found in 

 the very opening of the Bible. " In the beginning God created 

 the heavens and the earth." Now let the rule of the theologian 

 be applied to this passage, and let it receive a literal construc- 

 tion. We here find the first notice of creation. We do not find 

 it stated that the heavens and the earth were created six thou- 

 sand years ago, or at any other definite period of past time. It 

 is simply said, " In the beginning," a term, in the contemplation 

 of which, the human mind is lost, amidst feelings of conscious 

 weakness, and inexpressible humility. What that beginning is 

 coeval with, we cannot conceive ; we cannot come so near to 

 that Being, to whom all time is but one present existence : but 

 we can conceive painfully, after our human mode of thinking, of 

 the solitary existence to which those would assign the universal 

 Creator during the immeasurable period that preceded the six 



