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THE GEOLOGIST. 



day stares vacantly around, so the most gigantic mind first gazes, by 

 God's will mercifully, on the first aspect of creation. 



Like that of the child, day by day the mind of the student acquires 

 strength, until at last it grasps within its own capacity the whole 

 expanse, and bravely treads in fields unknown, undaunted, undeterred ; 

 at every stride becoming more and more reverently and devoutly 

 impressed with the mysterious powers and attributes of our great 

 Eternal Father. 



We have spoken all that is known of the first world and its inha- 

 bitants, and these are the legends of the Bottom-rocks. In one of the 

 sweet tales bequeathed to us by our Saxon forefathers of the Venerable 

 Bede, we are told that a boy in mockery once led the venerable old 

 man, when blind with age, into a vale " that lay all thickly sowed 

 with mighty rocks," and in mischief told him many men wanted to 

 hear him." Eloquently and long the gentle preacher expounded on 

 the wonderful ways and goodness of God, until " the tears ran down 

 his hoary beard," and when at the close, as seemeth always meet, 

 he prayed ' Our Father,' and pronoimced aloud 



* Thine is the kingdom, and the power. Thine 

 The glory now and through eternity,' 



" at once there rang through all the echoing vale a sound of many 

 thousand voices, crying. Amen ! most reverend sire. Amen ! Amen ! " 



Truly, from the primeval rocks rings out the universal response, 

 echoed and re-echoed from innumerable world-clusters, and from every 

 portion of illimitable space through which the Creative Energy has 

 passed in its eternal and ever-expanding progress, Thine is the 

 kingdom, the power, and the glory. Amen, Amen. 



