NOTES AND QUERIES. 
307 
such animals to his wants. My own conviction is, that this wide-spread belief 
of the recent existence of man is to be ascribed, so far at least as this country 
is concerned, to the impression made by the lesson taught in early youth, the 
soundness of which is not questioned in after life, by that marginal note in our 
Bibles over against the first verse of the first chapter of the Book of Genesis, 
that ' In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth' [four thousand 
and four years before the birth of Christ]. It is more than probable that of 
the many millions of persons who read the English Bible, a very large propor- 
tion look with the same reverence upon that marginal note as they do upon the 
verse with which it is connected. 
" It will be useful to look into the history of this date of four thousand and 
four years, given with so much precision for the creation, not of this our earth 
only, but of the universe, and to inquire into the authority by which an addi- 
tion of so much import is made to the sacred text. 
" The author of the chronology given in the margin of our Bibles was Usher, 
Archbishop of Armagh. I make no allusion to any part of the learned prelate's 
system, except the date he assigns for the creation of the world : that date 
comes properly within the province of the geologist ; for, as the almost reli- 
. gious belief in its accuracy is an obstacle to the acceptance of the conclusions 
to which he is led by a careful study of the facts which the structure of the 
earth exhibits, he is fairly entitled to deal with it. 
"In the eighth volume of the Ai'chbishop's works, there is a treatise with 
the following title : — ' Amiales Veteris Testamenti, a prima mundi origme 
deducti,' and in p. 13 of that treatise we find the following sentence : — ' In 
principio creavit Deus ccelum et terram, c[uod temporis principium, juxta nos- 
tram chronologiam, incidit in noctis iUius mitium, quae vigesiinum tertium diem 
Octobris praecessit, in anno periodi Julianse 710.' Then follows : — ' Primo 
igitur sseculi die, Octobris vigesima tertia, feria prima, cum supremo coelo 
creavit Deus angelos : deinde summo operis fastigio primum perfecto, ad ima 
mundanee hujus fabricse fundamenta progressus mirandus artifex, infimum huno 
globum ex abysso et terra conflatum constituit.' 
"In the eleventh volume of the same edition of the prelate's works there is 
a treatise with the title ' Chronologia Sacra,' in the second chapter of which 
the Archbishop thus settles the number of years, before the birth of Christ, 
for the creation of the world : — " Ita a vespera primum mundi diem aperiente, 
TLsque ad mediam noctem initium praebentem, 25, quidem diei Decembris, quo 
Christum natum supponimus annos Julianos 3999 menses rpiaKovQriftepovg 2. aies 
4. et horas 6. Kalendis vero Jaiiuariis anni periodi Juliauae 4714. (a quibus vul- 
f aris serse christianae exordium deducimus) annos 4003. menses 2. dies 11. et 
oras 6. decurrisse coUigimus.' This, therefore, is the authority upon which 
the confident belief is founded, that man could not possibly have existed upon 
the earth for a longer period than considerably less than four thousand 
years b. c. 
" But this determination of the Archbishop is only one of many dates which 
chronologists, in their vain calculations, have presumed to assign to this the 
most stupendous of all events, to attempt to form a faint idea of which, in 
anything relating to it, wiU ever be gross presumption and folly. In the well- 
known work, * L'art de verifier les Dates,' the following passage occurs : — 
' Les chronologistes sont loin d'etre d'accord sur le nombre des annees du 
monde. Desvignoles (Chronologic de I'llistoire Sainte, preface) assure qu'il a 
recueille plus de 200 calculs differents, dont le plus court ne compte que 3483 
ans depuis la creation jusqu'a I'ere vulgaire, et le plus long en suppose 6984.' 
There then follows a 'Table des annees ecoulees depuis Adam jusqu'a la 
naissance de Jesus Christ, selon le calcul des principaux chronologistes,' num- 
bering 108, beginning with 
