DISCOVERIES WITH SACRED HISTORY. 11 
proved by physical evidence, that the surface of 
the globe has not existed in its actual state from 
eternity, but has advanced through a series of 
creative operations, succeeding one another at 
long and definite intervals of time ; that all the 
actual combinations of matter have had a prior 
existence in some other state ; and that the ulti- 
mate atoms of the material elements, through 
whatever changes they may have passed, are, 
and ever have been, governed by laws, as regular 
and uniform, as those which hold the planets in 
their course. All these results entirely accord 
with the best feelings of our nature, and with 
our rational conviction of the greatness and 
goodness of the Creator of the universe ; and 
the reluctance with which evidences, of such 
high importance to natural theology, have been 
admitted by many persons, who are sincerely 
zealous for the interests of religion, can only be 
explained by their want of accurate information 
in physical science ; and by their ungrounded 
fears lest natural phenomena should prove in- 
consistent with the account of creation in the 
book of Genesis. 
It is argued unfairly against Geology, that be- 
cause its followers are as yet agreed on no com- 
plete and incontrovertible theory of the earth ; 
and because early opinions advanced on imper- 
fect evidence have yielded, in succession, to more 
extensive discoveries ; therefore nothing certain 
