80 
the theory may be expected to account for is that relating to 
the destruction of animal life. Assuming that sufficient reasons 
have been given by the theory for concluding that by the com- 
bined effects of copious rain, overflow of oceans, and oscillations 
of the earth’s crust, large tracts of the surface were for many 
days completely submerged, the destruction of living crea- 
tures, whether “ man,” or “ cattle and beast,” or “ fowl,” 
or “ reptile” (Gen. vii. 21), frequenting those districts, would 
be a necessary consequence. I cannot, however, on the 
same grounds assert that there would be no localities to which 
animals might flee for safety ; and the Scriptural account, 
as I have already intimated (p. 70), does not exclude means of 
continuing animal life after the Peluge, which at the time could 
not be within human cognizance. To this point I shall have to 
recur in the course of the third division of the subject, which 
I am now prepared to enter upon. 
III. In this the concluding division of the essay I propose 
to inquire whether facts of a certain class, the evidence for 
which is exclusively drawn from the observations and descrip- 
tions of geologists, can be referred to the same physical causation 
as that which is proposed in Division II. to account theoretically 
for the statements relative to the Deluge which are cited and 
commented upon in Division I. If so, those facts may be 
appealed to in corroboration of the truth of the biblical record. 
It will be proper, before commencing this inquiry, to intro- 
duce a few general remarks. There are two distinct processes 
of investigation applicable to physical questions : either it may 
be proposed to deduce, from the quality and circumstances of 
observed facts, the kind and degree of the agency to which they 
may be attributed, or the purpose of the inquiry may be to 
account for observed facts by a physical theory of causation 
which rests on hypotheses, the truth of wdiich is established in 
proportion as the theoiy explains the facts. The second method 
is more comprehensive than the other, inasmuch as, if complete, 
it should be capable of accounting for the amount and the laws 
of action, arrived at deductively by the latter. The second 
method is that which I have followed in this essay; the first is 
the one most generally adopted in treatises on geology. It 
may here be remarked, that the attempts made by geologists 
to derive from facts of observation the character of the physical 
operations to which they may be due, exhibit a great diversity 
of views. Some, of whom Lyell may be considered the repre- 
sentative, are unwilling to admit the existence in geological 
times of any causation differing in kind, or much in degree, 
from what is seen to be going on at the present time; while 
