422 
The Rev. Prebendary Irons writes 
I am sorry Professor Birks directed his arguments against one of the Assays 
and Reviews” of the last generation of thinkers, as they r nay be c ™ 
would have met the object of Prof. Birks’s paper 
ment, which he is so competent to make, of, hist, cer , , , , . £ ^ose 
astronomy ; next, the indications in the Old Testament .of th * ™ 
outlines, together with the admission of the popular la^ge o some Pas. 
sages, not more inconsistent with the latent truths m o er p > n . W ^ 
own popular language, e.g. as to the sun’s “rising and setting, with the 
the ■■ Copemicau ^ 
language is sometimes popular, sometimes ] poetical, ““f* • u i <ir . 
true “The sun o-oeth forth” to the uttermost parts of the heavens is P°P^ > 
God “ cIltHhe stars by name” is poetry ; “ He hapgeth the round earth 
U T,o°uS%f ra tdnrost all the gntver questions (and they are hut 
few! raised on this subject are, and will long continue to , q 
exegesis, and not capable of being judged by ordinary ® lbl ® 
must be content to use their Old Testament for spiritual edification, and 
satisfy themselves with the assurance that neither men of science who can 
read Hebrew, nor Hebrew scholars who read science, have yet found .«y 
instance in the Sacred Scripture of a statement opposed clearly 
facts of science? But I would go further, and add that, were it otherwise 
for the present, yet ordinary Christians, and the Blble ^> q ttle mOTe 
till men of science make themselves a little more clear and a Ii 
“Meanwhile our scientific doubters or critics seem to be bound be more 
pynlicit They should place side by side, in columns it they will, tne lacrs 
of ^astronomy or any other certain science, and the texts which deny them. 
There has been a great deal of loose talk on this subject, and not a little desire 
to look candid and knowing and liberal on the one side, and look devout 
and orthodox on the other. 
Rev Canon Titcomb.— I am sincerely thankful to Canon Birks for having 
attain brought forward this subject, because, however greatly om views may 
differ, I am satisfied that good only can result from its free and full discus- 
sion. Yet with regard to the paper which has just been read, I cannot but 
complain of its injustice ; for there seems to me to be a spirit in it whic i 
seats itself in a chair of dogmatic and infallible authority, and demands 
that all dissent from its utterances should be relegated to the empire o 
religious unbelief. Now, sir, I lay no stress upon the fact that this is rather 
hard upon a man who has all his life long been preaching and speaking and 
writing in defence of God’s Holy Word, and who has taken an active and 
public part in endeavouring to stem the progress of infidelity. I say I lay 
no stress upon that fact. But I do lay great stress upon the next fact 
which I mark in connection with this paper, viz., its mischievous contusion 
of thought, in bracketing the opinions of Mr. Hebert Spencer, who denies 
revelation altogether, and of Mr. Goodwin, “ the fifth Essayist,’ who 
acknowledges it only in part, with any one like myself, who believes in 
Divine Revelation as tenaciously as Canon Birks. I venture to submit, sir, 
that this sort of criticism radically fails to distinguish between things 
“ which differ,” and that while it may serve the purposes of controversy it 
