337 
silt up. The slightest change in the inflowing water, or in 
the temperature of the pond itself, causes a change in the 
character of the silt, and, consequently, a layer in the mass 
forming in the bottom. As to larger bodies of water, Page 
says that the clayey mud of the great Chinese rivers is esti- 
mated as borne clown at the rate of two million cubic feet in an 
hour I The Ganges alone carries 700,000 cubic feet every 
hour into the Bay of Bengal ! * Must such work take tens of 
thousands of years to deposit sixty feet of muddy strata ? In 
the face of the most common facts, it is surely anything but 
scientific to magnify duration into measureless vastness, when 
looking' at a rock which has been formed by such means. 
So much for the three great divisions of what is generally 
understood to be geology. It seems well that we should have 
the true nature of that which passes as the science clearly 
before us, ere we attempt to trace its relations many direction. 
Sacred Scripture is the Word of God. It is a word which 
He speaks, rather than one spoken concerning Him. It is the 
expression of thoughts which He desires to communicate to 
men. It is, we think, really an expression of a portion of His 
own thoughts, although that expression is necessarily cast in 
the mould of human language, and these thoughts are neces- 
sarily made to take a form such as allows them to enter the 
human mind. When thus viewed, the Sacred Scriptures 
present us with several divisions of very important matter for 
consideration. 
hirst of all, we think it necessary to note a very important 
distinction between what is called i( the Book of Nature,” 
and the written revelation contained in the Bible. The created 
universe is, no doubt, in a certain sense, an expression of 
divine thought, and as such, it is a c< Book 33 which may, and 
ought to be “ read j” but it is not such an expression as that 
which takes the form of human language, and comes near, in 
that language, with the treasures of the divine heart, to the 
human soul, as man comes near in speech, and opens his heart 
to his fellow-creature. If, for example, we observe attentively 
what a man does, we may generally so far learn what that man 
thinks and feels. If we note what he does to us, we may 
generally so far learn his state of heart towards us. Maids 
works are, in this sense, an expression of his thoughts 
which may be read. So far, we may speak of his doings as 
the Book of his deeds ; and we may also thus far speak of the 
ct Book 33 of God in nature. But this is very different from 
* Page’s Advanced Textbook of Geology, edition 1858 , page 31 . 
