84 
would fail. Granted. What then ? The possible increase of 
the foraminifera is only practically diminished by their supply 
of food failing, and the rate in which their enemies devour 
them. Any way, hundreds instead of myriads of years is all 
that arithmetical computation can afford us as a clue by which 
to estimate the time the cretaceous formation of Europe 
might probably take to form. 
Practically, we know too little about what is now forming in 
the depths of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, miles below the 
surface, to have any conception of the changes that may take 
place in the depths of the sea. We cannot guess the rate at 
which strata may accumulate. What would a man know of 
the surface of the earth if he had been all his life sailing in a 
balloon, and never approaching that surface nearer than two or 
three miles ? Suppose his knowledge of this surface was derived 
from a few quillfuls of earth drawn up from it. This is no exag- 
gerated account of all we know of deep-sea bottoms. We know 
that vast currents run, not only on the surface of the sea, but 
circulate through its depths. We know not the power of sub- 
aqueous storms in these currents. We know not how they 
may lift sedimentary deposits from one part of the ocean-bed 
and lay them over other strata. We know not how these cur- 
rents may pile strata after strata of material round the rugged 
sides of submarine mountains at all kinds of inclinations. 
Knowing this vast depth of human ignorance, surely this 
should be a reason why we should display profound humility 
while we learn to spell and by degrees to read in the volume 
of God^s works — why we should not substitute for this discip- 
line a false worship and adoration of the mind and understand- 
ing of man. 
The shafts of ridicule have been urged against those well- 
meaning men who have from time to time endeavoured to 
make the writings of Moses square with the fashionable 
theories of geologists. But why have they failed? Because 
they have been too credulous in accepting unproved hypo- 
theses as scientific verities. 
But now, when the incandescent state of the earth, passing 
through all stages from a flaming vapour to crystallizing 
granite, with indefinite ages for the cooling process, is ruth- 
lessly committed to the limbo of exploded hypotheses ; when 
the Huttonian theory of the igneous formation of granitic and 
other kindred rocks gives place once more to the water forma- 
tion of Werner ; when the successive creation theory, with all 
its power of determining age of strata by their palaeontological 
remains, seems melting before the inexorable logic of facts ; 
while the Darwinian or rather Lamackian theory of progres- 
