140 
REMARKS 
By the Rev. J. Challis M.A., F.R.S., F.R.A.S., 
Plurnian Professor of Astronomy, Cambridge. 
After carefully reading Mr. Titcomb’s paper “ On Certain Magnitudes in 
Nature, and their bearing on Biblical Interpretation,” I have been induced 
to comply with a request for some MS. remarks upon it, partly from the 
interest I feel in the subject, and partly from having written an Essay on 
the First Chapter of Genesis, which I produced soon after the appearance of 
“Essays and Reviews.” This work, which is entitled “Creation in Plan 
and in Progress,” was printed at the Press of the University of Cambridge, 
and published by Macmillan & Co., in 1861. As I am of opinion that if 
Mr. Titcomb had been acquainted with the contents of this publication 
(which I fear is now out of print), he might possibly have modified certain 
views expressed in his paper, I beg permission to offer for the consideration 
of the Institute a reproduction, as brief as may be, of such of the arguments 
therein contained as appear to bear immediately on subjects likely to be 
discussed when the paper is read. 
In the first place, I have to state that reasons are given in that work for 
concluding that the language of Scripture neither is, nor can be, unscientific ; 
that is, it cannot be contradictory to the language of Science. The 
arguments on this head arc for the most part contained in the Introduction 
(pp. 4 — 13). It will suffice for the present purpose to adduce the argument 
(in pp. 6-9) relative to the distinction to be made between physical opera- 
tions and their consequences in personal sensations, and to justify, in 
particular, on the ground of this distinction, the language of Scripture as to 
the fixity of the earth. 
By experiment and mathematics it has been ascertained that sound is 
produced by vibrations of the air, that loudness depends on the extent of the 
vibrations, the pitch of a musical note on the number of vibrations in a 
given time, and that the harmony of two musical notes depends on the ratio 
of the number of vibrations corresponding to one, to the number of vibrations 
in the same time corresponding to the other. Thus, in one rank we have 
such names as sound, loudness, pitch, harmony ; and in another rank vibra- 
tions, extent of vibrations, number of vibrations in a given time, and ratio of 
numbers of vibrations. Similarly, according to the undulatory theory of 
