'.>' ^fA _™ • - __ _^_J ^ LIBEAET I Theological Seminary. PRINCETOr i, N. J. Case ^C-- C — - Division Section i No v.-.-.j 1 Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2008 with funding from Microsoft Corporation http://archive.org/details/tenlecturesonphi02kenn i^U^e^c^fa. £C*^ t^r £?/ C4-p*r**-4£^&*J£-**< : *-*-J — • *^> £-C£^+-' t tU^J(^, f*y*#*J *y**»..*y« «£- 7 St(y,/>&+ &~*p %^iW? ^~ A^f^/ £-r A £c-*^ &>s& c&*ft?3^, jj&~edf- -tfktf^^ 6~***<«A &^L^k~?> a^~"~~~*'*> *^*a+~^j-^ <**-? TEN LECTURES ON THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE MOSAIC RECORD OF CREATION, DELIVERED IN THE CHAPEL OF TRINITY COLLEGE, DUBLIN. KET BY S KENNEDY, B. D. F.T.C.D. M.R.I. A. DONNELLAN LECTURER FOR THE YEAR MDCCCXXIV. IN TWO VOLUMES. vol. I. LONDON : C. AND J. EIVINGTON ; DUBLIN : RICHARD MILLIKEN AND SON EDINBURGH : WILLIAM BLACKWOOD. 1827. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE CHARLES KENDAL BUSHE, CHIEF JUSTICE OF THE COURT OF KING'S BENCH IN IRELAND, THE FOLLOWING DISCOURSES ARE INSCRIBED, AS A SLIGHT TRIBUTE OF ESTEEM AND GRATITUDE : THAT PAID TO ACCOMPLISHMENTS, WHICH DIGNIFY THE RELATIONS OF PUBLIC IN THE SAME MEASURE THAT THEY ADORN THOSE OF PRIVATE LIFE ; THIS EXCITED BY ATTENTIONS, WHICH TO THE LABOURER IN LITERATURE ARE ALWAYS ACCEPTABLE, MORE ESPECIALLY WHEN BESTOWED IN THE LIKE SPIRIT THAT THEY ARE RECEIVED, WITHOUT OSTENTATION ON THE ONE HAND, OR COMPROMISE OF FEELING ON THE OTHER. ERRATA. For " those" read " these," in Page 8. Line 3. As also im 21,5. 59,22. 66, 1. 68, 5. 79,20. 98,19.100, 19. 116, 16. 21. 117, 1. 124, 8. 134, 10. 28. 154, 1. 192, 24. For " ascendancy" read " ascendency," in Page 10 Line 5. " impede" read " oppugn," in 47 4. " we Christians" read " as we Chr." ... in 88 8. « >np" read « inn" •••• in 110 25 - " und" read " and" in 154 34. " principles" read " principle," in 173 23. " agianst" read " against," in ..... 206 29. «< and" read u nor," in 212 2. "18" raw* "78" in 232 1. %* In the Appendix, p. 248. I. 17. the expression " Hypo- statical union" is used to indicate the coexistence of the Persons (biroa-rd™?) in the unity of the Divine essence (« B-tin ovrict). In the sense of biroe-rcta-it,' as defined in the Council of Nice, (natura, substantia, essentia; Schleusner, in voc. § 3,) it accurately expresses the Second clause of the Fourth arti- cle of the Athanasian Creed: but in the (since) more generally received acceptation, perhaps " Hypostatical coexistence" might be substituted with advantage to the sense in the paragraph referred to. Its other meaning, which respects the Theanthropic nature of our Blessed Lord, is not contemplated in the present in- stance. PREFACE. The Discourses now submitted to public notice form part of a series, which was preached in the year preceding last before the University of Dublin, in consequence of the appointment of their author to the office of Donnelan Lecturer. The period which has elapsed since their delivery has been one of constant professional and official avoca- tion ; a circumstance mentioned to account for the delay which has attended their pre- paration for the press. Their purport (as ' announced at the time of his nomination) is, to connect the Biblical Records of Creation, as closely as their language and arrangement admit, with Physical Science ; and to estimate the degree of evidence which arises out of the comparison, of the inspiration of their Author. The details into which they enter have at all times attracted much attention ; more PREFACE. particularly those which involve the consi- deration of the mineral structure of the globe, since Geology, forsaking its uncertain speculations, has assumed its rank amongst the sciences. They suggested themselves, in consequence, to the author, at an early period of his literary career, as fit subjects of research, comprising so much in their respective pursuits to engage the considera- tion of the Naturalist and the Theologian. The causes which have led to this have assumed of late an influence still more ex- tended. The physiology of our planet num- bers amongst its students persons of the highest eminence in the scientific world, and is, owing to their exertions, in rapid progress to maturity. From this, indepen- dently of its direct results, a collateral good has arisen. Each fresh accession v of light has served on the whole to connect it more and more with the Mosaic Records ; through the feelings so invariably connected with which an additional interest has been ex- cited, and the spirit of inquiry preserved. The proof of this exists in many of the ablest productions of the present day, in the respective walk9 of the Divine and the PREFACE. Ill Physiologist. The Notes attached to the Lectures will be found to contain references to such as have appeared most indispensable to a knowledge of the subject. The author esteems it necessary to add, that the following Discourses appear before the Public in the exact form in which they wjere delivered ; a circumstance which may explain the frequency of recapitulation in certain instances. It was found expedient, in consequence of many and unavoidable interruptions in their succession, to resort to this mode of obviating the effects of an im- perfect recollection on the general argument. He has chosen rather to hazard the censure, however liberally bestowed, of prolixness of detail, than present his Readers with a mu- tilated transcript. The references also inserted in the con- text may appear to many to be unnecessarily multiplied. For this he pleads the nature of his subject, differing so materially from the purely theological. The considerations it involved at every step demanded a frequency of research proportioned to their number IV PREFACE. and importance, which appears in the latter case to most advantage, when incorporated with the language and sentiments of the writer. * # * [Postscript]. — Since writing the notice which precedes this, the articles in the Westminster Review for October, and in the British for November, 1825, have appeared ; containing remarks on the Comparative Esti- mate of the Mineral and Mosaical Geologies, a treatise published in the year 1822 by Mr. Granville Penn, and succeeded in the following year by a Supplement, chiefly purporting to be an answer to Professor Buckland's Reliquite Diluvianee, which advanced facts and argu- ments at variance with the Diluvian hypothesis of the former writer. As the first-mentioned Review has treated at consi- derable length of the principles of the research which has employed the author of the following lectures, he cannot omit the present opportunity of subjoining a few reflections on the article in question ; as also of stating, that Mr. Penn's work did not reach him until he had made considerable progress in the prosecution of his original plan. Pie holds it necessary however to add, that had even the appearance of the treatises referred to preceded the time of its completion, he should by no means regard a subsequent publication on the same sub- ject as uncalled for. As he professes but little interest in the mode resort- ed to of conducting this phy si co4 theological warfare, in which unhappily the acrimony of the polemic has been united with the self-sufficiency of the philosopher, he POSTSCRIPT TO PREFACE. V proceeds at once to a brief view of such passages of the article referred to, as have appeared to him more im- mediately connected with his own line of argument. The first which occurs deserving of notice, is that in p. 460. " It has never been held derogatory to Al- mighty power, that it operates, in creating as in pre- serving, by means of intermediate agents, or secondary causes." The Scriptural doctrine to which the writer of this sentence alludes, is one which involves much intricate discussion, in the manner in which it has been usually presented. It is the first principle of the Mosaic Phy- sics, and is that in truth, which all physics must ulti- mately terminate in, unless opposed to the plain light of common sense. Indemonstrable by actual experi- ment, of which it were easy to assign the reason, it yet is one which connects the metaphysical theory of causa- tion with the sciences which admit of that species of proof; and appeals to our first perceptions for its reality, as an originative principle, not less than to the revelation which expressly announces it. As the several details connected with this subject oc- cupy a principal share of attention in the following course, it is unnecessary to enlarge much at present on the grounds of its evidence. The remarks already of- fered tend to this ; that creation being regarded as a principle, antecedent to all modes of finite existence, and consequently unsusceptible of positive demonstra- tion, it becomes necessary to distinguish carefully be- tween the exercise — the efficacy — of the power, and their transmission through the phaenomena of being, already due to their Jirst direction. The absence of any thing, which may be termed a course of nature, during Tl POSTSCRIPT TO PREFACE. the former, and its commencement of existence during the latter, is a sufficient mark of distinction. Now, what we ordinarily understand by " secondary causes," are those which accompany this course of na- ture; qualities impressed upon, yet separable from, matter; the notion of duration is therefore, in the order of our thoughts, connected with them ; to different eras of which it becomes necessary to refer the operations of the efficient and the instrumental causes. We cannot therefore subscribe to the doctrine above- mentioned, or hold, that the exercise of the latter is even compatible with a right notion of creative power. No analogy can be traced between it and the preserving power, sufficient to authorise our concluding, from the manner of acting in the latter, as to that which took place in the former ; the truth is, as one of the Fathers of the Church has determined it — none subsists; enrii ToXvxpuovtov rovrovt Kocrpov e|«gX«5 nrXctTTlv o B~iog, B-ctu^xTX lirl BttVIUUrtt ilpycia-ocra, ov vo/aw jtJi 21 (pi/tru, xav oXus i7riTiTivyfiivn yivrtrui, ov ^uvaToi/ l^ixioSai rvig ctfAipTtTov 7ruvTo>v iZa^io-T/io-iat;. ia-rl yoi(> tivx ruv ui^uttuv (piAotySovcc, net) fitx^oe-otpec, tol 7rt/.Qct7r'cft.7rovTct. fAv tcc. xciAais f^owee rav t7T(Tite the era of reformed doctrine, but to tuut also of improved philosophy, which ef- fected in its degree, not less than the former, a INTRODUCTORY LECTURE. 21 salutary influence on the habitudes of thought. We appeal to the efforts of Lord Verulam in England, and of the continental philosophers, Gassendi and Descartes — to the aspect assumed by physical science consequent on those ef- forts — and to its final emancipation from the trammels of the Aristotelic system, from which, equally with the religion of Christ, it had suf- fered in its essence and external form ( 30 ). It is interesting to the Christian philosopher to mark this coincidence somewhat more de- finedly. We have seen the Handmaiden of Religion in bondage for ages to that depraved appetite for theory, which, in progress of time, intro- duced its puerilities into the doctrines of the Mistress. We have seen them likewise attri- butable to the same cause, a total misconcep- tion of the extent of intellectual power, and a consequent neglect of the only means to remedy the delusion. It were well had philosophy, when rising to its matured proportions, remem- bered this their community of suffering, and joined interests with revelation against en- croachments of reason, which were equally adverse to the spirit of the one, and fatal to the simplicity of the other. And this had been a consequence most obvious to a mind unbi- assed by preconceptions, and anxious to arrive at truth by the plainest and shortest path. If an inverted process of ratiocination mars the 22 INTRODUCTORY LECTURE. utmost efforts of human intellect to erect a system of physical science, destined to endure through ages amidst the collisions of thought, how much more are we to expect such termi- nation to its labors, when divine truth is sub- jected to the same systematising spirit ! How strange, that the mind, whose capacities are only second to those of unembodied intelli- gence, of aspirations ever progressive, of acute- ness all-penetrating, should arm itself with theories in the subject of religion, whilst it builds on the sure ground of experiment in the subject of philosophy ! How unreasonable, that the soberness of thought should be with- held from contemplations, transcending its ut- most unaided power, and conceded to those to which that power is commensurate ! We have now reached the point in our investigation, most interesting to us as denizens of an intellectual state, at which the human mind appears to have attained its maturity. We pass over the successive eras in the annals of philosophy, which were signalized by the achievements of a Bacon, a Descartes, a Galileo, a Locke, and a Newton, — eras, in which the emancipations cf the human mind from the tyranny of superstition, and the vague- ness of unsound philosophy, were contempo- rary, — to a period, of all others, marked by the wonderworkings of intelligence, the present INTRODUCTORY LECTURE. 23 epoch in its history. Man, like the lithophyte of the ocean, has aided his fellow in the erec- tion of an edifice, which seems destined to endure throughout eternity. As amidst the waste, where tempests raged, and uninhabited desolation forbade approach, we have beheld the massive structures to arise, and to assume by degrees a continuity and a form ; — the fowls of the air from above, and the insects of the deep from beneath, co-operating with instinctive union in cementing the pillars of those palaces of the ocean, until vegetable beauty and fer- tility adorn the surface, and attract the footsteps of man to complete the miracle ; — thus hath it been in the world of intellect. A few centuries since, and what was the aspect of mind and its energies? It presented a dark and sterile wilderness, with desolation brooding over its surface : but it contained the germs of its future regeneration, arid to-day " it blossoms as the rose" in the maturity of its loveliness. A nattering portrait this of our intellectual preeminence ! Yet who that retraces in his thought the numberless developments, which have rewarded the efforts of Literature and Science, crowded within a period, of dimen- sions altogether disproportioned to the mighti- ness of the achievements ; — who that has wit- nessed the disenthralment of mind from the bondage in which it lay, and, in so far as 24 INTRODUCTORY LECTURE. intellectual attainment is concerned, the re- storation of that image in which it was primevally created, can regard the outline as overcharged, or the colouring as tinged with hues too poetical ? ( ai ) Yet to this very advancement of the domi- nion of mind has a depravation of its powers been due in researches of incomparably superior moment. The sin of a preceding era, which resulted from debility of thought, has been trans- ferred to a subsequent one, and been incorpo rated with its vigor of thought. " Fables — which minister questions, rather than godly edifying," have been engendered ; "philosophy and vain deceit" have " spoiled" the Chris- tian's simplicity of heart ; " the high thing," and the aspiring " imagination," which should have been " cast down," and humbled before the cross, have, in inconsistence even with the canons of their admired philosophy, displaced the soberness of reflection, and the cautious spirit of scientific inquiry. The most convincing testimonies we can al- lege of the truth of our position may be derived from those persons, who imparted to the phi- losophy of the eighteenth century its form and influence. From the sound principles of our Verulam and our Newton did Rousseau and Voltaire extract the poison, which they in- stilled into the ducts of the social system. The INTRODUCTORY LECTURE. 25 physics of the one were grounded on materia- lism ; the ethics of the other, on a principle of isolation. Both concurred in producing that monstrous birth, the ante -revolutionary philo- sophy of France, which the sensualist Helvetius, and the atheist Diderot, fanatical in his hatred of religion, contributed to raise to a brief pre- eminence ( aa ). A modification of the same philosophy has prevailed, and still continues to assert its supre- macy, in the Institute of France, which, if not palpable atheism, tends essentially towards it, and carries with it the mind which is subjected to its control with an impulse nearly irresisti- ble. We speak of the philosophy of Second Causes — the rock, on which a Buffon and a Laplace have made shipwreck of their science, and which the better spirit of the eloquent Cha- teaubriand has failed of wholly neutralising. To this "rudiment" however we shall shortly have occasion to recur : we mention it at present, as connected with the series of our historical de- tails ; and we terminate with it, as completing the evidence of that doctrine, which the philo- sophy of the Christian has received from the voice of inspiration, that " the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God." Let us now reverse the portrait, and contrast with those aberrations of human research, its effect when guided by a better spirit, a 26 INTRODUCTORY LECTURE. temper more subdued, and principles less ima- ginative. We ascend to the period of intellec- tual disenthralment ; and we select from the writings of the illustrious Personage, to whom sound Science and true Religion have been thus singularly indebted, one amongst the mul- titude of passages which present themselves, in- dicative of the conviction which prompted, and of the spirit which regulated, his mighty enter- prise. " Philosophy," he observes, " exhibits a re- medy and an antidote of peculiar efficacy against errors and infidelity. For our Saviour saith, * Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God.' Wherein, to prevent our falling into error, he proposes two books to be studied by us : first, the volume of the Scrip- tures, which reveal the will of God ; then, the volume of the Creatures, which reveal his power" (- 3 ). How consistent is this observation of Lord Verulam with the advice of a primitive Saint to his Christian converts, " be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meek- ness and fear" ( 2i ). In the uninspired lan- guage of the philosopher there is presented to us the harmony which characterises the works of the Almighty, that of Nature, and that of Grace. In the Apostolic injunction, the ground Introductory lecture. 27 of our Christian hope is affirmed to be demon- strable on rational grounds, not less than sub- stantiated by faith. We thus possess the most cogent testimonies in behalf of the validity of that principle, which extends to the religion of Christ the adaptation of modes of argument, heretofore applied with such success to the re- searches of man. The cautious spirit of an in- ductive philosophy produces a harvest of most abundant increase, when incorporated with that frame and temper of investigation, which results from his indwelling influence who is " the giver of every good and perfect gift." Herein is no " vain deceit — after the tradition of men." " The rudiments of this world" are the ingraf- tures of a visionary system of philosophy on the genuine, the precise, the authentic revelations of God : but the understanding is fortified against " the fable," by a defined perception of the " power of God" exhibited in this his lower universe. Hence it was, that the same Apostle, who cautioned his Colossian church against the deadly influence of this error, maintained, in other parts of his writings, the salutary co-ope- ration of sound philosophy. Nay more, he traces to inobservance of its principles the gross- ness of conception, which pervaded the Gentile world, in reference to spiritual adumbrations :— " The invisible things of him from the creation 28 INTRODUCTORY LECTURE. of the world are clearly seen, being made known by the things that are made, even his eternal Power and Godhead : so that they are without excuse ; because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened : professing themselves to be wise, they became fools" (* 5 ). Such was the heavy censure pronounced by Paul of Tarsus on the idolatrous Gentiles, for neglecting the means of information, which even their impeifect science afforded, relative to the grounds of Natural Religion. "What, may we ask, did this censure imply, but an abuse of mental powers, which retarded their improvement in moral and religious, not less than their progress in philosophical, knowledge ? Was it not a vanity of their own that they ad- mired, and before which they bowed in stupid adoration, instead of abstracting their v regards from the entanglements of sense, and fixing them exclusively on that great Original, which even their disputes concerning immortality might have taugfit them was immaterial. " Ye men of Athens," said he on another occasion, " I perceive that in all things ye are too super- stitious. For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, to the unknown god. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto you. INTRODUCTORY LECTURE. S9 God that made the world, and all things there- in, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands ; neither is worshipped with men's hands, as though he needed any thing ; — for in him we live, and move, and have our being." When such was his language in an age of overshadowing darkness and morbid scepticism, what are we to conclude would the pupil of Gamaliel have uttered, after the lapse of six- teen centuries, when his brother in the flesh, the infidel commentator of Descartes ( S which unites " the heaven, and the earth, and all things that are therein" to the energies of the Supreme Intelligence. d 2 52 LECTURE IT. On this consideration of final causes should be rested much of the argument in behalf of the authenticity of the Mosaic Record. If the just conception of the former be that which leads to the contemplation of a pure intelli- gence, through the medium of animal instinct, or material agencies ; if true philosophy consists in holding to a principle, which presents that intelligence, uncompounded and unique ( a4 ), as a First Cause, and an ever-present Directer — a principle, not assumed by reason of its simpli- city, but deduced from the observable harmonies of creation — it were me thinks no dubious argu- ment in favor of our position, that the narrative of Moses has been conceived in strict accord- ance with a sound philosophy, and with repug- nance solely to a philosophy of materialism. This admixture of the philosophy of Final causes subserves moreover to views essentially connected with the Theocratical polity of the Hebrews. It is interesting to trace the corres- pondence in any system, between the spirit which pervades, and the outline which charac- terises, its moral contexture, and to ground a conviction on such internal evidence as to the validity of its pretensions. Let us direct our attention more particularly to this principle of argument. We have already observed, that the distinctive characteristic of the Judaical system, its Theism, emanated LECTURE II. 53 chiefly from their Lawgiver's mode of expres- sion (* s ). Yet not to this alone was the inesti- mable possession due of an unvitiated theology, but to their invariable contemplation of a cre- ative power through the medium of its effects, and the embodied form in which its acts and attributes were presented in their liturgical compositions, and their national archives. We behold the germ of this philosophy developed from the first, and ingrafted in all succeeding periods on their habitudes of thought. The spirit of their Legislator passed into and ani- mated the conceptions of their poets, their his- torians, and their sages. Thus, in his detail of the events reserved for the fourth day of the Hexaemeron, the Sacred Historian connects the phenomena and the final cause in such wise, as to preserve his read- ers from confounding the mere optical circum- stances with their causes,' or those causes with the Mind which originated their being. Nay more ; he has interposed a period of two days, the third part of the entire demiurgic era, be- tween the production of Light, and the sensible existence, as well as the express mention con- sequent on that existence, of both "the Lights of the firmament" — an arrangement, which will be remarked hereafter as precisely accordant with astronomical facts, but to which we advert, in the present stage of our argument, as sub- 54 LECTURE II. servient in an eminent degree to the integrity of the Theistic doctrine. Who, we may ask, amongst those, to whom the revelation was pri- marily addressed, allowing for a moment the sway of his Reason over his Sense, and rising superior to the dehasements of Ethnical Theo- logy, could pass from the study of those ancient records, and merge into the corruptions of Poly- theism ? Let the Sacred Historian speak for himself: " And God said, let there he Lights in the firmament of the heaven, to divide the day from the night ; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years : and let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth : and it was so. And God. made two great lights ; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night : he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, and to rule over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness : and God saw that it was good." Who, bestowing a due consideration on this exquisitely simple narrative, can resist the evi- dence that attends it of its being " a Scripture given by inspiration," comprising as it does, in one brief statement, notices of the intellectual and the final causes, of the aspects, positions, and distinct offices of the luminaries, above LECTURE n. 55 all, of the doctrine so essentially adverse to the polytheistic scheme, in that its earliest, perhaps its least revolting sin, the worship of the Host of Heaven ? Where was the Hebrew, however nurtured amidst his associations the personify, ing spirit might have been, who could " bow the knee to Baal," the idol-representative of the igneous energy, on the one hand, or defile himself, on the other, with the Canaanitish rites of Sabianism ( 25 ), and retain his belief in the third and fourteenth verses of the first chapter of Genesis ? From the same pure source may the Chris- tian philosopher also derive a light to guide him in his rational researches. He who, not limit- ing his inductions to a confined area in the realm of sense, but extending them to all the relations of material being, frames not for him- self an isolated system, with a peculiarity of law and a chimerical self-production. His, on the contrary, is the structure of Universal physics, whose basis are the intelligence and the power of the Creator, not less than is the principle of universal gravitation the keystone of that minor edifice, whose erection was reserved for the mind of a Newton. The "wisdom" of the in- genious Gentile, nurtured amidst hypothesis, and including within it the germ of premature decrepitude, may deride this as " foolishness.",., The philosophy of the modern Epicurean, fana- 66 LECTURE II. tical in his unbelief, and enslaved to his material- ism, may set it at nought " as a confession of our ignorance." But let not us, conceding to antiquity an unholy reverence, or to splendor of intellect an equally unholy admiration, hazard those involuntary misgivings of mind, which cannot but arise from contact with their scep- ticism. It is an " Idol of the Tribe" ( 27 ), the most noxious because the most fascinating — this affected disrelish for causes unappreciable by formal experiment ; as though a defined and unvarying and universal perception appeal- ed less forcibly to our convictions, than dyna- mical results, or the mechanism of the labora- tory. We turn then from those Idols to serve the living God ; from the Nature of the philosopher, a lifeless abstraction, to the Jehovah of the He- brew, an all-pervading intelligence ; from the exclusive contemplation of causes which affect the Sense, to a fitting regard for those which originate in Mind : and we claim for those Scriptures an unerring authority, in which are grouped the features of a pure philosoph) , not " the traditions of men." 57 LECTURE III. Isaiah, xl. 26, 28. Lift up your eyes on high, and behold ivho hat ft created these things, that bringeth out their host by number : he calleth them all by names by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power ; not onefaileth. Hast thou not knoivn, hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary ? There is no searching of his under- standing. In the Discourse preceding this, certain re- marks were offered for consideration respecting the philosophy of Final causes ; its intrinsic value, as an element of the demiurgic Record, was estimated ; and a special instance was ad- duced from thence, one of many, indicative of the essential union which, in physics of the highest order, subsists between the material effect and the moral contemplation. Yet we are not to suppose that to the narra- tive of Moses is exclusively confined that mode of expression, which leads the thought beyond the mere physical circumstance, to attach it to subjects so immeasurably transcendent as are 58 LECTURE III. the Intelligence, the Power, and the Goodness which gave it being, and which claim our undi- vided homage. It pervades the whole volume of holy writ, and presents in truth, in its indi- vidual aspect, the strongest demonstration of the influence, which was operated by the The- istic creed, on the national literature of the Hebrews. "We may, in consistency with our general plan, which limits not its regards to the records of the Pentateuch, select for contemplation from another portion of Scripture a passage illustrative of our doctrine. It were unneces- sary to advance any trite remarks on its beauty, or its sublimity : it is sufficient to observe, that the King of Israel, who " was wiser than all men," personifies the Wisdom and the Intelli- gence of God in his work of creation. " The Lord by Wisdom hath founded the earth, by Understanding hath he established the heavens. Doth not Wisdom cry? and Understanding put forth her voice ? The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his way, be- fore his works of old. I was set up from ever- lasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. When there were no depths, I was brought forth ; when there were no fountains abounding with water. Before the mountains were settled, before the hills was I brought forth : while as yet he had not made the earth, nor the fields, nor the highest part of the dust LECTURE III. 59 of the world. When lie prepared the heavens, I was there : when he set a compass upon the face of the depth : when he established the clouds above : when he strengthened the foun- tains of the deep : when he gave to the sea his decree, that the waters should not pass his commandment : when he appointed the foun- dations of the earth : then was I by him, as one brought up with him : and I was daily his delight, rejoicing always before him j rejoicing in the habitable part of his earth ; and my de- lights were with the sons of men. Now there- fore hearken unto me, O ye children : for blessed are they that keep my ways. Whoso findeth mo findeth life" ( J ). Such is the commentary of the royal Solomon on the Record of the Creation ; and we may challenge, as Christians and as Philosophers, the archives of human wisdom to produce its parallel, for sound science, unadorned simpli- city, and sublime imagery. Yet on higher grounds than those do we establish our convic- tion, that " the wise and understanding heart" which was vouchsafed to the son of David, dic- tated the illustration, as it had revealed afore- time the circumstances, of the event. It is the moral contemplation — that noblest feature of the Biblical philosophy — which invests it with all its beauty, and symmetry, and attractive- ness : which points so unerringly from its high pre-eminence to the source wherein originated its form and pressure. 60 LECTURE III. A reflection has occurred amongst the multi- tude suggested hy this principle of holy origin, which perhaps it may not be unuseful to pre- sent, with the circumstances which attend it, to the more advanced student in philosophy. It has grown out of the contemplation of the passage we have cited, and particular remem- brances which cling yet to the thought, with little to recommend them save " the mild magic of reflected light" — the impress which they still retain of those firstborn phantasies, so often and so deeply enshrined in the feelings of early youth. There was a period at which an intellect, which has since become associated in a more intimate union with those within these walls, owned, like numberless others, the bewitching influences of a refined philosophy. Contempla- tions of perpetual recurrence, which presented little else than physical truths, embodied in a recondite analysis, or collected from the mass of experimental results, deflected somewhat from its regular path the mind which was sub- jected to their sway, and, without impairing the native force of the lessons of childhood, tinged with their admixture the principles of youth. In this of Final causes was the influence most especially manifested. What was due to a doctrine of Religion was forgotten in what was conceded to the canons of philosophy. What was soundly argumentative, and essentially LECTURE III. 01 useful, in moral reasoning, was merged in the crude metaphysics, and the luxuriant specula- tions of scientific minds. Let then a word in season be addressed to those, whom the behests of Providence have placed in like circum- stances ; and let them be conjured to suffer for a moment the admonitions of one, who has moved over the same round of intellectual effort which they are now commencing. In the midst of all that intensity of research, which reacts on mind with impulse amply com- pensative of the painfulness of exertion, never let them lose sight of the moral consideration. Never let them forget, that their most sublime physics, when divested of this animating prin- ciple, are, with all their transcendency of views, but "rudiments of the world" ; and the devoted- ness they inspire, but an image- worship of the heart so much the more dangerous, because rendered as the tribute of a noble enthusiasm to victorious intellect. With them too often it fares as with their mighty auxiliary. Are not the visible, and tangible, and appreciable exist- ences, submitted to the operations of your ana- lysis, soon lost sight of in the infinity of its evolutions? Do they not, instead of remaining objects of sense, become, like the ideas of the metaphysician, occult — abstract — evanescent ? The relations of quantity merge into those of conventional symbols, and definedness of per- 6% LECTURE III. ception is sacrificed to amplitude of investiga- tion ( 2 ). Our Newton wielded his analysis too — but his giant intellect remained incorrupt, and he preserved inviolate his Christian principle ( 3 ). His illustrious Disciple of the Institute has, by too exclusive a devotion to his analytical pro- cesses, overlooking the sensible relations of be- ing, vacillated amidst the conflict of dubious principles, which characterise their minds with whom he is associated ('). Happy, had he con- tented himself with impugning a metaphysical principle, leaving untouched the holiness of the sanctuary, and undisturbed the repose of the believer's convictions ! But such would not have accorded with the favorite prejudices of his school, and he has consummated his labors with intimations hostile to the best interests of .the moral world. Yet his is the doctrine of Intelligence and De- sign in the ordination of physical laws ( 5 ). To the development of this principle an important article in one of his most beautiful perform- ances is devoted ; a principle maintained as far as the dogmas of Rational Theism permitted its intrusion, but abandoned in effect by his rejec- tion of the philosophy of final causes ( 6 ), when its consequences on opinion were regarded with an eye of suspicion. Above this temporising spirit of a half-em- LECTURE III. 63 braced atheism how elevated are the Christian's views ! He, recognising the moral attributes of his God in every appreciable harmony of his creation, " puts not asunder what have thus been joined together," but " breathes into" the inanimate form of material physics the " li- ving soul" of ethical contemplation. He hears the man, whose " wisdom" was not " of this world — foolishness with God," apostrophise in language as truly philosophical as, and vastly more sublime than, that of modern science, the intelligence which presided at the birth of our visible universe ; and he transfuses into all his habitudes of thought a congeniality of sound and elevated conception. It remains for us to profit by the instruction, "to go and do likewise," " to lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us" — the weight, the depressing weight, of phi- losophical arrogance, the sin of philosophical scepticism — and conform to the imagery of the royal Psalmist, in the moment even of their in- tensest abstraction, the efforts and the convic- tions of our matured understandings ; " O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth ! Thou that hast set thy glory above the heavens ! Out of the mouth of babes hast thou ordained strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger. When I consider the heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars which thou hast 64 LECTURE III. ordained ; what is man that thou art mindful of him ? and the son of man, that thou visitest him ? O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth" ! ( 7 ) The true conception of intelligence and design being thus denned, that namely which centres those attributes in a person or persons, not that which, seeming to regard them as ef- ficient causes, really contemplates them as ab- stract ideas ; the subordination of physical to moral agencies being moreover maintained on a principle which is grounded on this justness of conception ; the accordance, moreover, of the philosophy of Scripture with that of the in- comparable Genius, to which modern Science has been indebted for its extent and its certain- ty, being premised, not merely as a barren spe- culative truth, but as a fact introductory to a series of analogous ones, on which may be es- tablished a more extensive system • of coinci- dence ; — we are prepared with a basis of ada- mantine materials whereupon to erect a solid superstructure. Our first inquiry shall be, how far the fundamental proposition of the Mosaic physics, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth," accords with the prin- ciples of the Newtonian philosophy. In his beautiful Essay on the theory of the earth, antecedently to a more minute considera- tion of certain phenomena, regarded by him as LECTURE III. 65 essential to a just view of its revolutions and catastrophes, the Baron Cuvier presents a succinct detail of the efforts of preceding phi- losophers to account from second causes for terrestrial formations ( 8 ). The distinctive cha- racter of each is exhibited, and its soundness appreciated, by this profound writer, with the same acuteness which accompanies him in all his other researches ; and the conclusions ( 9 ) which he forms respecting each, in all the sys- tems which had amused the world during a cen- tury and a half, are such as to entitle the whole philosophy of first formations to the con- temptuous definition, " the uncertain science," bestowed upon it by a fellow-labourer in geo- gnostical research ( lu ). To account for Creation, one violates the principles of astronomical science ( u ), and to assign the causes of Catastro- phes, lapses into additional absurdity. The same effort at solution leads another into sys- tem at variance with the laws of motion, and the properties of matter ( 12 ). Hypothesis usurps in all the place of fact, and subordinate agen- cies the workings of the Great First Cause ( 13 ). Fatigued with the review of those wander- ings of science from the Origin of the mind which conceives it, and of the universe which affords it exercise, we pass from thence to the contemplation of truths, humiliating indeed to the intellect of man, but, as principles of philo- sophy, safe in their application and salutary in 66 LECTURE III. their consequences. Those are, the insufficien- cy of Second causes to originate material phe- nomena independently of Creative power ; and the incompetence of the human mind to the conception of this power, excepting so far as the reflex operation of sensible existences pre- sents in its effects what is unappreciable in its essence. This dominion of the intellectual over the material — belief in which results from no choice of the mind, but from its utter incapacity to conceive in any other mode the commencement of material being — is a powerful predisposing fact in behalf of a system, which refers exclu- sively to the former as the originating and con- servative energy. Such is the Hebraic Geo- logy. By this one feature it is individualised. Removed alike from the crude philosophy of the Greek, and the masked hypotheses of the modern schools, it ascends for its principle to the Source of being, and views in the wisdom and the power there associated the germs of universal existence. We proceed to offer some reflections on this philosophy, illustrative of the main purport of our inquiry. The order we shall observe is that of the sacred historian, which succeeding notices may demonstrate to be framed in a per- fectly philosophical continuity. It is remarked by a learned and ingenious LECTURE III. 67 Commentator on this and other parts of the Sa- cred writings, that heathen mythologists were wont to preface their systems in terms corres- ponding to the Mosaic " In the beginning" ( u ). From this coincidence, however, nothing can be inferred respecting a community of origin, as it is natural to suppose that, reference to a period so remotely antecedent being contem- plated, a term indicative of that reference has been adopted by all, and independently. We observe the same generality of expression in the Gospel of St. John, which opens with the Septuagint version of the Hebrew bereshith, and connects the doctrine of the pre-existent Word with the Mosaical account of creation by the Elohim ( 15 ). The question then occurs, to what point of duration are we to refer this general announce- ment ? Whether to a period immediately ante- cedent to the developments indicated in the following verses, or to one indefinitely remote ? This is not merely a question of speculation, but one which connects the Mosaical system, on the one hand, with Newton's doctrine of integrant molecules ( I6 ) ; on the other, with the views of the mineral geology ( ,7 j. Creation is represented in the former as an energy of the First Cause, an exercise of his volition, at once originating the elements of matter, and assign- ing them their relations to space and to each $8 LECTURE III. other. The hypothesis announced in the se- cond is, that the primitive disposition of those molecules, in the framework of our globe, was a process of indefinitely extended duration ( 1S ). The first aspect of those different views pre- sents, as has been intimated, features of con- gruity with the record of Moses. It remains for ulterior discussion to ascertain the degree of assent to which either is entitled; as well that which admits the agency of a creative power, as that which seems to regard it as an occult cause ; as well that which confines the first exercise of the Divine energy to the limit prescribed in the first chapter of Genesis, lite- rally understood, as that which seems to depress it to the ordinary level of physical operation. At present it may be interesting to inquire, how far the epochs of the record may, agree- ably to its literal interpretation, be made to consist with the second of those views^ admitted as tenable to a certain extent. The continuity of the narrative is preserved, in the authorised version of this chapter, through the first and second verses : it then commences anew at the third, and continues to the fourth inclusively. But we may compre- hend the latter three verses in the same unin- terrupted succession, by translating the particle which introduces the second, adversatively. For this we possess the authority of the Septuagint, LECTURE III. 69 and the sanction of many passages in the sacred writings ( I9 ). In truth, the concluding members of the se- cond verse afford so probable an indication of the agency of second causes, impressed on the body of material elements by the Power which summoned them into being ( 20 ), (an agency which seems implied for the express purpose of marking the continuity of the epochs,) that the arrangement of succession to which we have adverted, appears at least an assumption not gratuitous, independently even of philological views. The first verse may be regarded therefore, on those grounds, as prefatory to the clauses descriptive of secondary operations ; — as an- nouncing a primordial act, to which these are relative, not as assemblages coexistent with, but consequent upon, its results ; that namely of creative power, or as geologists express it, the mode of first formations : and it is import- ant to remark, that the term used to indicate this act occurs not afterwards throughout the whole series of announcements to the eight- eenth verse inclusive. We meet it not prior to the twenty-first verse, in which the Elohim is described as passing to the production of animal life, nor afterwards, until the twenty-seventh, in which it occurs thrice ; as though it were intended, in both those instances, to mark by 70 LECTURE III. the emphasis of the term the climax in the narrative — the transition to intellectual through animal creation from that of substances purely material. We shall revert to this subject hereafter, as it involves much interesting discussion. It is noticed at present as affording a general con- ception of the manner, in which the system of the geognost may be approximated, in its sound- er views, to that of the Hebraic record. This however has been announced as a partial con- sideration of the former, our belief remaining uncompromised of the exertion of creative power, and of the entire subservience of second causes to the volitions of a pure Intelligence. It is due to the Scriptural narrative to observe that, in those its defined characters, it is re- moved to an infinite distance from the efforts of unassisted reason ; which discountenances, from its inability to attain them, their reception as legitimate principles of physics. It is due, moreover, to the same to remark, in the more obvious circumstances of its detail, the singular propriety of its language, the precision of its nomenclature, and the accordance of its fundamental principle with the matured con- victions of the experimentalist. Commencing with this latter, we proceed to offer such attes- tations in its behalf, as may suffice for the esta- blishment of our general position. A distinct LECTURE III. 71 research shall he allotted to the former in our succeeding lectures. In the thirty-first of the Queries subjoined to his Optics, Newton expresses himself thus with respect to first formations : " It seems probable to me that God, in the be- ginning, formed matter in solid, massy, hard, impenetrable, moveable particles ; of such sizes and figures, and with such other properties, and in such proportions to space, as most conduced to the end for which he formed them." " By the help of this principle, all material things seem to have been composed of the hard and solid particles abovementioned variously associated in the first creation, by the counsel of an intelligent Agent : for it became him who created them, to set them in order. And if he did so, it is unphilosophical to seek for any other origin of the world, or to pretend that it might have arisen out of a Chaos, by the mere laws of nature : though being once formed, it may continue by those laws for many ages." " Space being infinitely divisible, and matter not being necessary in all places, it may be also allowed, that God is able to create particles of matter of several sizes and figures, and in seve- ral proportions to space, and perhaps of dif- ferent densities, and forces, and thereby to vary the Laws of Nature, and make worlds of several sorts in several parts of the Universe. 72 LECTURE III. At least I see nothing of contradiction in all this" C l ). We perceive the same spirit dictating his four admirable Letters to Dr Bentley ( 3a ). It were needless recapitulation to multiply in- stances of the conviction impressed on his mighty intellect, of the strict accordance of the Mosaic metaphysics with common sense and sound philosophy ; or to prove how deeply that intellect was imbued with the Apostolic doctrine* that " The invisible things of God are made known from the creation of the world by the things that are made, even his eternal Power and Godhead." Newton's animadversions on the unintelligi- ble hypothesis of a Chaos, — which seems to have, been introduced by commentators impress- ed with their classical remembrances, and deriv- ed from them on trust, for the support of their hasty inferences, by certain philosophers of a later era, — are in precise conformity with another part of his system, which maintains in express terms the origin of planetary motion to be due to causes not mechanical (* 3 ). The meaning of this it were superfluous to explain to my pre- sent audience. Equally unnecessary were it to advertise you of the principles, which have originated with his illustrious Disciple the grave charge of " deviation from the method so hap- pily applied in other parts of his writings" (* 4 ). LECTURE III. 7^ 11 Could not," says Laplace, " the Supreme Intelligence, which Newton makes interfere, have caused celestial mechanism to result from a more general phenomenon" ? (* 5 ) It is grant- ed that he could ; and we may fairly deem it improbable, that the philosopher who ascended in the scale of causes to the principle of univer- sal gravitation would impugn the possibility. Yet, until the existence of this "more general phenomenon" is demonstrated by experiments, equally appreciable with those which the Bri- tish philosopher has bequeathed us in his Optics, or has its laws developed with the same preci- sion as its supposed secondary principle, univer- sal gravitation, in his ever memorable work, we must esteem it the sounder philosophy to ad- here to Newton's doctrine, and permit our faith to grow in proportion as our Master's decisions confirm the Record of Creation. Newton, it is true, supposed the possibility of ultimate derangements in his created system, which might ultimately demand the interference of the First Cause ( 2<5 ). Yet we cannot per- ceive, in this hypothetical announcement, any impeachment of the saneness of his philosophy. If we contemplate it merely in its physical as- pect, we perceive therein no traces of an at- tempt to invest it with the semblance of a de- monstrated truth : if we regard it as a mixed conception, one in which his Science has bor- 74 LECTURE in. rowed from his Religion, it is ours to admire the sacredness of feeling which enshrined the sentiments of this great man, and taught him, in the midst of his material contemplations, " to ascribe unto the Lord the honour due unto his name." The homage thus rendered to a mind so regulated, and to conceptions so pre- servative of purity in their scientific views, be- comes in persons of a kindred character a quickening and a growing principle. It acquires strength, not by comparisons instituted, but by appreciated effort. The one it withholds from contemplation as an unfair standard of opinion ; the other it ever does, and ever will, attend, as the embodied excellence of all-subduing mind. We apply this principle to the instance we have cited. Modern Science has ascertained the fact, that certain elements of the planetary orbits remain unaffected by disturbing forces, and that all their inequalities are accurately compensative ( S7 ) ; and by its establishment have the philosophers of the Institute added one more link to the chain of our moral induct- ion ( 28 ). Yet what does this conclude, but the superior refinement of analytical investigation ? What in the conduct of Newton's science does this impeach, which resulted not altogether from the infancy of its auxiliary ? Are not those sublime truths but scions themselves of the elder stem — the matured growth of our LECTURE III. 75 Newton's mind — indications rather of an adult analysis, than reproaches of a philosophy in which its powers have originated^? (* 9 ) From this vindication of the intellect which produced the Principia from the charge of un- philosophical views, we revert to our first dis- cussion. We pronounce it to be inconsistent with his philosophy to suppose, that those pro- perties of material elements, termed in the Bib- lical nomenclature "the Ordinances of hea- ven" ( 3 °J, were left at the first creation to the after-agency of second causes to be developed or perfected ; — that they issued not in the integri- ty, which we recognise at present in the formulae of science, from the omnipotent and intelligent First Cause ; — that aught else was requisite to educe them from the womb of being, but the fiat of that Cause, acting independently of time, or modes of operation, or elements of workman- ship cognizable by us, whose sphere is that of sense, and but reflectively that of spirit. With the same degree of assurance we may pronounce a similar judgement on the theories respecting "First Formations" referred to in the commencement of this Lecture. What the physical astronomer has essayed with his " nebulous matter," the geogonist has attempt- ed, on a minor scale, with his " chaotic ocean" ; the one aspiring to generalise the principle which sways material elements in their recipro- cities of influence— the other reproducing from 76 LECTURE III. mineral assemblages a supposed primordial state, the better to account for the phsenomena of their present disposition ( 3I J. It is obvious to perceive throughout the workings of the same spirit. Creation is the " stumbling stone" which offends the philo- sopher of the present era, not less than did the announcement of a spiritual faith the sage of former times, when the voice was that of inspi- ration, and the wisdom that of Heaven. As though it required a more acute intelligence, a greater latitude of belief, or a sense suj^eradded to those which God has vouchsafed us, to con- ceive the primordial framework of our globe issuing perfect from the hands of a Creator, than it does to see it developed in a series of operations diffused over interminable ages, through the mist of second causes ( 32 ) ; — princi- ples of being, which must themselves have be- gun to exist, unless the absurdity of their exist- ing independently of matter in which they in- here, or the still grosser one of the eternity of matter itself, the revolting dogma of the atheis- tical creed, are still to deform the reasonings of the metaphysician. And such, or similar, must eventually be its conclusions, unless our modern philosophy be content to forego its phantasies, and to admit the truth of the Biblical Record. We are in- formed by this record that organic and inor- ganic matter commenced existence at certain LECTURE III. 77 epochs. We are told likewise that the event was due to a power, exerted in definite portions of space, and perfective both of the antedilu- vian earth, and of certain worlds which people the surrounding ether. If this be true, then is the act to which they owe their being rightly denominated creative^ as to begin to exist, and to be framed of, or superadded to, matter not previously existing, are in effect the same. But the philosophy which admits not this mode of efficacy, must multiply its successions without limit, and merge at last into something worse than speculative infidelity. Let us, in accordance with our general me- thod, interrogate nature itself, and see what answer shall be returned respecting this article of our belief. We designate it thus, as we mean not to rest its claims to admission amongst the principles of philosophy, solely on the grounds of metaphysical deductions, or argu- ments ad verecundiam. . Our inquiry, be it remembered, respects the eligibility of a principle ; whether the Mosaic one of Creation, or the Chaos of the Geogo- nist — the former admitted by the Founders of the inductive philosophy, the latter proposed by its adherents themselves merely as an auxili- ary conception — merit a priority of regard. Our evidence is at present derived from sensi- ble phenomena. The proof for the Laws of motion, "the Ordinances of heaven" in the language of inspi- 78 LECTURE ill. ration, merges into that for matter in which they inhere. Of this we must select the portion ac- cessible by our experiments, that of our globe, its Mineral masses and its Organic remains. The researches of two illustrious Naturalists in geological science have established the im- portant facts, that the organic remains imbedded in the strata of the earth are subjected to a cer- tain continuity in their developments ; and that, with the same respect to a law of continuity, the primitive strata are disposed according to the type of their chymical constitution. In the one case, descending towards the centre, we find the exuviae included in the different formations and terminating in the intermediary, converging from the highest to the lowest point in the scale of animal being : in the other, proceeding in the same route, and commencing at the point where the vestiges of organic remains disap- pear, we detect analogous gradations in the earlier strata of the globe. Of the regularity observed in those transitions we may form some conception from the attempts of philoso- phers to frame laws for the succession of strata v as well from the quality of their imbedded pe- trifactions, as the developments they present to the chymical observer ( 33 ). Passing from the contemplation of those re- markable facts, the absence of fossil remains from one series, and their implication accord- ing to an order of succession in another, of the LECTURE III. 79 terrestrial strata, — the comparative internal characters of the rocks denominated primitive, and of the others whose bases they appear to be, present an interesting research. In the former we behold that homogeneousness and uniformity throughout, which it is difficult to trace to any known operation of nature : in the latter we detect either the concretion of masses previously existing, or the recomposition of substances previously decomposed, or evident indications of the combined agencies of gravi- tating force and chymical affinities. The importance of this research will be more fully appreciated, when we review the cata- strophes of our planet which are indicated in the Mosaic record : the first, constituting most pro- bably an extended series, and mysteriously an- nounced in the darkness, and the deep, and the Spirit's motion over the waters, severally expressed in the second verse ; the second, whieh forms the subject 'of the ninth verse, and which prepared the strata for the reception of organic remains to a certain depth below the surface ; the third, and last, of which the seventh chapter is an animated detail, which contributed to the grouping of others at higher elevations ( 34 ). If we perceive those indications impressed with a vividness on the material world, not in- 80 LECTURE III, ferior to that with which they are transmitted in the inspired record ; if the legitimate inductions of modern science be found altogether co-ordi- nate with the announcements of that record ; if, by different routes, and with views not less dissi- milar, the Naturalist of our day and the ancient Historian of the Jews be observed to meet at the same point, and to speak a language essential- ly the same, — it were methinks no inconsidera- ble, nay it were a powerful and most convincing argument, that, in the philosophy of his nar- rative not less than in the ethics of his code, this " holy man spake as he was moved by the Holy Ghost." We shall terminate this Lecture with a brief abstract of the research to which it has been devoted, and more particularly that which has elicited from observable phenomena attestations in favor of the preceding argument. We have contemplated, in the first instance, that beautiful feature in the aspect of Geognosy which reflects the expression of its kindred science, the Physics of our Verulam and our Newton ; both exhibiting the identity of the workmanship which originated and perfected, as well the material assemblage, as the laws which regulate the relations of its parts. Not less beautiful is that to which our attention was next directed, which attests the commencement of Divine agency in the production of organic life. In the former we are presented with a LECTURE III. 81 bond of union subsisting amongst the effects of creative power ; and are directed, by no uncer- tain inference, to assert the sameness of the Agent from the unity of the conception. In the latter, the exclusive attestation of geology, we perceive the limit of those successions, which have been alleged as invalidating the system of Moses ( 3S ). It is reserved for subsequent investigation to exhibit both the grounds of this hypothesis, and the fallacy on which it reposes. So far as our researches have hitherto extended, we argue in behalf of the pretensions of that system, the principles of which are amply verified in the pages of science, and the convictions of the phi- losopher ; which presents us with the announce- ments of both, in the intelligence ascribed by it to the Cause of Being, in the extent which it asserts for his power, in the unity of the Mind thus conceiving, and the beginning of the agency thus effecting, this visible order of created things. 82 LECTURE IV. Hebrews, xi. 3. Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God \ so that things which are seen were not made of things ivhich do appear. The preceding Lecture presented certain features of that interesting research in Natural History, which connects its phenomena with the announcements of the Mosaic Record. It adduced, moreover, the attestations of the in- ductive physics to the reasonableness of the principle, which was interwoven with the The- istic belief of the Jews, or which rather was the very essence and the animating spirit there- of, — the doctrine of Creation ; and the entire terminated in a conviction, apparently not ill- founded, that the external characters of the one, and the matured reasonings of the other* concur, so far as the comparison has been instituted, with the facts of Revelation. That part of our argument, which reposes on the phenomena of organic remains, becomes doubly interesting when we consider, that this class of facts has been added to science but very recently ; that it has been indebted for its most elaborate illustrations to philosophers, the LECTURE IV. 83 least of whose characteristics is an exclusive partiality in favor of the Christian faith ; that it is, in truth, a testimony extorted from the interpreters of nature in hehalf of the veracity of our invaluable record. Creative agency, or one at least of a very peculiar kind, has been asserted in the case of primitive formations from a view of their inter- nal characters. Under this term geognosts in- clude those strata of our globe, which contain no remains of organised substances, or frag- ments of other rocks ; assigning to them more- over, in consequence of this homogeneousness, as well as their order of position, an antece- dence in era to all other mineral masses ('). We proceed from those direct attestations to others not less corroborative of the Biblical philosophy. Their force reposes, it is true, on analogies ; but such as are founded on no arbi- trary conceptions ; such, on the contrary, as subsist in the indications of the material world, and are principles of induction the most legiti- mate. Let us select for contemplation the coralline structures of the globe, and those its inferior assemblages, which a parity of reasoning has induced the Naturalist to conceive as due, not less than the former, to the agencies of in- stinct ( 3 ) ; that series arresting the observer's notice by present and obvious phenomena ; f2 S4 LECTURE IV. this by its myriads of imbedded relics, modify- ing the constitution of entire masses, and fixing, in the systems of certain philosophers, their type and nomenclature. With the labors of the minutest animals of creation thus present to our view, influencing the aspects of immense tracts, rearing with a ra- pidity of operation almost inconceivable subma- rine structures, destined ere long to support the habitations of man, or concealing them within the abysses of the ocean from all but the view of the philosopher, — accords it with reason to suppose that the Divine Being is more power- less in his agencies than animal instinct ? that He could not, independently of that instinct, or of any subordinate efficacy whatsoever, originate by his own exclusive act " the foundations of the earth" ? ( 3 ) that He could not anticipate by a single fiat, in what measure or form or con- sistence he pleased, an analogous series of na- tural effects ? It is, methinks, a view of things much warped by materialism, which appreciates most profoundly the results of instrumental agencies, the mirrors themselves of Creative power, but becomes altogether dim of vision, when the theologian asserts for the Object of his worship the essential and underived inhe- rence of that power. If animal instinct can operate to the decomposition of matter, what is there incongruous in supposing Divine energy LECTtJRE IV, S.5 to have operated to its primal modification? If the insect's skill can extend to the conversion of the fluid mass into a solid integument, or a continuous structure, what is there preposterous in attributing to the Divine Being the power, not merely of an analogous disposition, but of summoning into existence the material cause ? We insist on this argument from Natural History with the fullest conviction of its logical propriety, yet aware at the same time of the limit to its conclusiveness. It is a presumption as to agency from a comparison of effects ; an induction, by which we fix the character of the former, and estimate its reasonableness, by a series of operated results, their extent, and their analogies. All that we contend for is the legi- timacy of that reasoning, which assigns to each cause a commensurate operation — which as- cends from Mechanical to Creative power, when we pass from Instinct to Supreme Intelligence. What then is Creation ? Regarded as the exclusive energy of Omnipotence, how far are we permitted, in this our region of sensible phenomena, to become conversant with its laws — its modes of effectuation ? Is it unphi- losophical to refer those principles, which we are incompetent to express in types ( 4 ) more general, or those mineral assemblages, which so evidently converge to a point of origin ( 5 ), to such definite act of the Supreme First SC) LECTURE IV. Cause ? Or, on the contrary, are hypotheses, whether like Buffon's, so inartificially framed, as to be unable to abide the test of science in its maturer development ( 6 ), or like Laplace's, more philosophically accurate, and more plau- sibly intrenched within the breastwork of a sub- lime analysis, to be allowed that ascendency in physical systems which is due to inductive infe- rences alone ? Those are momentous questions, and demand a proportionate intenseness of thought, ere the student in philosophy, who is also a believer in his bible, should hazard their solutions, to be erected hereafter into principles of investigation. It should ever be retained in mind, that of laws of nature or mechanisms of being, of their connexion with time or their precise relation to intelligence, we can, during the period of which we speak, form no possible conception. The most legitimate mode of reasoning which occurs to a thinking mind appears to be this, to frame conceptions, as far as can be done, in consistence with our views of the Divine attributes. These, whilst contemplated in their metaphysical as- pects, the Rational Theist must hold in com- mon with the Christian, as in this case we ap- peal to those grounds of argument alone, which, though conformable to it as far as they extend, can be established independently of Revelation. He must concede therefore the possibility of LECTURE IV. 87 events expressive of those attributes in the high- est conceivable degree ; and it then becomes the province of the advocate of revealed truth, to approximate that possibility as close as may be to fact. Such has been the aspect of the reasoning to which we have hitherto directed our attention : we have traced the grounds of our belief in the relations of sensible pheno- mena. On this principle we hold that Creation is an energy of Omnipotence, manifested without re- ference to fixed laws, which can only have com- menced at a period subsequent ; without re- ference to Archetypes ( 7 ), in any sense of the term which is attainable by a limited intellect ; independently of time, unless we can conceive the necessity of succession to be compatible with principles of Theism ; irrespectively in fine of every coexistence, which the notion of finite Being is supposed to imply. We can define it, in positive terms, merely as a Volition ; but of the influence of the intellectual over the physi- cal world, which has caused the latter, from a state of no perceived existence, to become an object of sense, we profess ourselves to be wholly uninformed ; and we may rest satisfied with being involved in an ignorance, not superior to that which attends us in our most ordinary cir- cumstances. We shall promise the Rational Theist a perfect solution of this problem, when 88 LECTURE IV. he explains the mode in which even limited in- telligence operates on matter in its volitions, or raises sure footing within the precincts of that mysterious interval, which separates the world of spirit from that of sense. If even this has eluded the keenest vision of metaphysical minds — this which concerns a limited, a derived, and, we Christians say, a created intellect — it seems to be hardly philosophical to require an accu- racy of conception in the case of that which is self-existent and Divine. Nor let it be urged by philosophical minds, that it is unsafe to admit a principle so uncog- nizable into a system which professes to build on fact ( 8 ). Unsafe we should rather term that procedure of the modern philosophy, which concludes hastily, and assumes gratuitously \ the former, inasmuch as it establishes on a limit- ed indtiction its whole process of generalization ; the latter, in so far as it assigns to each sensi- ble physical effect a secondary physical cause, as its necessary precursor ( 9 ). In our review of ancient systems, we have traced their contra- dictions and their instability to the absence of the first, and the universal predominance of the second of those principles : we have witnessed too, even in systems of a later era, which pro- fess a purer metaphysical perception, the work- ings of the same spirit, and ascribable to like LECTURE IV. 89 causes — incomplete analogies, and materialised views. But we deny it to be unsafe, even on the ground of common experience, to introduce in- to our science this principle of the Mosaic sys- tem. It is neither the occult quality, nor the mechanical assemblage, which have alternately disfigured human philosophy. We claim not for it, independently of Scriptural attestation, a higher degree of proof than that which is afford- ed by the purity of the theism which it estab- lishes, the amplitude of the power in which we conceive it to reside, and the testimony of universal nature. Regarding it as exclusively a divine energy, we may content ourselves with the high probability we possess of its exercise, without labouring to ascend in the scale of causation by the aid of palpable experiment. This, even in our physical systems, we never yet have accomplished beyond a certain extent, and probably never shall ( I0 ) ;• and in circumstances of a more mixed character we may appeal to the fact but recently mentioned, that the daily and hourly conversations of life may be allotted their respective claims, without that overpower- ing evidence, which is so unreasonably demand- ed in concerns infinitely more transcending our abilities of perception. Does the adversary of revelation require more evidence for the effi- cacies of Divine volition, than he does for those 90 LECTURE IV. of human ? for the completion of that series of acts, through which matter is educed and modified by the former, than of that, through which it is operated upon by the latter ? It is, methinks, an unstable system, which re- fers its facts ultimately to an hypothesis, — an un- reasonable one, which interrogates others from the suggestions of its own imperfect light, — and an unphilosophical one, which admits not ob- servable analogies. Still less is the scriptural doctrine of Creation inconsistent with sound philosophy in its view of second causes. The chief discrepancy con- sists in this, that, as the latter are essentially relative to time, so is the former essentially in- dependent of it. The agencies of the one are subordinate, and their effects are integrated in differently extended periods : those of the other are originative and influential ; combining, not in succession, but in indivisible units of time, the sum of each series of observable effects. Thus it is that the one may present the same optical phenomena independently of time, which the others render cognizable by a continuity of physical acts ; and that, to apply our present views to a subject recently considered, the con- formation of primordial strata may have issued as perfect from the fiat of the almighty Archi- tect, as those of a later era, which have sprung forth into being from the womb of nature, ap- LECTURE IV. 01 preciabie only by the philosopher's eye even in their completeness of development ("). Thus it is that Creative power may have superadded, at the same indivisible moment, their tendencies of gravitation and their elliptic motions to the planetary orbs, their magnetic energies and their polarity to mineral masses, their chymical affinities and their combinations to gaseous ele- ments, insomuch that the induction of those at- tributes of which we conceive as of causes, and of those appreciable phsenomena which are re- garded as effects, may have been simultaneous ; yet have connected them in such wise, as to leave to the one all their semblance of priori- ty, to the others their philosophical subordina- tion. Hence it is that those phsenomena of de- position, which impede so much the faith of the mineral geologist ( IS ) in this article of belief, ef- fects which apparently require the lapse of ages almost interminable for their completion, may have assumed their optical being through an act contemporary with that, which endued the molecules of our system with chymical relations and gravitating tendencies ; relations and ten- dencies designed for perpetuating those various assemblages, identical in their formal nature with those which were due to creative power. Such, it is conceived, is the view of our present subject, which obviates any collision between the faith of the Christian, and the sounder doc- 92 Lecture iv. trines of the philosopher ; leaving to Second causes all their demonstrable efficiency, and in- vesting the First with his rightful preroga- tive ( 13 ). To the assemblage at present before him, the Preacher esteems it altogether needless to express himself in terms of vindication, for much in the preceding details that is appreci- able solely by an attentive research, and much that eludes the grasp of mind, unless habituated to reflection the most internal. He presents, to plead in his behalf, the nature of his subject, and the succession of its members. Amongst the exhaustless themes of Biblical inquiry he has selected that of the philosophy of the Pen- tateuch. The distinctive character of that phi- losophy, the connection between matter and mind: — one of causation as respects the latter of dependance as relates to the former — an- nounced itself in the very threshhold of his re- search ; — the momentous truth, which distin- guishes it on the one hand from the atheistic scheme of the Stagyrite, contemplating his eternity of matter, and from the visionary ideo- logy of the Pupil of Socrates on the other ; — the troth on which reposed the Israelite's belief in the personality of his Jehovah, whilst the Gen- tile world was in bondage to the physical ad- umbrations of their mythologies ( ,4 ). An attempt to estimate the reasonableness of this theistic doctrine has formed the subject of LECTURE IV. 9S this, and the preceding discourses. The oracles and facts of natural science have been interro- gated; and that has befallen us, which, in numberless instances, has occurred amidst the researches of human speculation. Collateral and important truths have presented them- selves, spontaneously as it were, to the mind engaged in the pursuit of one ; and the charac- ters of that which seemed transcendent and in- demonstrable, have been traced in the eternal monuments which surround us. It is thus that Natural History, conspiring with the Biblical Record, attests the attribute of the Divine Being which ranks the first in the series of the Theologian. This exhibits to us the Elohim, united in agencies, and one in essence, investing matter with its properties by an act contemporary with that which called it into being : the former echoes the sublime truth in its indications of design, of identity of design, pervading the entire series, not only of the organizations of animal, but of the struc- tures also of material existences ( 15 ). We conclude this branch of our inquiry with some observations on the term employed to ex- press the act of omnipotence, which, in our translation is rendered " to create" : and it is submitted, not as a barren philological resparch, but as indicating a certain choice of nomen- clature, least of all attributable to chance, nor yet to any studied variation of language, an 94< LECTURE IV. artifice belonging to those writers alone who contemplate words rather than ideas. Two distinct terms occur in the first chapter of Genesis, expressive of the operations of the First Cause, the meanings of which appear by no means identical. It has been already ob- served, that the term occurring in the first verse is repeated often in the course of the narrative. It may not be unuseful to advert more directly to the passages in which it appears, as it is solely by an induction of this kind we can establish the position, that its usage in those places is by no means fortuitous, but that it is applied in conformity to the peculiar sense, which has been ascribed to it on different grounds in this and the preceding discourses. The texts in the Pentateuch in which it occurs are ten in number ( 16 ), in one of which it is repeated thrice, in two others twice succes- sively. In the first instance of repetition, the twenty-seventh verse of the first chapter of Genesis, we possess clear indication of an em- phasis of a very marked character, the transi- tion being made from the production of merely animal existence, to the act which superadded the intellectual principle in its original purity of essence — " in the image of God, and after his own likeness." A similar emphasis may be observed to recur in the first and second verses of the fifth chapter, which recapitulate the passages to which we have just now adverted. LECTURE IV. [)5 The next passage in which we may remark this phraseological propriety occurs in the thir- tieth verse of the sixteenth chapter of Numbers ; which is rendered literally in the margin of our Bible, " but if the Lord create a creature." A reference is announced to Almighty power, ma- nifested in the miraculous destruction of the rebel Koran and his accomplices, which, from the manner of its accomplishment, awful and unprecedented, expressed that power in all its evidence of interposition. So at least we may conceive it to have been regarded by the Sacred historian, from the language which lie adopts in his narrative. In the remaining six passages, Jive of which occur in Genesis, and one in Deuteronomy, the Agent is uniformly the Divine Being. Matter is endued with its essence and its form, animal being receives its development, the immaterial soul is transfused into man, by acts which, though it were improper under the circum- stances to term miraculous ( 17 ), we rightly de- nominate creative. The same propriety of usage may be observed in other parts of the sacred volume. The fore- going texts have however been cited from the Pentateuch, as it seemed most logical to form our opinions respecting the force of the expres- sion from the writer's application of it in other parts of his composition ; and more particularly 96 LECTURE IV; so, as Hebrew phraseology, like that of ali other living languages, had changed its form consi- derably in the interval between the Mosaic and the Prophetic eras ( 18 ). Those however, who deem the subject of suf- ficient importance, may be referred for ulterior research to the twenty-sixth verse of the fortieth chapter of Isaiah, and the twenty-second of the thirty-first of Jeremiah — passages, in which the verb fvH^ occurs in its simple form, without any of those adjuncts so peculiarly emphatic in the Hebrew tongue. The text in Jeremiah ex- presses altogether the same conception with that which has been cited from the Book of Numbers ; and that in Isaiah, which stands at the head of our preceding Lecture, requires no additional comment to illustrate its meaning. In truth, the passages referred to in Num- bers and Jeremiah afford of themselves a strong independent argument in behalf of the philoso- phy of the term. It seems reasonable, to infer from its appropriation to the detail of an event strange and unheard of — the elements of which were, if we may be allowed the expression, not pre-existenty a similar peculiarity as to usage and sense, when it is employed as descriptive of the primal act of Omnipotence. If so, then may the philosophy of the Pentateuch, in this its most recondite principle, be fairly esteemed as accordant with those, which the illustrious Re- LECTURE IV. 97 formers of physical science have so logically reasoned from, and so unequivocally maintain- ed (19). Our induction may, however, be considerably strengthened by a review of certain texts in which the kindred verb, already adverted to, occurs. For it adds much to the evidence of a singularity of meaning in the case of any word — of the conception which it represents be- ing, so to speak, incommunicable — if we can detect a variation of meaning in the instance of another, which appears at first sight to be nearly synonymous. Such is the root ntlW C°)- Ira the several texts which have been selected for comparison, it has been found expressive of hu- man agency, or of that of the Divine Being not exerted in the manner of creation. We mean not necessarily, as is sufficiently evinced by the latitude of signification of which it admits ( 3I ). It appears above all things necessary that this distinction should be strictly adhered to in this and similar inquiries. On it is dependent all our accuracy of conception respecting the agen- cies of the First Cause, so far as it is derivable from the structure of the Pentateuchal language; an accuracy to be diligently sought after, and scrupulously maintained, if we wish to establish, Avith all the certainty of which it is capable, the genuine philosophy of the Hebraic Record. It may be observed also that much inaccuracy G 98 LECTURE IV. has resulted, on this point, from the poverty of the classical languages. The Greeks had no term expressive of the act of creation in its phi- losophical sense. Hence the LXX translators, and in accordance with them, the writers of the New Testament, have varied in such wise their renderings of the Hebrew verb, as to indicate rather the act by which matter is formed, dis- posed, modified, than that by which it was ori- ginated. Most of the passages to which we have adverted have been collated with the above- mentioned version, and in all has the pure con- ception of the original word been found vitiated. Kt/^iv and 7ro»£»V are, almost uniformly, the ex- pressions used to denote this mysterious agen- cy, — and the Creator of the Hebrew Prophet is degraded to the " opifex rerum" of heathen my- thology ( 3 *). Whatever light it is possible to derive from those sources, we must seek for in the primordial relations of language ; which ex- isted at a period more nearly in contact with unadulterated tradition, when its usages were as yet unaffected by the crude efforts of a syn- thetic philosophy. The Latin creo points more particularly to this source. It has been usual to apply this term, and its descendants in the Romanic dia- lects, as definitively expressive of first agency : yet neither in our own tongue, nor in any kin- dred language with which we are acquainted, LECTURE IT, <)g has the unity of application been observed, which we admire so much in the Scripture nar- rative. It is found in numberless instances to express the agencies of finite beings ( 23 ) ; and to nothing rather should this be attributed, than to the influence on our minds of the philosophy of second causes, which has accustomed us to view them through a false medium, and to in- vest them with an efficacy not their own. We perceive the workings of this spirit in the more improved ages of Greek literature ; and no more apposite instance could be adduc- ed, than the very term which has been the sub- ject of our preceding observations. The ana- logy of language renders its existence in the elder dialect, and in the form which was sub- sequently transferred to the Latins, extremely probable ; in which case it may justly be sup- posed to have possessed, with its greater simpli- city of exterior, a meaning more approximated to the Mosaic standard. -But mark the gradual declension. The intellectual KPEn lost imper- ceptibly its primitive meaning, and degenerated into terms of merely material import ( S4 ). Yet even through this clouded atmosphere were transmitted some rays of the pure original light, and the Zsu? 7txvt and rendered by our Translators " without form, and void." Secondly, of the existence of a primitive fluid enveloping the surface. Thirdly, of the incuba- tion on this fluid mass of " the Spirit of God." It were a task of almost indefinite extent to conduct you through the mazes of Commenta- LECTURE V. Ill tors on the terms which have been cited from the context. In almost all has the clear light of the Biblical record been obscured by those classical associations, which present a Chaos — the " magnum per inane coacta semina" of the Roman Epic — in its several allusions to the antecedent state of our planet ; more especially in those, which are shadowed forth in this se- cond verse, — briefly, it must be owned, and with somewhat of mysterious import, yet with selection of language and arrangement of events, which impart to the whole series a de- terminate aspect. We have already discarded, as incompatible with principles of Theism, this instrument of creation. The philosophical con- ception, in truth, of the latter, as defined in our two preceding Lectures, were sufficient of itself to evince its absurdity. With the view of ascertaining to some degree of certainty the precise meanings of those terms, the language itself has been interrogat- ed ; and from a collation of twenty-one texts, in which they occur either separately or con- jointly, the renderings, as they are exhibited in our received version, have been found, with certain modifications, nearly accurate. The most remarkable of those appear to be the follow- ing ; the tenth verse of the thirty-second chap- ter of Deuteronomy ; the twenty-ninth of the forty-first of Isaiah, the eighteenth and nine- 112 LECTURE V. teenth of the forty-fifth, the fourth of the forty- ninth ; and the twenty-third of the fourth of Jeremiah. In the first of those texts, which forms a part of that sublime ode entitled Moses' song, the wilderness through which a present Deity conducted the Iraelites is termed tohu. This is rendered in our version "waste," and by a word of similar import in the version of Munster. The LXX have varied their ren- dering for an obvious reason, because that which they had adopted in the first chapter of Genesis would, if applied here, afford no con- sistent sense. As it is, their translation appears rather paraphrastic than literal ( I3 ). It requires however but a brief review of the text to perceive, that the term is employed to indicate, in contrast to others, the sterility and the horrors of this unfavoured portion of the earth ; and in a sense analogous to that, by which it expresses the aspect of the whole earth antecedently to the organization of its v surface. Of the remaining five texts we select that in the prophecies of Jeremiah, on account of its evident relation to the Mosaic narrative. The LXX vary in this passage also from their first rendering of tohu. That of bohu would be singularly applicable. Both conceptions, however, seem united in their view of the pre- sent text ; their «e/>.«Tos and their axaTao-xsuao-ro?, in their representation of the historian's notices, LECTURE V. 113 becoming, in that of the prophet's announce- ment, the emphatic ovUv. This prophetic detail is well worthy a few moments' more accurate consideration, as the circumstances which it presents point very de- cidedly to the just conception of the demiurgic expressions. "I beheld the earth," says the Prophet, " and lo ! it was without form, and void ; and the heavens, and they had no light. I beheld the mountains, and lo ! they trembled, and all the hills moved lightly. I beheld, and there was no man, and all the birds of the hea- ven were fled. I beheld, and lo ! the fruitful place was a wilderness, and all the cities there- of were broken down at the presence of the Lord, and by his fierce anger. For thus hath the Lord said, the whole land shall be deso- late ; — for this shall the earth mourn, and the heavens above be black." In this energetic address we behold a repro- duction of the earth's primeval state, present in all its train of imagery to the prophet's mind, and shadowing forth the political ruin of Israel and Judah. We have Light forsaking the hea- vens : we behold the extinction of animal and vegetable Life : a series of catastrophes is indi- cated by the "mourning" of the earth and the " blackness" of the heavens in the twenty- eighth verse ; deformity has usurped the place H 114 .LECTURE V. of beauty, desolation of order. It appears there- fore most reasonable to suppose, that terms, which in one text are explained by the occur- rence of a series of catastrophes, indicate in another the absence of the relations which they efface ; a state consequent on the reproduction of disorder being identical with that which pre- cedes the organising process. The remaining texts which have been enu- merated above are well deserving a full discus- sion, particularly those in the forty-fifth and forty-ninth chapters of Isaiah. As much, how- ever, as appears consistent with the necessary limits of a lecture, has been advanced in behalf of the true conception of the Mosaic language. Of the two corresponding terms in the version of the LXX., dopaTog, invisible, and dy.xTa m its simple meaning, strictly applicable to the pre- sent state of things. Light had not as yet emerged at the Divine Fiat, nor had the surface as yet been completed in its formation, inso- much that, both in its physical and optical re- ference, this word is quite consistent with the tenor of the Record ( 19 ). Associated however with this its leading idea, there occur, in its scriptural usage, conceptions of a particular kind, which imply its circumstances of effectu- ation and being, to which we may reasonably refer as illustrative of its meaning in the present text; Thus, in the fifth chapter of Deutero- nomy the Lord is said to have promulged the Decalogue from Horeb, " out of the midst of the fire, of the cloud, and of the thick dark- ness ;." and the Israelites to have " heard the voice out of the midst of the darkness ; for," it is added, " the mountain did burn with fire." Hence the change of expression in the twenty- fourth verse, " we have heard his voice out of the midst of the fire." We perceive therefore the attendant circumstances of this ratification of the Divine Covenant, which are mentioned in the twenty-second verse, — namely, "the cloud," " the thick darkness" ( 20 ), " the LECTURE V. 1^3 fire," — comprehended in the single term oc- curring in the next verse, and the same with that in the demiurgic Record. A latitude of meaning analogous to this is ob- servable also in other parts of Scripture. As the awful concomitants of God's presence are, in the passage to which we just now referred, figured forth to our conceptions in this one term, so, in a metaphorical sense, are the disquietudes and the desolation of ungodly men denominated "their darkness:" " Heknoweth," said the Temanite to Job, " that the day of darkness is ready at his hand. Trouble and anguish shall make him afraid ; — and he dwelleth in desolate cities, and in houses which no man inhabiteth ; — and he shall not depart out of darkness." The infer- ence from those and like passages seems legi- timate ; — that a term applied in them to ex- press circumstances of Catastrophe may be re- garded as bearing a similar sense, where it oc- curs in the Record of Creation. Our attention is next to be directed to the words rendered "Spirit of God" in the third member of this verse. It is unnecessary to in- form you, that the n"n of Moses undergoes the same variations from its primitive meaning, as its kindred terms in the Classical languages ; and that this primitive meaning is the same in all. Hence, and from the known simplicity of the Hebrew diction combined with the indica- 124 LECTURE V. tions of the verse itself, the idea occurred on a first view, that the word " Spirit" might possi- bly express the changes produced throughout the Abyss by the action of Mechanical causes ( ZI ). We have therefore, with the view of ascertain- ing how far this supposition is tenable, examin- ed eighteen texts of the Pentateuch, in which rrn occurs ( is ). In six of those the undoubted sense of the word is Divine Intelligence. This opens to our view a harmony in the Sacred re- cords, not less beautiful as an object of the Christian's contemplation, than conformable to the analogies of the natural world. It presents the Elohim of the Hebrew, in plurality of per- son and in unity of essence, the Eternal Father, " Lord of heaven and earth" — the Eternal Word, "by whom all things were made" — and the Eternal Spirit, " who proceedeth from the Father and the Son," associated all three in the act of Natural, as afterwards in the mightier one of Spiritual, creation. It presents us with the harmony of distributive effect, and the ap- propriation at the same time of individual agency ( 33 ). The word occurring next in order, which in- dicates the agency of the Spirit, has received only its general sense from our Translators. It expresses properly a supervolant motion, or the kindred sense of incubative influence ; and is beautifully applied, in this acceptation, to the LECTURE V. 125 ever-present protection by its God of the house of Israel in the thirty-second chapter of Deute- ronomy, eleventh verse. It occurs but once again in the whole compass of Scripture, — in the twenty-third chapter and ninth verse of the prophecies of Jeremiah. The Syriac version in the text of Genesis presents a similar aspect, implying the act of incubation. The remark may not be esteemed irrelevant, that this demiurgic notion has trans- fused itself into the conceptions of other Orien- tals ; witness the Mundane Egg of the Hindus and Chinese. We may reasonably ascribe to the same source the origin assigned to the First- born in the Orphic mythology ( 34 ). The Fecundation ( 35 ) of the mass of waters by the Spirit is another mythological notion re- ferrible to this latter, which, though apparently inexplicable by any known analogy, may yet be regarded as figuratively expressive of the agen- cies of the period. Our preceding remarks have seemed to sanction the hypothesis, that the mysterious notices of this verse are indicative of a series of acts, principally confined to the external layers of our planet. To it we direct the modern Geognost for the epochs after which he so anxiously seeks, and to which he may refer the phenomena of his peculiar sphere. Material relations in all their various forms of attraction, affinity, repulsion, were perhaps to 126 LECTURE V. be perfected throughout the extent of the Abyss. Consequent on this may have been the solidifi- cation of those strata which are external to the primitive, the prior state of which is exhibited in the " formless earth," and " the deep" en- veloped in darkness. Then the formation of the " dry land" — the union of earth and oxide, adapted for the reception of vegetable germs, and perfective of the whole series due to the agencies of this period. We seek not in vain, amidst this assemblage of operations, this production, so to speak, of material life, for the origin and fitness of the term, through which the Spirit's influences on matter seem figured to our conceptions. We are not, however, limited to the view of inorganic substance in this interesting enquiry. This agency of " the Spirit" may, to any conceivable extent, have impregnated " the waters" and " the dry land" with germs of organic being, which the Fiat of the Elohim matured on the fifth and sixth days of the pri- mal week. There is nothing that I can see in the whole compass of the Record adverse to this supposition. Not in the twentieth verse, for the expression used there betokens as expli- citly as language can an embryo existence of animal life — " Let the waters bring forth abun- dantly." Not in the twenty-first, for the word "create" may be regarded as used in its pro- LECTURE V. 127 per and literal acceptation, but respective at the same time of the epoch, however antecedent it may have been, at which the rudiments of that life were originated. We speak not at present of a slight change in the disposition of the clauses of this verse, which effects still more decidedly the possibility of this reference, both because it may easily be inferred from our rea- sonings on the fifteenth and following verses, and because the reference itself is quite inde- pendent of any such variation. And we limit also our observations to the twenty-first, as the present argument applies with still greater force to other parts of the Record ( 26 ). For the justness of the preceding views we may appeal with confidence to the testimony of those philosophers, who have preserved the purity of their theism amidst the researches of their science. We have stated it as our belief, that the Perfecting of those relations amongst the elements of' matter, on which de- pend their various phenomena, was the agency of the period to which this Second verse is refer- rible. We select as one of many instances, their mutual gravitation. It is a recognised principle amongst philosophers of the class we have mentioned, that this quality is not essen- tial to matter ( 27 ). It plainly follows that it may have been superadded at some period not the same with that at which matter first began 128 LECTURE V. to exist, as the clearest conception of an essen- tial quality we can frame, is of one which begins to be by virtue of the being of that in which it inheres. If we connect with this principle the well-known fact, that all the efforts of modern Science to assign a Mechanical cause to this instrument of nature have failed, the reasona- bleness of the hypothesis, which ascribes its ori- gin and its continuance to the immediate act of the Intelligent First Cause, amounts to nearly the certainty of conviction. The same reasoning may be extended to those other forces, which appear subordinate in the scale of natural causes. Whether the ab- sence, in part, of these, the effects consequent on their induction, and the complete organiza- tion through them of the terrestrial system, be severally indicated in the members of the Second verse, are questions which, however they may be answered according to our pre- ceding views, can never be placed beyond the precincts of opinion. Yet we cannot refrain from suggesting these and the following parti- culars as connected, by no remote inference, with the clauses to which we refer. We have already, from the term selected to express it, hazarded a supposition as to the in- fluence ascribable to the Spirit, during the ope- rations of this period ; that it was of a vivifying nature; that it tended to the production of LECTURE V. 129 organic life. For the reasonableness of this you are referred to the reflections of physiolo- gists on the circumstances of the development of that life ; circumstances, which we may as readily conceive to have been due, in their ori- gin, to Divine power, as, in their continuance and their energy, to Natural causes. We allude to that philosophy, which regards the whole terrestrial surface as a receptacle of germs, awaiting only the presence of suitable influ- ences to mature their being. He who objects not to the reasonings of the Naturalist ( 28 ) on this point, can, with little consistency, impugn the vieAvs of the Theologian. The one asserts, from philosophical data, the probability of a certain class of agencies, to which, supposed as probable, the latter assigns an epoch of com- mencement : and the reasonings of both may be combined in the prosecution of an analogy, as striking as it is beautiful, in the several ef- fects of Divine power. We speak of the peculiar fitness of appropri- ating to that Person of the Godhead, whose especial office appears to be the imparting of life, the vivifying agency at the period of Crea- tion. Thus is the Being, who is designated in the Christian Liturgy as "the Lord, and Giver of Life," presented to us in the Jew- ish Record as the Animator of the insensate mass ; and the worlds of matter and of spirit 130 LECTURE V. are alike pervaded by his omnipotent influ- ences. Add to this the remark, that the Mosaic nil has been paraphrased by one of the Fathers of the Church " a quickening energy"... a spirit imparting life ( 29 )- If these words of Chrysostom have any meaning, it must be sup- posed analogous to that, to which we have been conducted by our preceding views. Let us re- gard them as expressive, by a figure as natural as it is common, of that Being, in whom we are taught by Revelation to believe that the office which they indicate inheres in a Spiritual sense ; let us connect this Personal reference of the O^n^N n"n with the Choice of construction we meet with in the verse immediately preced- ing ; the Second of these terms... a Plural noun. . .susceptible of every change in its syn- tactical usage. . .being placed subjectively to a Singular verb ( s0 ) ; the inference from all this appears plain, that not only is the Narrator's language framed in consistence with the sub- lime Mystery of the Christian's faith, the Triune Godhead, but definitively also of a Distinctness of agency in precise correspondence with other parts of Divine revelation. To particularise the several operations were, perhaps, an unsafe application of the terms of scripture. We are presented with the gene- rality of result, not with the minuteness of de- tail. We have attempted, it is true, to derive from the language of the Record a statement of LECTURE V. 131 consecutive events in the earliest physical con- formation of our planet ; but to this we have been led by the accurate observation of the geo- gnost, who has recognised in its aspect as well the interval as the species of agency, and as- signed to certain demiurgic events a succession in the order of time. We have been aided in this inquiry by fixed points, determined in the Record itself, which necessarily presuppose the effectuation of particular events. Thus the ninth verse presupposes the stratification of the globe ; the latter clauses of the second verse imply, amongst others, the acts by which it was effected ; the first verse, that particular disposi- tion of terrestrial matter, which was fitted to receive those ulterior changes in its mass. Now Analogy leads us to suppose, and in this it echoes the language of the Record, that in the material system, as in the Christian scheme, the total effect was the result of appropriated energies. He who willed the redemption of fallen man, and he who bore his sorrows, and he who sanctifies his heart, are discernible in their workings through the veil of sensible things, as the originating, the perfecting, and the vivifying powers. The spiritual world exhibits this threefold efficacy in the final bless- edness of the believer ; we contemplate in the material the union of like agencies, and equally omnipotent ( 3I ). i 2 13^ LECTURE V. We pass to an additional reflection, and one still more exclusively philosophical, with which we shall terminate the present lecture. The occurrence of the word " Deep" in the second member, and that of " Waters'* in the third, seem to imply the aqueous constitution of at least the external layers of our planet at the epochs which they severally announce. A learn- ed writer has, in consequence, in his remarks on this passage, connected its indications with the singularly concurrent systems of the Chaldean and Hindu Cosmogonists ; yet in a manner which leaves it problematical, whether or not he esteems the principle of a Chaos to be the genuine sense of the Mosaic Record ( 32 ). This aqueous state, regarded in the light of an origin of things, we reject altogether as a philosophical fiction, contrived by ancient sages from traditionary notices vague and misunder- stood ; and revived in these latter days by the school of materialism, as an auxiliary concep- tion in its theory of first formations ( 33 J. It cannot indeed be denied, that the aspects of the crystallised and stratified layers of our globe present, in most of their assemblages, ap- pearances of deposition in a fluid mass ( 3i ), con- tinued through periods unappreciable by man. This is equally indicated by their general ana- logies and their specific differences ( 36 J, the for- mer pointing to a similarity of origin, the latter LECTURE V. 133 presumptive of chymical changes uninterrupt- edly successive ( 36 ). In the case however of primitive formations' we regard all this as lead- ing nature into captivity to experiment. The records of Scripture and sound Science are alike adverse to the hypothesis, which ascribes to this indeterminate process the laying of those " foundations of the earth." The pure Theism of the one, which forbids us to contemplate the necessity of second causes, and the accumulated attestations of the other, which demonstrate the agency of a First Efficient, stand essentially opposed to this doctrine of the Geologist. Yet we are presented with this auxiliary of his science enveloping the globe. Is not this, it may be asked, an indication of a cause — a strong collateral proof of his theory of first for- mations ? We answer, that a wide distinction is to be drawn between the announcement of a cause, and the statement of concomitant circumstances. The reasonings of the Geologist proceed on the assumption, that in no other way than by con- cretion in a fluid menstruum could the solid strata have been produced, not considering that the very event which he contemplates as an ef- fect may have preceded, in the order of time, the existence of its assumed physical cause. It may have been, by the stronger reason, contem- porary with that cause. We instance in the 134* LECTURE V. agency of the second day of the Hexaemeron. The production of the atmosphere is announc- ed as a single act, yet its very notion involves the union of dissimilar elements antecedently produced. Light itself, the result of operations consummated on the first day, is a compound, the elements of which vary in their physical properties ; yet who that bestows a due atten- tion on the Record will find it necessary to suppose, that the creation of those elements pre- ceded their union, so as to constitute the lumi- nous fluid, in time ? In the order of our thoughts it may, perhaps must, precede ; but it were absurd to suppose that the volitions of the First Cause were effected conformably to any such succession. It appears, in fine, most suitable to our ideas of an Omnipotent Being to conceive, that in those, as in other compounded operations, the intermediate degrees were passed ever, and that the final result which comprehended them all was presented at once in its physical charac- ters. It is to be remarked however, that we con- fine these observations, as far as they relate to the strata, to the types which preceded the existence of organised substance. The concretions which succeeded those may, as we have seen, have been due to agencies of more protracted dura- tion : nor is there a single expression in the LECTURE Vi 1S5 whole compass of the biblical records to contra- dict the testimony of the geognost, that antece- dent states of our planet have existed, in which violent catastrophe and apparent ruin have led to the completer organization of its surface. Dismissing this subject for the present, we shall content ourselves with a brief review of the at- testations which natural science has produced in behalf of his hypothesis. The first is the fossilised vegetation which is discernible amidst certain types of formations. The second is the occurrence of organic re- mains, with somewhat of a law of continuity in their development, and apparently marking so many distinct intervals in the disposition of those types. The third is announced in the aspect of an extensive class of formations, indicative of the action of disturbing forces, operating succes- sively and at intervals. The fourth in the ex- istence of distinct assemblages of rocks, whose production can be assigned to no other cause, and is referrible to separate epochs. The fifth reposes on the analogies which modern observa- tion detects in the catastrophes of nature, and the forces which produce them. We reserve for future discussion the evidence which these phenomena present of a series of states of our planet, consequent on the first act of Divine power, and preceding the period of the Hex- aemeron. 13G LECTURE V. We pass to physics of a different order. In those we have hitherto contemplated, the re- searches of philosophers have failed of reaching the unit which terminates the series of sensible phenomena — an achievement reserved for that age, which is destined to give birth to the New- ton of Natural History ( 37 ). In those to which we now direct our attention, the processes and the results are regulated throughout by a prin- ciple, which, though it terminate not itself the climax of physical effects, indicates at least by its incomplexedness a close approximation to its extreme point. We speak of that force, which not only traces for the mass its route through space, but regulates also its form, in- duing the system of its molecules with relations not less denned, than those which it has dif- fused, over the vast assemblages of the universe. It were superfluous to apprise the present audience, that a reference is intended in the foregoing remarks to the figures of revolving bodies, and to their axes of rotation. The in- dications of the second verse render it at least a possible conception, that the latter motion may have been, at the same time with that of revolution, and during some period of its inde- terminate duration, imparted to our globe ; nay more, that the influence expressed by the term ngnha ( 3S ) refers, not only to that which was primarily exerted by the Spirit on the fluid LECTURE V. 137 mass, but to those reciprocations throughout its whole extent, which preceded the assumption of a stable equilibrium, and a permanent axis of rotation ( 39 ). If it be granted therefore as possible to infer from the notices of this part of the Record, that certain classes of mechanical agencies com- menced their operation — agencies referred in the spirit of the Hebrew philosophy to a Su- preme Intelligence — we are at liberty to con- template those amongst them which contributed to the disposition of the terrestrial molecules. Such, it is admitted, must have had a beginning, either coeval with, or subsequent to, the first production of matter. Their not being, any of them, essential qualities, renders it a matter of indifference which of the two suppositions it were expedient to adopt. If the former, we may recognise in the terms of the second verse the continuance of the effects of causes antece- dently impressed ; if the latter, the commence- ment of the operation of those causes. In either case it is reasonable to suppose that the aggre- gate of physical results was effectuated in time, unless we can hazard the conjecture, that a succession is observed in the historian's an- nouncements, merely to accommodate to hu- man capacity his narrative of those agencies, to which we admit of time's being in no wise essential. They are, however, questions alto- 138 LECTURE V. gether distinct, whether the First Cause ope- rated necessarily in time, or whether it pleased him to act so prospectively to an end. His power of creation is an answer to the first ; the actual exercise of that power, followed by one essen- tially different, is an answer to both. Such is the disposing and organising process, which is expressly recorded as influential on matter du- ring the epochs of the demiurgic week. We suppose then the operation of Second causes in time, which were due themselves to the energy of the First Cause exerted irrespec- tively of time. Let us now revert to the con- sideration of that which originates the form of revolving bodies. It recalls to mind an inte- resting epoch in the annals of philosophy, a brief notice of which may serve to establish an additional bond of union between the Biblical Record, and the profound Physics of the school of Newton. It is well known to many here, that, in the first approximation which was, made to the true figure of the earth, two suppositions were intro- duced to aid the efforts of research, Fluidity and Homogeneousness ( 40 ). Such was New- ton's hypothesis ; a resolution, as it were, of the globe into its supposed elements, and in a state susceptible of modification from the im- press of any conceivable force. It was, how- ever, but an approximation. The conditions LECTURE V. 139 we have mentioned accorded neither with the present, nor the primal state of the terrestrial mass. It forms, in truth, a reasonable pre- sumption against their coincidence with the latter, that each successive complication of the problem led to a conclusion more nearly ap- proaching to fact ; and that, from all embodied in a consistent whole, the analyst of modern times has reasoned with clearness and deter- mined with precision. They could not more- over have been intended as such by Newton, who impugns the chaotic principle in other parts of his philosophical writings ( 4I ). What the genius of this great man had com- menced, the labours of his followers in the same field, on the basis of more accurate expe- riment, and wielding a more refined analysis, accomplished ; and to the researches of a Mac- laurin, a Clairaut, and a Laplace, has this problem been indebted for its more complete solution Its announcement in the second stage of its progress supposed the union of two dis- tinct masses, an internal solid, and an external fluid shell. It modified the Newtonian hypo- thesis, in the third, by introducing a law of varying density ( 4S ). We behold, in all these conditions of solu- tion, an uniform conception blended with the research. The fluidity of the Geologist has introduced itself, in terms, into the speculations 140 LECTURE V. of the Natural Philosopher ; and the language of the inspired Historian appears, to a certain extent, in favor of hoth. On this analogy of expression it is that we repose the proof of our position, that a bond of union subsists between all three, which can scarcely be regarded as an accidental coincidence, or as originating in aught else than the progress of sound philosophy, on the one hand, from effects to causes, and the anticipation of its result, on the other, by an intelligence superior to that of man. We ar- gue in fine, that circumstances so widely differ- ent as are the aspect of secondary strata, the assumption of spheroidal form, and the demiur- gic motion of the Spirit, could have been con- nected with a sameness of conception on no other ground than this, that the state to which it refers marked one of a series of epochs in the primitive constitution of things. This coincidence is however to be understood in a limited sense. We must beware of con- founding the notions of the Geologist and the Natural Philosopher, and the more so, as the one appears to have approached the Scriptural Record much more nearly than the other. The varying density, the internal nucleus, the fluid shell, accord much more precisely with the in- troductory verses of the first chapter of Genesis, than the menstruum in which the strata of our globe are supposed by some to have been sue- LECTURE V. 14-1 cessively deposited. The difference in fine be- tween those two classes of inquirers seems to be this ; the one, from the evidence which he conceives to be presented of primitive forma- tions being referrible to agencies therein, has supposed fluidity, and reasoned upon it, and ended in a conviction of a primeval Chaos. The other has introduced the supposition for the sole purpose of facilitating his research. The former has reasoned on an hypothesis as a fact ; the latter has builded on a fact as an hypothesis. It remains for us to derive from the specula- tions of genuine science what may confirm and illustrate our common faith, a faith which, like the vesture of its Author and Finisher, " is without seam, woven from the top throughout," forming in all respects a perfect and an indivisi- ble whole, affected to its remotest bounds by an influence exerted on any single part. If this day's discussion has presented in the notices of the Hebraic Record features which discriminate an advanced philosophy, it appeals to those notices for your estimate of the prin- ciples which characterise them, as well as of the Mind in which they have originated. It appeals, for evidence of their inspiration, to the anticipated achievements of Science, at an era when its nobler energies were unborn, and 142 LECTURE V. its outlines but faintly traced in half-awakened intelligence. If moreover it recognises in the admirable harmony of their arrangement, in the singular propriety of their successions, in the beauty of their moral contemplations, and in the exact- ness of their physical allusions, the impress of a Divine Original — it limits not its inferences to them alone : it recognises also in the Gospel scheme the workings of the same almightiness ; that miracle of grace, which was the fulfilment of the Law ; whose spirit pervades those pri- meval notices ; which seems the consummation of all preceding agencies, and of all creative power. NOTES. NOTES ON LECTURE I. Note (1). — It were no difficult task to substantiate the grave charges advanced here against a certain class of philosophers. In truth, they have been alleged so often as grounds of well-merited reprehension, as scarcely to demand at present much expenditure of research. We may select amongst a multitude of authorities the con- cluding reflections of the Sysleme dn Mo?ide, in which unhappily we find much to excite those " illusions," and that " self-love," condemned by the illustrious author with so much apparent sincerity (Liv. V. C. vi. p. 448), and but little to produce in us the only emotions which can consecrate human acquirement to its noblest pur- pose. A very limited review of the same work suffices to establish the other points, to which I have adverted in the foregoing passage. Speaking of Universal Gravi- tation, he proposes the following queries ; " ce prin- cipe est-il une loi primordiale de la nature? n'est-il qu'un effet general d'une cause inconnue ? Ici l'igno- rance — nous arrete," etc. Liv. IV. Ch. 17. The same philosopher, adverting to the relations be- tween the motions of the planets and their satellites, namely, the sameness of their directions, the smallness of the inclinations of their respective planes, and the approach of the orbits to the circular form, derides the idea of Newton as expressed iu the Scholium Generale,* * Elegantissima hascce compages nonnisi consilio et dominio entis iu- telligentis et potentis oriri potest. — Hi omnes motus regulares originem uon habent ex causis mechanicis." p^. 673. Ed. Jacq. K 146 NOTES ON LECTURE I. and elsewhere, under the titles of " cause imaginaire," and " la supreme intelligence que Newton fait inter- venir." A little farther on, he speaks thus of Final Causes : " parcourons l'histoire des progres de l'esprit humain et de ses erreurs: nous y verrons les causes fi- nales reculees constamment aux bornes de ses connais- sances. Ces memes causes que Newton transports aux limites du systeme solaire — ne sont — aux yeux dephilo- sophe, que l'expression de l'ignorance ou nous sonimes, des veritable causes." Livr. V. Ch. 6. Our only remarks on this commentary on the doc- trines of the Principia shall be, that the principles which they are intended to discountenance are those of a cause of Gravitation not subjected to the laws of mat- ter and motion, and of the origination of all things by, as well as their continual dependence on, an omnipotent and intelligent Being. Compare Schol. Gen. Principp. and Optics, Query 31 . This latter attribute of Newton's Supreme Cause we shall perceive in the course of our investigation to be essentially connected with the doc- trine of Final Causes; the paramount importance of which, as a feature of the Biblical Philosophy, will fur- N nish matter of separate consideration. In the mean time, it may not be uninteresting to the reader to compare the different influences of the same spirit amongst the Savans of the present period, and the ancient Gnostics. Materialism of conception amongst the latter withheld from the Supreme the agency of creation, and introduced the absurd doctrine of the Demiurge, (Comp, Mosheim, Vol. 1. pp. 60 — 4. 101. 107,) the third of their imaginary Aeons, the image of the Unigenitus, and theunco?iscious framer of the visible Universe and Man. Vid. Irenaeus adv. Hcereses, Lib. i. Cap. 5. 20. 33. NOTES ON LECTURE I. 147 Note (2). — See Whitby in loco ; and Mosheim, ubi supr. pp. 56, sqq. The commentator sanctions our ex- position of the Apostle's words in express terms. The word yvSa-t?, in its primary application, conveyed a meaning widely different from that which it expresses in 1 Tim. vi. 20. Comp. Euseb. Eccl. Hist. p. 38 D. Clement of Alexandria defines it thus: a-oiplx «y m » ym- ctf, i7ri9 t fiifixi'x xxi xrtpxhvis, as uv ira^x vlov $~icv 7rx^xoc6itTX icxt x7rox.xXv$QuTx. Strom. L. vi. The words of Valesius in his note on the passage in Eusebius to which the reader's attention has been directed are well worthy of consideration : " Haere- tici — quamvis earn (yvuo-iv) sibi vindicent, et Gnosticorum nomen usurpent, earn tamen habere non possunt, cum alieni sint ab Ecclesia Dei." If a sect whose knowledge was pretence, and whose vanity was only exceeded by their abandonment of religious feeling, could yet attain to such pre-eminence — what may we not apprehend from their representatives of the present period, who use not even the semblance of Christian principle as a mask for their impiety ? Note (3). — Compare 1 Cor. iii. 19. 1 Tim. vi. 20. (4) — Thus Eusebius : U7n> roi/rm -^sv^o^Krrei, •J/iv?io7r(>c

iTXt i i^iv^X7r6.oycts x.xTx rov 3tov kxi kxtx tov %giS ^iv xctt TFOI.^lX.VQfiU^. X.UTU Vl T«J ZT££< tZv TV^XyftUTaV, x.cci tov j-uov oo%xs, tXXvjvi^av ti xcti ra. ixXvivav to7? oivilot? vvjojiccX- Xofttyos (Avion;. rvvviv n yu% ecu T* >sr>.XTWi. Porphyr. apud Euseb. supr. cit. 15t NOTES ON LECTURE I. The word vrroZxXxiuiv^, as is rightly remarked by Va- lesius in his note on this passage, preserves the metaphor implied in the preceding htxwfasvn. The system which owed its origin to such perverted rules of interpretation might very fitly be termed viroGiXiftaTev, the spurious off- spring of a distempered fancy; in correspondence with which notion we may remark the application of the phrase «0vs/o. £«« ^8 tov Myto-ftov Tovdi, vovv fA.lv tv "\*vys[, ^v^tiv 2s tv c-atf^xn 0-WlO-TCt.i;, TO 7TCIV %VVlTlXTClUlTt>, Q7TUS OTtXciXhtTTOV lit) XUTOt, (pVFtV agie-Tov rt 'i^yov a.Ttu^yos.rpivoi;. ovtui; ovv 2vi xciTcc. Xoyov tov uxotcc oh }Jiyiiv, Tovcii tov xoo-ftov, ^aov 'ip-^v^ov hvovv Ti t>i «Ajj(W« ha t\v tov 3-iov yivio-Sxi 7r£ovottzv. TimcEus, p. 305 b. Farther on in the same treatise, he styles it opoiov tS ttcovtixH fyu, and establishes on this ground the doctrine of its unity, as well as the congruous disposition of its elements ; pp.307 b. sqq. We perceive from hence how nearly allied the Platonic physics were to those of Spinoza a and Hobbes ; and that the doctrine of providence, whilst the Universe itself was an integrant part of the directing Mind, was but one step removed from the philosophy which denied its superintendence, and rejected the belief of final causes. Such was the system of Epicurus. Note (9). — This will be the more readily admitted, when it is considered, that St. Paul grounds his accusa- tion of the Gentile world respecting their idolatrous NOTES ON LECTURE II. 163 practices, on the fact of their possessing advantages, inferior even to those of his nation. See Rom. i. 20 — 2. I am aware at the same time of this article of their belief having been made known to the Jews by express revelation, of which Exod. iii. 14 affords of itself a suf- ficient proof; as also, that the unfavourable circum- stances of that people for intellectual improvement have been connected with their purity of belief in this par- ticular, in order to the proof of the Divine origin of their religion. Vid. Records' of the Creation, Vol. I. pp. 295 sqq. The question however, as it appears in the lecture, simply concerns a probability, whether the Jews could, during any period of their existence as a nation, have arrived at the conclusion, of which we speak. It is matter of fact that they did ; and the coincidence of the two principles, forming a perfect and unexceptionable theism, far beyond the attainment of the most enlightened heathens, renders the evidence derived from the existence of one of them altogether irrefragable. I am concerned however at present only with the argument, how far the principle of Creation was available as a basis for the doctrine of necessary existence. The reader will find some sensible observations on the intellectual character of the Jews in the British Review, Vol. 22. p. 250. sq. Writers, otherwise of considerable learning and acuteness, have, unduly per- haps, depreciated their attainments and capability. Note (10.) — " Quia tota ha2c historia captui vulgi est accommodata, loquitur Moses ex veritate optica, non physica," (Rosenmuller Sen. pp. 13. 63. Jun. p. 14.): that is, "he describes effects accurately, according to their sensible appearances : by which means the mind is enabled to receive a clear and distinct impression 164 NOTES ON LECTURE II. of those appearances, and thus to reduce them to their proper causes etc." Penn, Comp. Estim. p. 140. Whether exclusively so, the present course of lectures will assign some reasons for doubting. It is in truth extremely questionable, whether this Optical delineation would be the one best calculated for accurate conception on the part of those whom it was intended to inform ; whether it might not, in important instances, originate error. This admits of easy illustration from the common phenomena of real and apparent motion. Yet neither is it asserted, that a description purely philosophical was intended ; solely this — that the pecu- liarities of each are so combined, as to present the accuracy of the one retaining at the same time clearness of description, and the vividness of the other without hazarding its deceptions. The references in this note respect two distinct publi- cations of the Rosenmullers ; that by the Father, entitled " Antiquissima Telluris Historia," and the " Scholia in Vetw.s Testamentum" of the Son ; into which, in the part more immediately connected with our present subject, he had incorporated, as is observed by Mr. Penn (p. 138), the rules of exposition laid down in the former tract. It is proper however to mention in this plr -c, that the opinions of the younger Rosen muller seem to have undergone a considerable change, in the interval which has elapsed since the first publication of his work. Whether for the better, or not, it remains for my readers to determine. I have looked in vain over his Scholia, as they appear in the Second Edition, fox an avowal of his belief before expressed of the entire harmony of the Mosaic language with physical principles. His statement indeed in his " Admonitio de Secunda Editione" p. vii., " Interpretationem trium priorum NOTES ON LECTURE II. 16$ capitum Geneseos refinjd" prepares the reader for this change ; which has been followed up by views very different from those he entertained previously to the at- tempt of Hensler. I select the two which follow : " Noster" (Moses J " philosophatur de rerum omnium ortu, in quibus quis non statim agnoscet prisci aevi simplicitateni, disciplinaeque omnis physicas et astro- nomiae infantiam." — " Quae cum ita sint, jam sponte patebit, quam recte hoc veteris opinionis commentum revocetur atque examine tur ad accuratam rerum physi- carum scientiam, qua nostra aetas gaudet." Cap. i. pp. 12. 14. Farther on, he proceeds the length of saying, that, in his cosmogonic system, the Author of the Pen- tateuch " is to be regarded as having imitated the Phenicians or the Egyptians, p. 19. The fittest answer to be returned to all this, inde- pendently of the contradictions it involves, is, a careful examination of the philosophy thus depreciated, and of the terms in which it is expressed. Many causes seem to have concurred to disqualify the German Critic for pronouncing a final judgment as to the sense of either. Note (11.) — I say exclusively ; as it appears obvious from the very mode of its announcement, that the prin- ciple of the Mosaic physics, the doctrine of Creation, was matter of universal belief amongst the Israelites antecedent to his legislation, and formed part of the patriarchal religion. It is presented as a known and recognised truth. Yet whoever compares the distinct- ness of narrative in the remainder of the first chapter of Genesis, with the brief declaration of its first verse, will have little reason to conclude, that each was alike the subject of prior revelation ; oi that the precision with which the events of the Hexaea.-e-ron are detailed, is an insufficient evidence of direct and personal commu- nication. 166 NOTES ON LECTURE II. On the belief connected with the first part of this note the reader is referred to Mr. Sumner's Treatise, ufsupr. Vol. I. Chap. iii. pp. 261 ss. Note (12.) — It is concluded from the relative dura- tion of the lives of the Patriarchs, as well as from the probability of the existence of no inconsiderable degree of civilization before the Flood, " that there is nothing either impossible or improbable in the idea that the history of Moses was founded upon original revelation." Id. p. 81. Between this opinion, and the one ex- pressed in the text, there is no real contradiction ; for we may hold, that the Principle existed by means of previous inspiration, and that the Details were the result of personal. As to the traces of a philosophical language in the Record, we argue thus : it appears im- probable a priori, that a system such as the Mosaical, which produced so salutary an influence on the philo- sophy of succeeding ages, (Vid. Records of the Creation, ut supr. pp. 277. sqq.,) would be found on investi- gation destitute of such a language; and we connect with this the obvious fact, that the era of the Jewish lawgiver was better adapted than any which preceded* for the fuller development of that language ; — a circum- stance which, from the inadequacy of any known means, existing at that period, to effect it independently of inspiration, we ascribe to the latter cause. (13.) — Vid. supr. Note (5.) Note (14.) — By " the evidence cumulative" in theo- logy is understood that which, setting out from the concurrence of two or more particulars, augments the conviction which it produces in the mind, by a con- stantly increasing series of co-ordinate facts. As it is possible that this augmentation of particulars may take place, as well in the collateral as the direct evidence of Christianity, it follows that the species of each are NOTES ON LECTURE II. l67 essentially subordinate to it, so far as they are viewed as the causes of a varying intensity of conviction. Now it is plain, that the evidence of experiment towards es- tablishing any physical truth is of this nature ; for, set- ting aside the difference which exists between moral and physical evidence, it necessarily varies in the degree of persuasion, which it produces, in proportion to the number of conspiring facts ; and as no limit can be assigned to such, therefore none can be assigned to the effect, the degree of persuasion. The final results are the same in each — the highest probability, as to the degree of evidence, and the strongest conviction, as to the manner of its entertainment by the mind. If the processes termed by Bacon, Variation, Pro- duction etc. of the experiment, (Vide. Bp. Young's Analysis etc. Introd. § 17.,) be examined by this stand- ard, the effect of each towards establishing any physical law will be found entirely cumulative, in the sense in which it is confirmative of the first result. Note (15). — This question cannot be placed in a clearer light than by comparing the different effects produced on moral evidence, when a system, such as we are considering, is viewed in its relations to moral truths, or philosophical principles. It falls to the ground if it be. found defective in the former point of view; the connection being thus dissolved between its parts, and the unity being no longer preserved, which can alone entitle it to the character of that which it professes to be — a Divine revelation. It may or may not, however, be assigned an accuracy in the latter respect, as no violation of its moral unity can take place in the one case, and no augmentation of it can be pro- duced in the other. Thus the declarations of Scripture might be framed solely on the basis of optical phaeno 168 NOTES ON LECTURE II. mena, and yet the evidence of its origin be preserved. In this case however, (which is regarded as by no means probable,) that evidence would wholly rest on moral grounds. This is what is termed by Theologians " the independent moral evidence" of Scripture ; which in- volves no references extraneous to that which connects it with the principles of unchangeable morality. The reader is referred, for the testimony of a distin- guished philosopher to the integrity of this evidence, to the VindicicB Geolo^ica, pp. 22 sqq. Compare also Kidd's Geol. Essay, ch. i. Note (16). — Vid. Records of the Creation, C. iii. § 9. pp. 295 sqq. (17). — Id. Vol. ii. p. 12. (18).— The Reader is referred to the " Abstract from the works of Hutchinson" published in Dublin, 1756; as also to the " Thoughts concerning Religion etc." Edinburgh, 1743, for a succinct account of the system of this sect of Theologians. The professed object of " Moses's Princi- pia" was, to refer all physical knowledge to the Scrip- tures, and subvert the Newtonian philosophy. Comp. Supplem. to Mosheim's Eccl. Hist. Note (19). — Modern philosophy abounds in in- stances in which the argument from final causes ap- pears of pre-eminent importance : Geology supplies an abundant harvest ; Physiological researches, properly so called, a still greater ; it may be asked, why should it be excluded from works on Physics, the subjects of which include so wide a range of providential economy ? The cause appears to be this ; the laws which regulate a certain class of phenomena, being resolvable into one simple and undoubted principle, become accessible through it to the conventional language of analysis, the immediate effect of which is, to impede the mind in its progress to the consideration of purpose — of design. Nearly the same effect is produced as in the case of NOTES ON LECTURE II. 169 forces themselves, which disappear from the view amidst the crowd of artificial symbols. But in the more popu- lar sciences, in which the laws of phaenomena have not as yet been very generally subjected to geometrical calculations, the inquirer is forced, as it were, to adopt the only causes which suggest themselves as his foun- dations for further research. There cannot be in these any substitution of secondary for primary causes. Hence in his Vindicia Geologicce Mr. Buckland considers the admission of final causes, as most allowable in those branches of physical knowledge which relate to organised matter (See Note, p. 21.); and their importance in Natural History, under the title of " Conditions of Existence," is fully admitted by the Baron Cuv jv in his Regne Animal, p. 5. Transl. Beautiful instances of their application may be found in the first-mentioned discourse, (Note, p. 19) ; as also in a paper of Dr. Mac- culloch in the Quarterly Journal etc. Vol. xiv. p. 290. abounding in ingenious and philosophical views. Yet such is the tyranny of fashion, that even this original writer ventures on the subject with diffidence. The French philosopher terms them " a principle peculiar to Natural History" — in which he appears to me to concede too much to the principles of his brother savans. If indeed, they be regarded merely in the philosophical light in which M. Cuvier views them, it may be true, because a knowledge of them alone would ne% " lead to the discovery of general laws" in Dy- namics or Chymistry, as in Natural History : but their contemplation serves to an infinitely higher and more important end, which the philosophers of that school seem not to understand, or understanding to contemn. N 170 NOTES OS LECTURE II. The reader may consult with much advantage on this subject, Bp. Butler's Analogy, pp. 134 sqq. Ed. 1796. Note (20). — Of the subservience of the natural effect to the final cause, and its connexion, through this latter, with the moral accessaries alluded to in the context, the science of Physics affbrds?us numberless examples. We need not however go farther than Revelation itself; the Mosaic history of the Deluge furnishes a remai'kable instance, which is very forcibly enlarged upon in the Comparative Estimate, pp. 262 ss. (21). — i in^yiKt &*'*»• S. Chrysost. on the Mosaic nn Genes, i. 2. quoted in Poole, Synops. Critic, in loc. Note (22) — Thus Dr. Mac Culloch, in the essay abovementioned ; " Had it not become a sort of fashion in philosophy to omit all considerations of final causes, I might here point out the singular and beautiful ar- rangement thus made," etc. one in perfect consistence with the distinct avowal of the Author of the Syst. du M. " parcourons Thistoire des progres de l'esprit humain et de ses erreurs ,• nous y verrons les causes finales reculees constamment aux bornes de ses connaissances. Ces memes causes ne sont aux yeux du philosophe, que l'expression de l'ignorance ou nous sommes, des veritables causes." Liv. v. Chap. 6. p. 444. Yet the admission of this unfashionable error leads the first- mentioned of these philosophers to the detection of an important law in the formation of insular soils. The maxim is as old as the days of Bacon, who pro- nounces on the Vestal barrenness of final causes. With what justice, even in an historical point of view, the Reader may determine for himself by referring to arti- cles 482. 483. of Robison's Mechanical, Philosophy Edit. Brewst. See Note (23) infr. NOTES OX LECTURE II. 17 1 In truth, in all this that concerns the doctrine of final causes, the philosophy of the mere savant is singularly infirm. Let us attend more particularly to M. Laplace, who denounces them with peculiar acrimony. In his Syst. pp. 221. sq. he classes them with " chance," and looks upon their introduction as a confession of our " ignorance of true causes." Again in p. 241, he uses the following expressions : " quelques partisans des causes finales ont imagine que la lune avaitete donnee a la terre pour l'eclairer pendant les nuits. Dans ce cas, la nature n'aurait point atteint le but qu'elle se serait propose; puisque souvent, nous sommes prives a-la- fois de la lumiere de soleil, et de celle de la lune." He then proceeds to direct the Deity in placing thii satellite so as to insure a constancy of light from it. Now to all this it may be answered, that whoever those "partisans of final causes" whom M. Laplace men- tions are, they are lamentably deficient in their know- ledge of Scripture. Does the Sacred historian say, that the moon was created for the sole purpose of " en- lightening the earth" ? Are there not other final causes implied in the terms, " let them be for signs, and for seasons etc." as well in the case, of this lumi- nary, as in that of the centre of the planetary motions ? How moreover could this multiplicity of end be better attained, than by the present disposition of iu orbital plane and motion, relatively to the earth ? The philosopher seems to lose sight of this fact, that the whole effect to be produced may be the result of many ; that the mechanism of final causes may be com- plex; and that the wisdom of the Supreme Cause is best manifested by the simplicity of the arrangements leading to the co-existence of those assemblages. To argae therefore against the doctrine, from the partial 172 NOTES ON LECTURE II. attainment of any one end, seems as bad logic as it is unsound philosophy. Note (23.) — It forms part of Lord Verulam's censure of the philosophers who preceded him, that they took an incomplete view in their respective inquiries after the causes of phaenomena ; " invenitur etiam hoc ge- nus mali in partibus philosophiarum — introducendo formas abstractas, et causas finales, et causas primas, omittendo saepissime medias, etc." Nov. Org. Aphor. Ixv. It is against this disunion of parts that the Chris- tian philosopher protests; parts which necessarily har- monise, and contribute by this harmony to the attain- ment of the true end of science. Had the illustrious author, however, of the Novum Organum lived in the present day, he might have had sufficient grounds for altering his sentiments res- pecting final causes. Let us take the instance of com- parative, physiology — a science, the limits of which have been so widely extended in modern times. By studying the phaenomena of life, both in the animal and the vegetable kingdoms of nature, with reference to jinal instead of physical causes, a principle of ar- rangement is introduced, which gives to the whole science a new aspect, and creates an interest of a dif- ferent and superior kind to that which the mere phy- sical relations of cause and effect are calculated to in- spire. This, in truth, has become matter of necessity, from the impossibility of reducing those phaenomena to a single law, in the same philosophical sense in which the movements of the heavenly bodies are re- ducible to the single law of gravitation. In what other principle, but this, did the splendid discovery of the circulation of the blood originate? NOTES ON LECTURE II. 173 Note (24.) — The Mosaic system opens with the an- nouncement of the doctrine of creation, on which, viewed in the philosophical sense in which it has been explained by St. Paul, (Hebr. xi. 3.,) reposes the theis- tic belief, which was intrenched within the most tre- mendous sanctions. The weight of this doctrine, in es- tablishing the Divine commission of the Jewish lawgiver, is ably estimated in the Records of Creation, Part I. Chap. iii. Sectt. 5, 6, 8, 9. Now, what is the course which the philosopher pur- sues in this investigation ? The idea of power is neces- sarily connected with that of a Creator; his works — the effects of that power — come next in order ; the charac- ter of those works determine the nature of the Cause by whom they originate : for whether we regard this character, as it respects the principles employed, or the effects in which they terminate, the conception of a unity forces itself on the mind, which it is impossible not to transfer to the nature of the First cause. It is thus that he may apply the particular instances which every department of Nature supplies; and combining them in one harmonious whole, establish on satisfactory grounds the first and most important principles of Na- tural Theology. There occur not, perhaps, in the whole compass of Natural Science more beautiful instances of the ground- work of this argument, than those noticed by the able Naturalist abovementioned in his essay, Quart. Journ. Vol. xiv. p. 285. and no more interesting research can devolve on the Christian, than that which tends to the recognition of the agency of the Mosaic Elohim, in " the common mysterious principle" which sways the operations of organic nature. Note (25.) — " God was honoured among the He- 174 NOTES ON LECTURE If. brews, under one consistent character : as a Being so spiritual, that he cannot be either represented, or pro- perly worshipped, under any sensible image ; and yet at the same time as constituting the fit object, and the only fit object of human worship, inasmuch as he is the independent Creator and sole Governor of the Uni- verse." Records of the Creation, Vol. i. p. 164. Com- pare our Lord's Commentary on the two first com- mandments of the Decalogue, St. John, iv. 24. Note (8) supr. (26). — Compare Simon, Histoire Critique etc. Liv.i. C. 7. Euseb. Prceparat. Evang. L. i. p. 307. (27). — See Novum Orga?ium, Aphor. xli.li i. NOTES ON LECTURE III. Note (l.)-Prov. iii. 19. viii. 1. 22-32. 35. (2). " L'ana- lyse algebrique nous fait bientot oublier l'objet prin- cipal, pour nous occuper de combinaisons abstraites, et ce n'est qu' a la fin, qu'elle nous y ramene." Sys- teme du M. p. 423. (3). Ibid. p. 422. For the purity of Newton's religious belief, relative to the nature and attributes of God, it may be sufficient to refer to the Scholium Generate alone. The question is discussed however at some length in the present lectm*e, pp. 1 2 sqq. (4). Vid. Syst. du M. pp. 407. 408. and concluding re- flections, p. 448. on which the reader is recommended to peruse the latePr. Robison's animadversions, Mechan* Philos. Vol iii. pp. 390 etc. Compare Notes (1), (27), of Lect. i. and (22) of Lect. ii. Note (5) Vid. Syst. du M. passim : particularly pp. 428 sqq. 439 sq. " The only explanation" (namely, of the three conditions, on which the compensation of the inequalities of the planetary motions depends) a that remains is, that all this is the work of intelli- gence and design, directing the original constitution of the system, and impressing such motions on the parts as were calculated to give stability to the whole." Play fair, Outlines of Nat. Phil. Vol. ii. p. 290. Note (6.) — A proof adequate of itself to induce a suspicion of the soundness of this philosopher's doctrine of design. The question however is placed beyond all doubt by the mode of expression employed in discours- ing on this subject. Thus, in the Syst. du M. p. 442. 176 NOTES ON LECTURE III. speaking of the disposition of all things so as to insure stability, he observes, " il semble que la nature ait tout dispose — pour assurer la duree du systeme planetaire, etc." Thus again, announcing the dependence of the phenomena of the stability of the poles, the equilibrium of the sea, etc. on the laws of motion, he speaks of " rapports — caches ; mais dont il est plus sage d'avouer l'ignorance, que d'y substituer des causes imaginaires. The Bible might have taught him better : Compare the passage from Proverbs quoted in this lecture, p. 58. Job, ch. xxxviii. Isaiah, xlii. The passage in which he ridicules Newton's Doctrine of the interven- tion of the Supreme Intelligence (Id. p. 443) has been already brought before the reader's view; its manifest tendency is to destroy entirely whatever impression his belief of design, as stated in other parts of his writings, may have produced. It is in no wise connected with the doctrine of a particular providence, and is such as might have been subscribed to by the most rigid Epi- curean. The same delicacy of philosophical sentiment may be observed in his " concepts dont les geometres font souvent usage," (p. 196,) and in his queries respecting Universal Gravitation, (p. 310). In accordance with the phraseology of his school, he represents the prin- ciple of the least action as flowing from the essence of matter, and the solar system as animated by forces, pp. 162. 193. a style of expression not far removed from the " corpora sensu praedita" of Hobbes : See Clarke, Demonstration, etc. p. 87. It may be unnecessary in the present stage of my argument to remark on the marvellous inconsistency of eulogising the law of Universal gravitation (p. 211), and of tracing it in one of its most singular effects, NOTES TO LECTURE III. 1?7 namely, the relations between the mean longitudes and motions of the three first satellites of Jupiter, yet of avoiding at the same time the slightest mention of a Supreme Intelligent Cause, (p. 244); an inconsistency which is much enhanced by his avowal, that it is con- trary to all probability to regard the phenomenon as the result of chance. Compare Lect. i. Note (27). Yet the reader is not to suppose that this philosopher is averse to the phrase "first cause:" it occurs in his writings, but in a sense manifestly limited to physical considerations. See the chapter on moleculary attrac- tion, p. 350. One passage more, and I shall conclude this discus- sion ; it has been already noticed (Note (22) Lect. ii.): " quelques partisans des causes finales, out imagine que la lune avait ete donnee a la terre, pour l'eclairer pen- dant les nuits. Dans ce cas, la nature n'aurait point atteint le but qu' elle se serait propose, etc." We have sufficiently animadverted on this mode of expression already; and refer the reader for some truly philoso- phical observations on the same subject to the Com- parative Estimate, Supplement, p. 133. Note (7). — Psalm viii. 1 — 5. 9. Comp. S. Luke, x. 21. (8).— Vid. Essay, etc. § 1 9. pp. 39—47. (9).— Ibid, p. 45. § 20. pp. 48. 9. (10). — Humboldt, Superposition of Rocks, etc. Engl. Trans, p. 1. (11).— See Cuvier, tit supra, p. 41. for a detail of the principal theories re- lative to Creation. The cometic hypothesis has been a favourite one : it was long since proposed by Whiston, to assist in the solution of the geogonic problem j and was extended by him to the case of the Deluge. How unfortunate the selection of this astronomical agent was, is manifest, from the tenuity of the masses thus em- ployed to account for physical derangements, and from o 178 NOTES TO LECTURE III. the law of the secular inequalities of the planets. Com- pare Sfyst. du M. pp. 133. 206. 242. Dr. Brinkley's Elements of Astronomy, Art. 24-3. (12).— See Cuvier, etc. p. 40. The remark is particularly applicable to Woodward's hypothesis ; yet may be extended to all, which have, in their efforts to ascend to the physical causes of the last catastrophe of our planet, lost sight of the obvious meaning of the Mosaic narrative. The reader is referred, for an ample detail of these theories, to Rees's Cyclopcedia, Art. Deluge. Mr. Penn has, in his Comparative Estimate, adopted the theory proposed in its ruder form by De la Pryme, and successively improved by King and De Luc ; the plausibility of which constitutes its chief merit. Its ap- plication to the subject of ExuvicB formed part of the discussion in the tenth Lecture of this series ; in pre- senting which, I was influenced more by the respect due to the name of the distinguished Geologist who adopted it, than by any conviction of its truth. Note (13). — Thus Pr. Buckland, not less piously than truly, has animadverted on the " views" of geolo- gists, " who have presumed to compose theories of the earth, in the infancy of the science, before a sufficient number of facts had been collected; and. that, if pos- sible, they are still more at variance with the conclu- sions of Geology, (as a science founded on observation,) than they are with those of Theology." Vindicice, p. 22. (14). — Compare Grotius, de Veritate etc. L. i. § 16. Not. 5. 6. from Hesiod, Hymn. Orph., Apollonius, Epicharmus, etc. Parkhurst, Lexic. in voc. jpki. (15). — See Appendix. (16). — Perhaps the term "constituent" would be more accordant with the present nomencla- ture of Chymistry. The doctrine to which I refer is delivered by Newton in the 31st of his Optical Queries. NOTES TO LECTURE III. 1?9 See infr. Note (21). (17).— The philosophy of Newton allows not of a Chaos ; it supposes the particles of mat- ter to have been indued with their forms, properties, and relations to space, independently of time, by the Divine Fiat. The mineral Geology on the other hand neces- sarily presupposes an indefinite interval for the several processes of solidification of the strata, oxidation of the surface, etc. with which the second of those expositions concurs. See Pr. Buckland's Vindic. Geol. p. 31. sq. Cuvier, Theory etc. § 7. p. 18. (18). — See authors cited in preceding note; Comparative Estim. Chap. iii. Note (19). — Thus, "juraty nVi, sedtui non sumus obliti ; Ps. xliv. 17. Compare Isaiah, xl. 8. Zephan. i. 13. Noldii Concordant. Partic. Hebr. p. 300. The LXX have it k Ti ysj. It were unnecessary to remark how much better the times indicated in the commencement of this chapter, that of the first creation, and that at which the regular organization of our system commenced, are separated by this version than by the common one. In truth, the actual state of things antecedent to this latter operation (which I regard as announced in the latter clauses of the 2d verse) is alluded to, not indeed in express terms, that being foreign to the purpo'se of the historian, in the first clause. Now, to say that the Earth was irui mo, retaining the common version, might be received as in- dicating that this imperfect organization was the result of an inadequacy in the Divine power exerted in the act of Creation ; that the agency which operated that orga- nization successively, and in the order which appeared best to Infinite Wisdom, was incompetent to effect by a single act the perfection of the physical system. The adversative particle, on the contrary, is well adapted to exhibit the Succession observed in the Divine operations, 180 NOTES TO LECTURE 111. without leading the thoughts to any thing farther than the announcement of a fact— the state of things at the time that God commenced his work of disposition in certain elements of the system, whose origin cannot be traced to chymical or mechanical causes ; such as are, the aggregation of the solar fluid, and the consequent production of Light ; the combination of the atmos- pheric gases; etc. Compare Lect. v. pp. 108. sqq. . Note (20). — Compare Lect. v. pp. 118. sqq. The reader is however to beware of extending the denomi- nation " second causes" to the nn in the last clause of this verse. Another word occurs in that clause which affords abundant room for reflection, as well on the mode of agency employed by the nn, as on the probable results of that agency ; vid. ibid. pp. 123. sqq. Note (21). — Vid. Horsley's Newton, Vol. iv. pp. 260 sqq. So far he considers the primary act of the Almighty to extend ; as to his other principle, namely, the reformation effected in our system from time to time by the intervention of its Framer — we have already noticed its contemptuous denouncement by M. Laplace (Syst. p. 443) ; with what justice it may be left even to the philo&< « hical reader to determine. It is true, an improved analysis has demonstrated from the form of expression of every inequality in the planetary motions, that all such are periodical ; and hence, that the system does not involve any principle of destruction in itself, but is calculated to endure for ever, supposing external impulses to be removed. " Le systeme planetaire ne fait qu'osciller autour d'un etat moyen dont il ne s'ecprte jamais que d'une tres petite quantite : Syst. du M. Livr. iv. C. 2. p. 206. It is illogical, however, to infer from all this any con- clusion against the superintendence of his works by the NOTES TO LECTURE III. 181 ailwise Creator. We omit the evident proof of con- summate design manifested in the choice of the arrange- ments in thejirst instance ; but we contend for the high degree of probability of the constant operation of that wisdom, to whose first acts they were due; since to argue against its effectiveness were to deprive it of its rank as a cause ; and to deny the universality of that effectiveness, both in Duration and Space, were to ex- clude either different parts of the same Universe, or the same parts* at different periods, from its superintend- ence. It has often occurred to me also, that the very argu- ment derived from the planetary inequalities defeats the purpose oi the modern philosopher. In what, we may ask, is founded the law of these inequalities? Is it not in the arrangements respecting the eccentricities, and the planes of, as well as the motions in, the planetary orbits, joined to the law of Universal Gravitation ? And does not the philosopher, who argues from hence for the stability of the system independent of the Divine su- perintendence, take it for granted that the cause of Gra- vity is mechanical, or perhaps essential to matter ? This has never been proved ; until it is, it will ever remain an obstacle in the way of the' Materialist towards the establishment of his Epicurean creed. Note (22). — The letters to which I refer are prefaced thus : " When I wrote my treatise about our System," (Newton alludes here to his well known work De Sys- tcmate Mwidi,) " I had an eye upon such principles as might work with considering men for the belief of a Deity ; and nothing can rejoice me more than to find it useful for that purpose. But if I have done the public any service this way, it is due to nothing but industry and patient thought" etc. Horslejfs Newt. Vol. iv. p. 182 NOTES TO LECTURE III. 429. In the same letter he considers the framing of the visible universe as not explicable " by mere natural causes," but ascribable solely " to the counsel and con- trivance of a voluntary agent." Ibid. p. 430. He ad- duces an instance of this in the inclination of the earth's axis; thejTnal causes of which physical arrangement he fails not to mention. Ibid. p. 433. His Second letter contains an additional proof of this derived from the accurate proportioning of the transverse impulse to that produced by the attractive force of the Sun, due, as he conceives, to no other " power in Nature" but " the Divine arm." Ibid. p. 436. It is left to the reader to contrast the philosophy and the religion of these expressions with the concluding reflections of the Systeme du Monde. Note (23). — Compare ScJwl. Gen. Princip. with his fourth letter to Bentley, ubi supr. p. 441. (24). — See Laplace, Syst. p. 443. (25). — Laplace, ubi supra. (26). — See Horsley's Newt. Vol. iv. p. 262. Compare Note (21) supr. in which some considerations are offered on this subject. (27). — This is equally true of those inequalities which oscillate between certain fixed limits, such as is the change of obliquity of the Equator to the Ecliptic, and of those which particularly respect the planetary motions, and assume, in consequence of certain conditions, the forms of A sin fit, A cos nt. The mathematical reader will easily perceive, that inequali- ties admitting such a form of expression are periodical, inasmuch as the extreme limits of the variable factors are I (Radius) and 0. The elements to which I refer as in- variable are, the mean motions, and the greater axes : the conditions mentioned in this note are, the smallness of eccentricity of the orbits, as also of their mutual in- clination, and the sameness of direction of the plane- NOTES TO LECTURE III. 183 tary motions. Compare Syst. etc, Livr. iv. Ch. 2. p. 205. Playfair's Outlines, Vol. ii. pp. 288 — 90. Note (28). — Newton extends this idea yet farther, so as to embrace a wide range in Ethical science. " If" (he observes) " Natural Philosophy in all its parts, by pursuing this method, shall at length be perfected, the bounds of Moral Philosophy will be also enlarged. For so far as we can know by Natural Philosophy what is the First Cause, what power he has over us, and what benefits we receive from him ; so far our duty towards him, as well as that towards one another, will appear to us by the light of nature." Horsley's Edit, ubi supr. p. 264. Can there be a clearer exposition than this of the Apostolic doctrine, Rom. i. 19 sqq. (29). — Discoursing in one of his most eloquent chap- ters on the achievements of Newton in behalf of phy- sical science, M. Laplace adds — " Pimperfection du cal- cul de Pinfini a sa naissance, ne lui a pas permis, de re- soudre completement les problemes difficiles qu'cffre la theorie du systeme du monde ; et il a ete souvent force de ne donner que des apercus, toujours incertains jusqu'a ce qu'ils aient ete verifies par une rigoureuse analyse. Malgre ces defauts inevitables ; Pimportance et la generalite des decouvertes, un grand nombre de vues originales et profondes qui ont ete le germe des plus brillantes theories des Geometres du dernier siecle, tout cela, presente avec beaucoup d'elegance, assure a Pouvrage des Principes Mathematiques de la Philosophie Naturelle, la preeminence sur les autres productions de Pesprit humain." Livr. v. Ch. 5. p. 4-19. ubi supr. Such is the elogc of the Author of the Meca- nique Celeste on the illustrious Newton. How passing strange, that he who is allowed in this passage to have had a perception almost intuitive of truths the most 184 NOTES TO LECTURE III. recondite in Physical science, should be den ied the same clearsightedness in principles, which connect that science with Religion and Morals. Comp. p. 443. Note (30). — Compare Job, xxxviii. 33. Jerem. xxxi. 35. xxxiii. 25. In the second of these texts, the expo- sition of the most learned Jews is, " DO/rra, varii motus orbium lunarium, atque planetarum." Two Commen- tators in Poole's Synopsis (Vol. ii. p. 430. 50.) express the cow nipn in the first more generally, " Statuta se- cundum quae gubernatur ccelum. Totam rationem, cur- sum, et ordinem, turn quoad motum, turn quoad potes- tatem in hasc inferiora." Vid. Minister, Comment. Vol. ii. p. 917. The laws of the celestial phenomena, in their most extended sense, seem to be the meaning of the Sacred writers. The view expressed in the context, as well as in other passages of the present treatise (compare pp. 84. 86. 87. 91. 93. 108. Postscript to the Preface, pp. xv. sqq.), of the independence of the act of Creation on Time, is to be understood as the ground of a distinction between it and the effects of subordinate causes, not as purporting to convey any definite notion of the Mode of effectua- tion resorted to. It appears most evident, that to con- nect Time, or any of the concomitances of -finite being with the results of the Divine volition at this period, were to depress the operations of an Infinite Being to the level of the passive capacities of matter. As the latter exists not, wills not, in succession, so neither is he to be conceived as " laying the Foundations of the earth," or " appointing" them, as well as other assem- blages, their " Ordinances," through agencies in any respect connected therewith. In short, what the Au- thor of the Essay on the Human Understanding conceives of the actions of the mind (B. ii. Ch. 9. § 10.) may, in a NOTES TO LECTURE III. 185 degree proportioned to the distance to which it is re- moved, be affirmed of those of the Infinite Intelli- gence. It nay I)e observed also, that the writer, whose sen- timents have been referred to on the subject of Creation (Postscript, ut supr. p. xi.), as hostile to attempts of the present nature, has expressed very distinctly his con- ception on this point: his words are; " Qui munere Dei potuerit perspicacius ista rimari, inveniet fortasse in creatura," quae ita facta narratur sine intervallis tern- poralium morarum, distinctum mirabiliter ordinem re- rum." Augustin. Contra Advers. Leg. etc. i. 8. Again, in the fifth book of his Genesis ad Litteram, Ch. 11. he lays down the important distinction between the act thus defined and the present order of Nature, conclud- ing thus ; " Quis enim operatur ista nisi Deus, etiam sine ullo tali suo motu? non enim et ipsi accidit tem- pus." It would not be difficult to prove, from Newton's ex- pressions relative to the doctrine of Creation, that " the Beginning" of which he speaks was, similarly with the Mosaical, a period incommensurable with the " inter- valla temporalium morarurn." Yet I would not be un- derstood as asserting, that the first perfective agency extended to all the masses' of the terrestrial system, a notion which the Second verse of the Record plainly sets aside : merely this ; that so far forth as the existing Final cause was concerned, that is, to a certain extent, those masses were created perfect. That distinct ope- rations took place afterwards amongst others, and rela- tively to a distinct series of ends, the verse abovemen- tioned, and the details of the Hexaemeron incontestably prove. See Lect. v. p. 110. Note (31).-— See the doctrines referred to in this P 186 NOTES TO LECTURE III. place developed in the Systeme du Monde, Livr. 5. Ch. 6. pp. 43 1 sqq. and in D'Aubuisson's Traitc de Geogno- sie, Tom. i. p. 270. I wish it to be understood however, that in dissenting from the principle of a Chaotic Ocean, I mean not to contend against a fact which I conceive to be established both on scriptural and philosophical grounds, of the plastic state, during part of the demiur- gic era, of certain types of formations. It is solely a doctrine, which seems to ascribe every thing in the first formation of the Globe to the laws of matter and motion, that the present observations are directed agianst. It is reserved for the fifth Lecture of this series to consider how far the doctrine of a fluid crust, prior to the epochs of the Hexaemeron, can be recon- ciled with the Mosaic language in Genes, i. 1., as well as with the principles of Newton, detailed in the present lecture ; Vid. p. 71. Note (32). — Such is, in an especial sense, the doc- trine of those Geognosts who hold the successive depo- sition in a fluid of most of the strata which compose the crust of the earth. We have first a chaotic ocean, con- taining the elements of the primitive earths: by affinity of composition they groupe in different manners: de- position next takes place, and originates the mineralo- gical structure, which in its turn exhibits, by the as- semblage of its parts, the phenomena of stratification. It is quite evident, that in a process of this kind, our ordinary measures of duration would be scarcely ade- quate to serve as standards for appreciating the ope- rations of Nature ; " we should," to use the language of a distinguished Geognost, " look coldly at them through the lapse of ages incalculably distant." Hence a distinction has been drawn between those primeval operations, and the processes which take place NOTES ON LECTURE III 187 in our laboratories, insomuch that we cannot with any safety argue from the one to the other. The immen- sity of the masses on which nature acts, the time which is at her disposal, and the variety of the means which it is possible for her to employ in her operations, and of which it may be equally impossible for us ever to form an estimate, offer insurmountable barriers to the forma- tion of any analogy. Such is the doctrine of one of the most liberal of the school of Werner. Others however of the pupils of that illustrious Geognost differ somewhat in their de- tail of the first processes of terrestrial formations from that just now described : to instance in a particular case ; they comprehend the whole assemblage of primitive formations in a single result, conceiving them to be due to contemporary crystallization. This theory, it is true, abridges somewhat the modulus of time expended on the changes which led to the organization of the surface, but is, equally with the former, incumbered with the hypothesis of a chaotic ocean, a figment not dissimilar to the " innabilis unda" of the Roman my- thologist. Compare Cuvier, Theory etc. §. 4 — 7. Quart. Journ. ubi supra, p, 279. D'Aubuisson, Traite etc. Tom. i. pp. 270. 355. 271. 241—2. Disc. Prel. p. 30. Pr. Jameson on the Geognostical Relations of Granite, Quartz-rock, and Red Sandstone, Edinb. Phil. Journ* Vol. i. pp. 109 sqq. Now to all the views of those ingenious philosophers there occurs in limine one formidable objection ; too much is conceded to second causes ; they are in effect made to supersede Creation. Had they kept in view the canon of Newton, that " it is unphilosophical to pretend that the world might have arisen out of a Chaos by the mere laws^ of Nature," they might have 188 NOTES ON LECTURE III. reasoned more consistently with the attributes of the intelligent First Cause, and at the same time not de- tracted from the soundness of their philosophy. The Geognost has moreover performed but an in- considerable part of his task, when he contemplates merely the external layers of our globe. What solu- tion of the problem does he offer relative to the in- crease of density towards its centre, and the constitu- tion of its nucleus, as presented to him in the research- es of the physical Astronomer ? The truths developed both by analysis, and experiments with pendulums, when not viewed as the effects of the disposing fiat of the Creator, afford a rather perplexing research into the operations of the Chaotic Fluid. See Laplace, Syst, etc. Livr. iv. Ch. 8. pp. 260. 3. 4. Note (33). — See Pr. Jameson's preface to Cuvier's Theory etc. pp. vi. sq. Note M. § 23. Cuvier, Eloge de Werner, Edinb. Phil. J. Vol. iv. p. 1. Theory, § 22. p. 53. Dr. Fleming's Notice of Werner's theory, Edinb. P. J. Vol. viii. pp. 116 sqq. See also the law of Orga- nic Remains very generally announced in Dr. Ure's Dictionary of Chemistry, p. 4S0 b. The acute Hum- boldt has also directed his attention to the subject in his work on the Superposition of Rocks ,• principally however with a reference to particular classes, such as the Jura limestone, chalk etc. in which the observations have been most numerous, and best attested ; pp. 366. 377. Eng. Transl. Ed. 1823. Compare pp. 12. sq. 337. 381, 2. This Geognost is, however, sensible of all the difficul- ties which attend a classification of rocks on any other principle than their relative position ; and limits there- fore to the four most ancient primitive formations, the announcement of this position on the basis of interior NOTES ON LECTURE III. 189 development. In these cases it affords data for his pasigraphic notation, (p. 471. ubi supr.,) but in no other. The subject of Organic Remains was resumed in the viii th. and x th. Lectures ; and the degree in which it should affect the Evidence of Revelation consi- dered. Note (34). — Compare Lecture v of the present series, in which the grounds are stated, for supposing a series of primeval revolutions to be announced in the terms of the 2d verse. This subject was resumed in Lectures vii. x. (35). — See Pr. Jameson's note, ubi supr. § 23. On the geological fact announced therein, Pr. Buckland thus argues ; " It is demonstrable that there was a period when no organic beings had existence : these organic beings must therefore have had a begin- ning subsequently to this period ; and where is that beginning to be found, but in the Will and Fiat of an intelligent and allwise Creator ?" Vindicics G'lologictfj p. 21. NOTES ON LECTURE IV. Note (I). — The conception of creative agency which it has been reserved for this and the following discourse to develop more fully, has been already presented in the words of Newton ; Vid. Lect. iii. p. 12. Its proof, independently of Scripture, reposes on its suitableness as an agency to our ideas of a First Cause, as well as on the impossibility of conceiving how, or by what means, matter began to exist, unless by the Volition of an Intelligent and Omnipotent Agent. To say that it exists not independently of a Percipient only removes one difficulty to embarrass us with a greater; for then it may be asked, what originated the perception,... re- garded as a faculty distinct from, or superadded to, systems of matter,. ..on which its being depends? In truth, the inquiry resolves itself into that concerning a First Cause : the antecedence implied in that notion expresses commencement of being in all other cases, unless we have recourse to the monstrous 'absurdity of supposing, that an Essence necessarily uncompounded contains within itself, formally and essentially, all the elements of all finite existences. It must however be confessed, that, when we pass from the discussion of the abstract principle, the proof is impeded in its application to particular cases by diffi- culties of a peculiar kind. " We see nothing now" (observes a sensible writer treating of this subject) "at all analogous to creation. We see plants and animals endowed with a power of reproduction, which they NOTES ON LECTURE IV. 191 derived from the Creator when he called them into ex- istence, and which they continue to possess only in conformity to his will. But of creation, properly so called, we see no instance, whether we consider it as implying a production of organic substances out of no- thing, or the formation of animated beings out of pre- existent materials. I do not see then, how man could have formed any idea of creation; it is a matter of tes- timony ; it is the result of faith, and not of reasoning, and hence'it is that the apostle says, ' Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen, were not made of things which do appear.' " Esdaile's Christian Theo- logy, p. 100. The question however is not so much, whether we can form "an idea of Creation," as reason from obvi- ous phsenomena as to the exertion of the power. These are inquiries very different in their ends. The one ter- minates in the fact, whilst the other respects the mode, of the Divine operation ; and natural appearances con- stantly occur, which force a belief of the former on our minds, whilst the latter, like other mysteries in the visible world, may for ever be hidden from our eyes. It is worthy of remark too, that the inspired Apostle uses the expression, " Through faith we understand," snWe* foovftsv, " narrationi Mosaicoe fklem habentes, sci- mus, et persuasum nobis habemus" (Schleusner in voc. vo'su). Now it seems to me, that this intelligence, so far from excluding the exercise of Reason, implies it in its highest sense, and refers the reader to a distinct, and corroborative, testimony, natural phoenomena. Let us take one of Mr. Esdaile's examples, the re- production of vegetables. The physiologists of this kingdom of nature explain it by the stimulus imparted 192 NOTES ON LECTURE IV. to plants to elongate themselves in the direction of that from which they derive their peculiar nutriment ; hence that the radicle penetrates the earth, the stem ascends to the atmosphere. But what has imparted, and per- petuated, this stimulus ? Not vegetable organization, unless we suppose that a particular disposition of ele- ments, which is all that the word organization implies, can of itself originate the functions of life. This were to recur to the unphilosophical principle, that Life pre- supposes Organization ; a supposition which would in- volve, amongst others equally untenable, that animals could be generated and plants propagated by means not different from those employed in inorganic matter: at least, that no sufficient reasons can be assigned, why the kingdoms, classes, genera, etc. of the organised creation should be perpetuated in a different way from that of the forms and kinds of inorganic matter. If then the hypothesis of organism be laid aside, and the more philosophical one substituted in its stead, that organization presupposes life,... that is, if a vital principle which counteracts and controls the affinities of the ele- ments with which it is allied be admitted,. ..the next in- quiry is, by what laws it operates. Now palpable expe- riment fails of detecting those, because the principle itself is inaccessible to its ordinary means of research ; we can only appreciate it by its effects. Hence, though, as a Cause, unappreciable, it is not occult, because the sensible relations of organic matter attest its existence. We have now arrived at the point from which we are conducted, by parity of reasoning, to the persuasion of the existence of a yet higher principle. If that which we have hitherto considered be proved to result, not from the laws of matter and motion, but from something essentially distinct from both, why stigmatise with the NOTES TO LECTURE IV. 193 name occult a principle, which, without being less con- ceivable, is still more general ; and is that to which we must ultimately tend, unless the Universe be sup- posed God, and matter eternal. Reasoning moreover analogically — the vital principle, thus proved to be not mechanical, must, for successive organised beings, be either one and the same, or differ- ent. If the latter, we have a new principle continu- ally superadded, and contributing to reproduction — a supposition" not more easy to conceive than creation itself; if the former, let us suppose it traced back to the first organised existence of that species, (as we are at liberty to suppose this from the fact of a commence- ment of organised being) ; it must of course have been superadded in time, and therefore have had a beginning of existence itself, unless we can suppose that a princi- ple destined to a certain end, could have had an exist- ence ah ceterno without relation to that end. A power of Creation must consequently be admitted with respect to a principle which presupposes not orga- nization .- the difficulty therefore disappears with re- spect to that to which it is superadded. In any particular species of purely inorganic matter, it were impossible to determine the limit to which the creative act extended in perfecting the materials of our planet. The very notion of that power, an anticipation with no respect to time of the effects of second causes observable at present in the ordinary course of nature, precludes the possibility of any such determination, as nothing can be detected which does not exist conform- able to such laws, and therefore nothing which may not be ascribed as well to them as to the act to which they owe their being. Hence the arguments to prove the Q 194 NOTES TO LECTURE IV. creation of the primitive formations of the earth from their internal characters (Compar. Estimate, etc. P. i. Ch. 7.) cannot be admitted as si?iglj/ conclusive, since those " simple homogeneous mineral substances" pre- sent nothing in their composition which may not have been the result of crystallization in a fluid. That such did take place is a question wholly dif- ferent. Those who admit on the authority of Scripture, that the " laying the foundations of the earth" was an act due to the immediate fiat of the First Cause, may appeal in behalf of the, tenableness of the hypothesis to the philosophical doctrine of Creation ; for it is not assuredly more difficult to conceive, that the integrant particles were arranged in their due proportions to space by the exertion of a power, which must be granted to have commenced somewhere, than it is to conceive of it as educing those particles into being, and impressing upon them laws, which were to lead in progress of time to the assumption of those proportions. The> difficulties as far as they respect natural effects being thus equipoised, we recur to the abstract argu- ments in favor of the principle, to those from analogy, and from revelation ; and apply it to the case of the frame-work of our globe. Whether this was produced in a state completely solidified, or not, is a question, the determination of which is not very important. The Analogy of strata which are at present in course of formation in certain parts of the globe (See Brongniart's paper, Ed. Ph. Journ. Vol. viii. pp. 56 sqq.) might lead us to suppose that it was not. The terms of the second verse of Genes, i. conduct us, as will be shewn, to the same supposition respecting the exterior strata, ( Vid. Lei t. v.,) one which imparfs considerable light to the question of NOTES TO LECTURE IV. 195 marine exuviae. Once the certainty of a creation is es- tablished, it seems unimportant to determine in what degree of consistence it elicited the masses of our planet; the probability of that point is to be considered relative- ly to the phenomena which they exhibit. This question has been already considered, at some length, in the Postscript to the Preface, pp. xv — xxi. The arguments against Organism adverted to in the commencement of this note may be found very forcibly stated in the English Translation of Cuvier's Regne Animal ; Introduction, pp. 12. 15. 17. 18. Note (2). — See Quart. Journ. etc.V ol.xiv. pp. 282 sqq. (3). Compare Job. xxxviii. 4. Psal. civ. 5. Prov. viii. 29. Isaiah, li. 13. Mic. vi. 2. The homogeneousness of primitive rocks has been lately alleged by an advocate of the Mosaic system as a mark of some peculiar agency in their formation ; in a word, of their creation. (Vid. Comp. Estim. ubi supra). It seems however unsafe to rest any evidence of what is allowed to consist in an anticipation, without respect of time, of the usual effects of second causes, on any supposed peculiarity of constitution, as it appears difficult to prove, that such may not have been the re- sult of ordinary laws; more especially at the period of which we speak, at which the dynamical effects of their superaddition to matter may have been very different in degree from those at present observable. Comp. Find. Geolog. p. 5. Compare note (32) Lect. iii. Post- script to the Preface, pp. xix. ss. The difficulty is much enhanced when it is considered, that not only do the different species of primitive formations differ from each other in their constitution, but that a marked one is observable in the members of the same order. How- ever homogeneous therefore any one of those latter, con- 196 KOTES TO LECTURE IT. sideretl absolutely, may be, it ceases to be regarded as such, when referred to the standard of some other. Thus ihe granite which does not alternate with gneiss, which presents no appearance of stratification, which is less abundant in mica, and richer in quartz, is consider- ed by geognosts as anterior to the joint formation primitive granite and gneiss, as well as to stannifer- ous granite (Humboldt, Superpos. etc. § 1 — 3.). The subgenera of this order are still more distinctly classifi- ed by another Geognost of eminence; (Vid. Edin. Ph. J. Pr. Jameson's Art. Vol. i. pp. 109 sqq). This difficulty is not proposed as tending to invalidate the doctrine of the creation of those primordial masses : for the last-named of those authors contends that " no one primitive rock is older than another ; but that the whole class appears to be a simultaneous crystallization ;" {Ibid. ; ) thus approximating to the principle of the He- braic Geology as near as may be, consistently with the views of the school of Freyberg. Vid. in-fr. Note (.<3). fin. It is only stated to shew, how unsafe that mode of argument is which defends the Biblical doctrine on a ground, which cannot be said to embrace the entire assemblage. It may be useful to present the reader with a gene- ral view of the geognostic doctrine, which it is the pur- port of the present Lectures to develop, as most illus- trative of the Mosaic system. The eras which commence the periods, over which I should distribute the agencies of the Elohim, are four: that of Creation ; that indicated in the second vs. Genes, i. ; that commencing with the 3d, and extending over the days of the Hexaemeron ; and that at which commenced the Universal Deluge. At the Jirst of those epochs it may with much probability be con- NOTES TO LECTURE IV. 197 ceived that " matter was formed in solid, massy, Lard, impenetrable, moveable particles; of such sizes and figures, and with such other properties, and in such proportions to space, as most conduced to the end for which they were formed;" and that the disposition of those particles in the framework, as well as the nucleus, of our planet, was perfected by the same cause, namely, the Almighty fiat. The second may, with equal probability, be conceived as the commencement of agencies which disposed the external surface of the earth ; to which we may refer the completion of those orders of strata which suc- ceed to the primitive ; the formation of the oxidated crust, adapted to the reception of vegetable germs ; and, perhaps, a development also, to a certain degree, of animal life. This period may have comprised a series of distinct epochs, each marked by catastrophe ,- a term employed in geognostical systems to indicate, not a sus- pension of laws of nature, but the excitement of its forces preparatory to some change to be operated in the disposition of its assemblages. The third of those periods, (one which it pleased Di- vine Wisdom to comprise within six days,) was as- signed to a completer development of parts of our sys- tem, as well terrestrial as celestial, than was due to pre- ceding agencies;— that, nameby, which was adapted to the being and functions of a more perfect animal and vegetable kingdom. Light, therefore, the Atmosphere, and the Fluids of the surface, were endued with those properties, which are at present observable ; and by the exertion of the same power, which had already origi- nated their constituent parts, to wit, the Divine Fiat. The fourth was one exclusively of catastrophe. It was an interference of Almighty power, connecting na- 198 NOTES TO LECTURE IV. tural with moral evil ; and is attested by the clearest indications of disturbance, referrible to its alleged epoch, amongst the assemblages which compose the crust of our planet. The series of changes thus pro- duced, both in the more ancient strata, and on the sur- face, in the animal as well as the vegetable realms of nature, has attracted the attention of the best-informed Geognosts : the result has been, a complete verification of the Mosaic Record. The reader will observe that I vary somewhat in the preceding view from the Mosaico-geognostical systems, of which a brief sketch is given in the Vindicice Geologicce, pp. 31. sq. one of which seems more particularly recom- mended by the acute author. His words are: ** A third hypothesis may be suggested, which supr »es the word " beginning" as applied by Moses in the first verse of the Book of Genesis, to express an undefined period of time, which was antecedent to the last great change that affected the surface of the earth, and to the creation of its present animal and vegetable inhabitants; during which period along series of operations and revolutions may have been going on, which, as they are wholly un- connected with the history of the human race, are passed over in silence by the sacred historian, whose only con- cern with them was barely to state, that the matter of the universe is not eternal and self-existent, but was originally created by the power of the Almighty." With this plausible acceptation of the Mosaic lan- guage, we have merely to compare the announcement in the verse referred to — " In the beginning God created." A single act is here specified. The virtue of the Divine Fiat (Ps. xxxiii. 6.) originates the being of the objects of sensation ; and to suppose time to have been required to this manifestation of power implies the NOTES TO LECTURE IV. 199 necessity of succession in that which cannot but be re- garded as an indivisible act. It should appear from hence that imperfection attached to this first agency, viewed relatively to its end ; a supposition not only ad- verse to every notion we can frame of the Divine attri- butes, but unauthorised by Scripture, which exhibits invariably the sense of the Newtonian doctrine as al- ready stated. This difficulty is at once removed by commencing the series of epochs, into which this author would enlarge the Mosaic rvtm, at the period indicated in the second verse ; the probability of which it is re- served for the 5th Lecture to demonstrate : see pp. 109. sqq. The fourth of Pr. Buckland's hypotheses is still more objectionable. It is that of indefinite extent, as ascribable to the Days of the demiurgic Week ; a doc- trine sanctioned, at least impliedly, by the high authority of Bp> Horsley, and espoused since by the learned au- thor of the " Three Dispensations :" Ch. iii, pp. 1 1 1. ss. I shall at present examine the probability of the Bishop's position ; vid. Serm. etc. quoted in the Find. Gecl. p. 32. It will, I suppose, be readily granted, that what- ever imagined inequality may' have subsisted between the days of the Hexaemeron, and those of the present period, none subsisted amongst themselves; that they were all of the *ame length. There is nothing in the language of the Record from which we can infer the contrary; and even Mr. Faber, who assigns from the standard of his Sabbatic day a lesser limit for the o»d» of Moses, ventures not on any supposition relative to this inequality. Secondly, it appears most probable that the agencies of this week were conducted without any interruption, 200 NOTES TO LECTURE IV. such as would have been occasioned by the reciproca- tions on the surface of a terraqueous mass in its pro- gress to a permanent axis and time of rotation. No- thing relative to this can, it is true, be affirmed of the first two days, the agencies of which respected not the organization of the surface ; of the remaining, the only one of which any doubt can be entertained is the third; and the catastrophe indicated on this day is plainly stated to have been such as led to the aggregation of the waters into one place — a result not very accordant with the oscillations arising from the cause above-men- tioned. Now, it is clear, on physical grounds, that a greater duration of rotation of the earth at this period only con- sists with the supposition of a less degree of density ; for it is not difficult to prove, that the limit of this time, con sistent with the equilibrium of a fluid homogeneous mass, is diminished in the subduplicate of that ratio in which the density is increased. In order therefore to adopt Bp.Horsley's opinion, the mean density of the terrestrial spheroid must be supposed very different, at the period of which we speak, from that which it afterwards was, or is at present ; a supposition not consistent with the ninth verse of Genes, i., which plainly indicates its complete solidification. Had such change of density moreover actually taken place, it would, it is true, have been accompanied by a change in the duration of the D'D' ; but as the former change would most probably have been progressive, a proportionable difference would have taken place in the lengths of those latter, contrary to our first principle ; and thence would have resulted a second series of changes in the ratio of the axes of the spheroid, which would have induced the NOTES TO LECTURE IV. i2Ul disturbances, the improbability of which has been already mentioned in the second. The result of all appears to be; that the exact degree of ellipticity, as well as the exact density, had been assumed by the terrestrial spheroid antecedently to the operations of the demiurgic week, which adapted it to rotation round a permanent axis: and that in no one of these circnmstances does it seem probable, that its state during the Hexaemeron differed from its present. As to the operation of other causes on the length of the day ; — the displacement of the Ecliptic combined with the action of the sun and moon on the terres- trial spheroid — the constant operation of the trade- winds — marine currents, etc. the utmost effect they are capable of producing is so minute, as to produce no sen- sible effect. It is inferred therefore by M. de Laplace, that this period is one of the most constant elements in the system of the world. Livr. iv. Ch. 14 fin. Note (4). — " The proximate cause of solar gravity, as it may be called, is unknown. We cannot trace by what agency the Supreme Being, from whom all things originate, has ordained the operations and laws of gra- vity to be executed." Brinkley, Astron. § 113. Thus Laplace; "ce principe est-il une loi primordiale de la nature ? n'est-il qu'un effet general d'une cause incon- nue? Ici, l'ignorance ou nous sommes des proprietes intimes de la matiere, nous arrete, et nous ote tout es- poir de repondre d'une maniere satisfaisante a ces ques- tions." Syst. p. 310. and Newton himself; " rationem proprietatum gravitatis ex phsenomenis nondum potui deducere, et hypotheses non fingo." Schol. Gen. Prin- cipp. p. 676. We may extend the same observations to other phaa- uomena of nature, with this difference, that the law of R *20i2 NOTES TO LECTURE IV. action of the former force is ascertained, in so much that it enters as a fixed element into the calculus of the geo- meter; those of other forces are, on the contrary, either not susceptible of expression in terms of the distances at which they act, or, if they be found so at certain dis- tances, deviate from the law observed for these dis- tances beyond a certain limit. Yet, as the physical cause into which Gravitation may be resolved is equally unknown with those to which phaenomena of the latter description may be referred, such are Cohesion, Elasticity, Heat, Light, Chemical Affinity, Magnetism, etc., notwithstanding all the at- tempts which have been made for their discovery — may it not be the sounder philosophy to conclude with Bacon ; " est aeque imperiti et leviter philosophantis in maxime universalibus causam requirere, ac in subordi- natis et subalternis causam non desiderare ;" and to ascribe to causes not mechanical, the influence it may be of a present Deity, those admirable arrangements of his universe? We may however, without danger to our theistic doctrine, presume with the eloquent Playfair on the existence of a general principle, connecting all the phaenomena of matter in one unbroken bond; and hold forth such ultimate attainments to " names which are to stand on the same levels with those of Newton and Laplace;" for in the agency of Mind, omnipresent, ceaseless, and all-powerful, we must terminate at last. Note (5). — Vid. Cuvier's Historical Eloge of Werner ; Edinb. Phil. J. Vol. iv. p. 8 sq. Preceding Lecture, sub. fin. This view derives perhaps additional probability from the concession of the Mineral Geologist himself, (vid. supr. not. (3), ) that no one primitive rock is older than another, but that all seem the result of a contem- NOTES TO LECTURE IV. 203 porary crystallization. If then their origin can be ascribed to a single operation of nature in the language of philosophy, we can see nothing repugnant to reason in referring it to a single Fiat of the First Cause in the language of revelation. (6). — Vid. Sj/st. du M. Livr. v. Ch. 6. pp. 430 sqq. (7). — The following is the reason- ing of Plato on the subject referred to in the Lecture ; i7TKrx.i7rTZov 7Ti£i xvtov (the universe), Trgoj TroTi^ov tZv ■?rx(>xoityfAci- TUV TlX.TC6W0[&iV 6$ XVTOV X^il^yX^iTO. 7T0TSg0V TT^Og TO X.XTX TXVTti, KXt U(TXVTCi)$ ?%0V, i] TTgO? TO yiyOVOf. it f&iV OV X.XXo$ iCTtV OOi X.0Q-- ftog, o, T£ yos xyxdog, dijXov a>{ 7r^o<; to xtdtov £/3A£5TSV tl oi (o firio' U7ruv Tivi &'if£is) Trgos to ysyovo?, ttxvti %l 3. 409. sq. and reflections on the subject of this note in the Postscript to the Preface, pp. xiv. sqq. Note (14). — Vid. Records of the Creation, Vol. i. pp. 189. 196. sq. 200-8. first Edition. (\5). — See this argument enlarged on, and confirmed from Newton and Paley, in Pr. Buckland's Vindicice Geol. pp. 13. sqq. Cf. Humboldt, Superposition, etc. pp. 3. 20. sq. 30. sqq. 84. The " immutable laws" observed in the geognostic edi- fice, so frequently referred to by this writer, affords proofs as irrefragable of the fundamental principle of Natural Theology, as those of any other department of nature. It is an easy transition from " that identity of design which has established in each link of the bound- less chain of living being a system of delicately propor- NOTES ON LECTURE IV. 207 tioned laws of existence pervading its minutest parts," (Vindicia: Geologicce, ubi supra,) to the oneness of the Designer. (16).— Genes. L 1,21, 27. ii. 3, 4. v. 1, 2. vi. 7. Numb. xvi. 30. Deut. iv. 32. (17) — " A miracle, in its very notion, is relative to a course of nature ; and implies somewhat different from it, considered as being so." Bp. Butler, Analogy, etc.F. ii. Ch. 2. At the period we treat of the reference implied in the term is wanting t (18). — See Bp. Marsh's Authenticity of the Jive books of Moses vindicated, pp. 6. 14. On this fact nlone we may repose our argument, that the sense we attribute to this Hebrew verb is not affected by real or apparent de- viations from it in the Scriptures posterior to the Pen- tateuch. I say, real or apparent, inasmuch as very many of the instances alleged in support of other mean- ings afford by no means as conclusive evidence as the oppugners of the theistic one imagine. Thus Rosen- muller determines; " Verbum N*n proprie notat cccdere... uti Josh. 17, 15...Ezech. 23, 47. ubi jungitur cum nmn, ut significet excidere gladiis" (Scholia, Cap. i.) The learned reader however, on referring to these texts, will find, that the words am "p ntm! in the former are by no means necessarily to be translated, " and cut down for thyself there." A sense much more analogous with what I conceive to have been the primitive one is at least as applicable ; in confirmation of which Munster's version may be cited..." Et praepara illic tibi (locum)." Nor will the text in Ezekiel be found more conclusive as to the meaning ca?dere. The Prophet announces the utter destruction of Jerusalem and Samaria ; is it then supposing too much, to attribute his use of the word K"ai in this sense of extinction. ..of annihilation. ..to its primary reference to a state of no perceived existence ? We may again cite Munster's version, " Et extermina- 208 NOTES TO LECTURE IV. bunt eas gladiis suis," as conformable to this opinion. It appears on the whole much more natural to suppose, that the meaning which Rosenmliller (after Schultens) holds to have been the proper one, was a derivative amongst many others from that stated in the Lecture. (19). Vid. supr. Not. (3). Compare Lect. iii. pp. 69. sqq. Note (20). — The observations in the preceding in- stance respecting now were extended, in Lect. ix. to its cognate verbs. The learned reader will perceive that the opinion of Maimonides has been adopted respecting the theistic sense of k-q, one which it would be difficult to disprove by the language of the Pentateuch alone. As to ntzw, the expressions of the older commentators are precise: "fecit secundum quid, i. e. aptavit. Sic nwy sumitur Deut. xxi. 12. et 1 Sam. xii. 6. Fecit ergo dando ei qualitatem accidentalem, non formam substan- tialem." Poole, Synops. ad Genes, i. 7. which latter words, translated into philosophical language, express the union of the atmospheric gases, prospectively to a new order of things in the animal and vegetable kingdoms. With the same propriety of usage it occurs in the 16th verse, indicating a perfection of disposition towards the attainment of a certain end. Compare Not. (3) supra, p. 195. On the whole, I conceive that nothing can be clearer than the existence of this peculiarity of meaning, amongst the earlier Jews, of the word tos. That its usage was extended by writers posterior to the Mosaic era furnishes no argument against the conclusion we should derive from this, of a consistent and well-adapted nomenclature; no more than the import of the Latin verb, which some Grammarians refer to it as a theme, can be alleged as determiningitto an analogous meaning. I see no reason for refusing assent to the exposition of NOTES O.V LECTURE IV. 209 the learned Jew already mentioned, nor the equally explicit one of Aben Ezra, who has expressed in the words pao tv> K'yinV the opinion common to their most approved philologists. It is true, the phrase j'Ko carries with it something revolting to a mind intent solely on illustrating through known analogies the manner of effectuation in this case. This it is unreasonable to expect: but let us receive the expression as purely relative,,. .relative to the ordinary operations ' of finite agents, and implying a negation of these in the case of the Deity,.. .and we shall ar- rive at a conclusion less at variance with our concep- tions. Thus the inspired Apostle represents the visible world ft* yiyonvxt .. .not s% Itx^cvtuv, but. .J* (ptttvepiv&iv ; Carefully avoiding the repugnance to common sense which the former might be understood as implying, and approach- ing by the latter as near to the truth as human language admits. A comparison was instituted at greater length be- tween the root tm on the one hand, and nwp with its cognates on the other, in Lecture ix. Note (21). — Compare texts referred to ; Genes, i. 31. ii. 2. iii. 1. v. 1. ix. 6. xviii. 8'. xxi. 6. xxxi. 1. Isaiah, xii. 5. xxxviii. 15. xl. 23. (22). — "llle opifex rerum, mundi melioris origo." Ovid, Metam. i. 79. Comp. Cic. De Nat. Deor. f* Opifex aedificatorque mundi Deus," i. 18. to which examples the learned reader may add the expressions of Megasthenes, ap. Strabon. Lib. xv. Ch. 5. Neither did his language afford the author of the TimcEus words more expressive of the primary act of his '*' Parent of the Universe" than ymZt, |tmVr#e-0«:<, aVegyoe^srd**, hftiov^wu; — altogether inadequate to con- vey its philosophical conception. We experience the same deficiency in the reprssentation by translators of 210 NOTES ON LECTURE IV. the sense of the Sacred writers : thus w««7v in Genes, i. 1. yw£v, Ezek. xxi. 30. xxviii. 13. Kecre^uxwa-eeti, Isa. Ix. 26. *«'£«», Mai. ii. 10. the latter of which, and its derivatives kt/ms and xta$v, miscere, etc. Vid. Damm, Lexicon Homericum, in voc. *■£*>. Lennep, Lex. Etymol. in voc. xgara^ x^uro-aiv, and the root *g«A», to which, as also to the one mentioned in the Lecture, the senses " in antiqua lingua Graeca imperare, validum esse" are attributed. That this itself was a derivative sense from one of a higher order, extant during the pro- fession of an unadulterated Theism, is highly probable. In truth its connection with x^du expressing the mode, as well as with xg«T«j designating the efficiency, strongly confirms the supposition. (25). Comp. Isaiah, xl. 28. Euripid. Electr. 1257. et pass. (26). In this sense Plato is to be understood, when saying; xxXov eg utuyxm ebr6){ u7TOTiXi( &%»ito, revB~' iftTv avtftxg-tet, Tim(SUS t p. 302 b. NOTES ON LECTURE V, Note (}). — " Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures and the Power of* God." S. Matth. xxii. 29. Comp, S. Mark, xii. 24. (2). Compare Isaiah, xl. 12. Pro- verbs, viii. 29. Jerem. xxxiii. 25. xxiii. 6. S. Luke, xvii. 5. Ps. xxix. 11. Isaiah, xlix. 13. Joel, iii. xvi. S. Luke, i. 68. (3). Hebr. iv. 15. Note (4). — The meaning of the term " approximate" used here is best expressed by the denomination which Naturalists have conferred on one class of the Animal Kingdom, Zoophyta — indicating the conjunction in the same subject of the properties of Animal and Vegetable life. lie that contemplates the regular degradation from the class of Vertebral Animals terminating in the Infusoria, and the corresponding ascent in the Vegeta- ble Kingdom to the genus Mimosa, will perceive little reason to doubt of the perfect continuity of Organic being, however marked the distinction may be which exists, according to the views of physiologists, between plants and animals in the mode of performance of their respective functions, and in their relations to external circumstances. To cite a single instance 5 in concluding his description of the genus Vorticclla, Dr. Macculloch observes — " The whole dependence presents a singular analogy to the vegetable identity,— so as almost to lead us to conclude that there was here a perfect gradation from one department of nature to the other." Qiiart. Joum. Vol. xiv. p. 286. May it not reasonably be supposed, that the complete development of this physical continuity was the opera- NOTES ON LECTURE V. 21S tion reserved for the third, fifth and sixth days of the Hexaemeron, a period which beheld the consummation of the works of Divine Wisdom ; and that a faint out- line of this fact may be traced in the abundance implied in the word WW* Genes, i. 20. Note (5). — See Lectures ii. iii. (6). See Lect. Hi. p. 68. Note (7).— This term nwKii has created much diffi- culty to commentators ; some (as the Author of the Com- parative Estimate, p. 157.) comprising it in the first day j others (Buckland, F/W.G. ( 1 3) — Compare Poole, Synops. Critt. Note e. p. 3. Note (14).— It may be regarded, perhaps, as a sup- position not wholly inadmissible, that a brief reference to the demiurgic acts which respected our planet is con- tained in those terms mm inn ; the idea here expressed being supposed accurate, namely, that the former is used relatively to inorganic, the latter to organic, sub- stance. The Second verse thus becomes, as it were, a link connecting two epochs, the agencies of each of which, though perfect in their kind, implied, this the an- tecedence, that the succession, of the other, in order to the attainment of the final cause. Such were the epochs of Creation, and the Hexaemeron; the boundaries of that series which research discloses amidst the masses of our globe, as well as in the Hebraic geology, when duly comprehended. See Postscrijrt, ut supra, pp. xviii. xx. For inn Mr. Penn selects the rendering «J^to?. His exposition is ; " That solid body was concealed by the cloak of waters, and total darkness encompassed that cloak; so that the spheeroid, speaking relatively and optically, was invisible, or unapparent :" Comp. Estim. p. 156. He then supposes the agency which gave the spheroid its optical existence, announced ill the third verse, to succeed in such wise, as to form with all those that preceded it a connected series, comprised within the limits of the first demiurgic day. The better to accord with this view, the text is so arranged as to pre- sent the notice of the operation of the XVT\ interposed in the way of parenthesis, and the particle commencing the third verse is translated " therefore." Ibid. p. 147. Now, it appears in the first place introducing some- what of unnecessary description into the Record to an- nounce, that the earth was invisible, and that darkness NOTES ON LECTURE V. 215 covered the abyss, that is, that an unapparent earth was enveloped in an unapparent deep. I cannot but think that the notice conveyed, supposing a.o^xro'; to be the legitimate version, would have expressed this state of the Earth and Deep, as to optical circumstances, con- jointly. Again, it seems better to comprehend the whole terraqueous spheroid in the designation pN, as is the case in the first verse ; and thus the reasoning applies with still greater force, as the tautology becomes more apparent. This acceptation of p« I find to be sanc- tioned by the authorities of Estius and Menochius ; cf. Sj/fiops. Criticorum in loc. Granting however that, according to Mr. Penn's dis- tribution of the clauses and acceptation of the terms, there is nothing absolutely superfluous in the Narra- tive,... yet the very circumstances of depriving it of a succession in its notices so as to indicate distinct eras (vid. supr. not. (3) Lect. iii.), as also of introducing within so brief a compass three different meanings of the particle 1 to accommodate it to a disposition, which ap- pears at best artificial, and not the result of a first view of the narrative as it presents itself, seem sufficiently to warrant a different arrangement. We may add to this, that the exposition as quoted above appears little less inartificial than the arrange- ment, and not at all calculated to meet the difficulties which embarrass it; unless the ingenious author will explain what is meant by the concealment of a solid body by being enveloped in a fluid, itself concealed in consequence of (according to the view in the Comparative Estimate) the non-existence of Light. One is led to suspect in this case, (at least from the mode of expres- sion adopted,) a violation of the well-known rule, which 216 NOTES ON LECTURE V. forbids " more causes of natural things to be assigned, than are (both true and) sufficient for explaining the phenomena." It seems evident, that the concealment which the absence of Light was adequate to effect in the case of the Abyss, it was also adequate to effect in that of the solid Nucleus. But this proceeds on the supposition of the true meaning of ^tyrr in the second verse being assigned by Mr. Penn, of which some observations in the course of our present inquiry may incline us to doubt. Vid. p. 122. As to the rendering of inn, the authority derived from the LXX. in behalf of it is much weakened by «'og«To? being itself a questionable reading. ««g«? has been sug- gested as a probable emendation, (cf. Schleusner, Lexic. in voc. uigxroi,) which, according to its exposition <*p,o£d of the second verse to express the same idea, and that Hesychius' interpretation of the LXX. */3uc-s-e?, namely, w3»tw «*•£<§« is equally applicable to both. Comparat. Est. p. 156* This appears gratuitous. It deprives moreover the Mosaic Record of one of its most beautiful features, (See Not. (3) p. 197,) namely, the succession of its announcements corresponding to the gradual develop- NOTES ON LECTURE V. 217 ment of the parts of the geognostic structure; particu- cularly those which are connected with organic sub- stances. This, if not altogether lost, is impaired in one of its most essential points by uniting two designations so different in one idea. It forms, on the contrary, part of our system to ex- hibit this change of designation as indicative of different states in the fluid exterior of the earth, and consequent- ly of successive eras in the demiurgic period. (See pp. 119 sqq. of the present Lecture). Connecting these with the events of the Hexaemeron, the period allotted to preparing the globe for the reception of man, and which preceded its last great catastrophe, we possess means quite adequate to the solution of the chief diffi- culties which present themselves in this field of research; and are enabled to conclude with the Geognost, that " the sublime picture of the successive development of organisation upon the Earth, had already existed in- scribed at the head of our Sacred Books, many ages before the diligent and scrupulous investigations of geologists and naturalists had attained to the demon- stration of its counter-proof in the bosom of the solid strata ;" presenting in its several parts, " the order of creation, and the comparative recentness of the human race, indications of a Supernatural light thrown in the midst of the profound obscurity and absolute ignorance of the people of primeval times." Prof. Necker, Dis- course on the History etc. of Geology, Ed. Ph. Journ. Vol. xii. p. 323. We compare with much satisfaction, notices so con- firmative of our present argument, with expressions of a very different tendency in the Antediluvian Phytology of Artis, Introd. pp. iv. sq. The confusion in the passage to which I refer of the plain and coherent narrative of T 218 NOTES ON LECTURE V. Scripture with the wild allegories of the Chaldean cos- mogonists, reflects but little credit on the learning, not to speak of the religion, of the writer. The reader may consult on this point Mr. Faber's Horce Mosaicce, Vol. i. Ch. 2. pp. 31 etc. The careful perusal of this work will be found highly advantageous to the Biblical student in this department of his research, not only by exposing the misconceptions of Physiologists, but by fortifying his mind against the less pardonable errors of Theolo- gians. We cease to be surprised at the former, when the exploded opinion regarding the Mosaic philosophy, its having been framed after the model of the Phenician or the Egyptian systems, has found an advocate very lately in the person of E. F. C. Rosenmiiller. Vid. Scholia, Cap. 1 . p. 1 9. This is so far from being the case, that the Hebraic system from its very outset was intended to counteract, in the minds of those who professed its purer faith, the prevalent absurdities of those of surrounding nations. The principles of the Egyptian cosmogony, in particular, the necessary eternity of the world, and the endless suc- cession of like worlds, were totally at variance with it ; and it appears highly improbable that the details of a sys- tem should have served as a model to the Jewish Law- giver, the principles of which he so entirely opposed. See this subject adverted to in Horsley's Biblical Criticism, Vol. i. p. 3. Hales' Analysis, Vol. i. p. 317. and more fully in Pritchard's Egyptian Mythology, pp. 17S — 87. Note (18). — We may be allowed to anticipate cer- tain heads of discussion of the present Lecture with the view of placing in a clearer light the considerations which have offered themselves respecting the meaning of the clauses just now mentioned. It will be seen that an agency of a permanent kind is NOTES ON LECTURE V. 219 indicated by the expression flDITlD which occurs in the third clause ; and that the cause to which it is ascribed can be none other than the Efficient, the o>r6*< tl)^ indicating the third Person of the Trinity (pp. 1 23 sq.) We thus possess certain data for individualising the demiurgic agencies. The solid frame-work of the globe has been completed by creative power, the announce- ment of which event has been sought for in the first verse ; and we have found it to terminate in the forma- tion of a C3inn, or matrix, which assumes in process of time the aspect Q>ort, " the waters." Now we may conceive of the types of formations superposed on the primitive, to a certain degree, as of the primitive them- selves, namely, that they were due to Divine agency, the incubating Spirit ; and that the successive orders of those strata resulted from successive changes in the constitution of the matrix, in which their elements had been disposed ; which disposition may have been one of the acts of the creative power previously exerted. This much is unequivocally announced, that the agency was exerted on a fluid mass. It is therefore impossible not to conceive, that reciprocations in that mass were the result of the motion implied in nDHnO> as also that these, transmitted 'to the particles which it held suspended, contributed to their disengagement, and originated the phaenomena of stratification — unless we are content with affixing no defined meaning to the terms of the second verse. It is possible moreover to hold all this in perfect con- sistency with our first principle of creation, and to com- press within the limits of any assignable duration the operation of the Spirit, as we have before that of the Elohim. This is observed in reference to the opinion of those, who would connect the several epochs of the 220 NOTES ON LECTURE V. first part of the Record in such wise, as to comprise all within the morning and the evening of the third verse ; — a supposition however, which is, in the first place, not necessary for maintaining the principle above-mentioned, as this has been assigned its distinct agency, and which, in the second, deprives the Record of a principal part of its illustration by modern science, as will appear here- after. We may extend this inquiry from the general phas- nomena of stratification, to particular aspects which many of the strata of sedimentary origin exhibit, such for instance as their wave-like forms ; to the production of which the compound motion of subsidence and the oscillations of the fluid was adequate : as also to the formation of the " dry land," the oxidated crust, which was laid bare on the third day, fitted for the reception of vegetable assemblages, and the support in conse- quence of animal life. Again ; passing from rocks of sedimentary origin, to those which are reckoned exclusively volcanic,... we may refer to this as the probable era of the formation of many such types ; more particularly if the view about to be presented (p. 122) of the meaning of ■jttTT be esteemed as defensible. Forces may have been excited " of which the actual state of things affords only a faint image ;" modifying those types which had already been produced, and introducing new ones into the geognostic assemblage. Those events, at whatever era they com- menced, certainly did not terminate, until " the reces- sion of the ocean from the summits of the mountains" on the third demiurgic day. We possess therefore, so far as the Record has as yet conducted us, notices more or less distinct of the following geognostic circumstances : the creation of the NOTES ON LECTURE V. 221 primordial world in its solidified state ; the plastic state of the secondary strata ; agencies affecting those strata, accompanied by disturbing forces, which originate the arenaceous rocks, and those of igneous origin. For authorities as to the preceding details, the reader is referred to Prof. Buckland's Vindicioc Geol. p. 5. Dr. Martius, in Edinb. Ph. J. Vol. xii. p. 48. D'Aubuis- son, Traitc de Geogn. T. i. p. 8, Cuvier, Histor. Eloge, ubi supr. p. 9. more particularly where he speaks of the violent movements accompanying the changes in the ante- diluvian ocean, the oinn of Moses j p. 8. Ibid. This a; tide {Ed. Ph. J. Vol. iv.) contributes, in a brief com- pass, much in illustration of the Scripture Geology, pro- vided the distinctive principle of the latter be held in view. As to the proof of the existence of Volcanic power, adequate, not merely to the demiurgic effects of this period, but to those of the third day, the reader is referred to the fourth and following sections, extracted from a treatise of Mr. Conybeare in Dr. Ure's Dic- tionary of Chemistry, pp. 482. sq. as also the passage (p. 483), in which, " during the subsidence of the ocean, in the Wernerian system, mechanical forces are sup- posed to have acted in a series of great convulsions." Compare also Cuvier, Theory, etc. § 4, in which the existence of the catastrophes is admitted, with a dissent however from the assigned manner of effecting them. Vid. § 17. No fact however in Geology seems better established than the operation of Volcanic agency over a very con- siderable portion of the Earth's surface, and traversing all the strata, from the primordial to the tertiary. Of this, the pyroxenic masses mentioned by Humboldt (Superpos. pp. 341. sq.) afford a clear proof; and primi- tive trap, which is often found in vast strata in the 222 NOTES ON LECTURE V. midst of gneiss, passing through granite and micaceous schistus, and alternating with the two former and argil- laceous schistus ; Encycl. Brit. Vol. ix. p. 559. The researches of the former distinguished Naturalist in Equinoctial America sufficiently prove, that it is un- safe to argue as to the intensity and extent of Volcanic action at the demiurgic period, from those at present in operation. The following extract from the work above-mentioned, Ure's Dictionary of Chemistry, may serve as our con- cluding notice of the remarkable coincidence of the views of Science with the announcements of Revelation, when duly examined : " It must be remembered, that one of the essential conditions of the theory above sketched is, the operation of volcanic agency beneath the pressure of an incumbent ocean ; and that it does not, therefore, in any degree question the Neptunian origin of the majority of the rocks, which have evidently been formed in the bosom of the ocean. With regard to the trap rocks alone, and perhaps the granitic, does it venture even to insinuate an opposite mode of for- mation." p. 483. § 10. from Messrs. Philips' and Cony- 1 beare's Outlines etc. Abstracting from the geogonic hypothesis > as to the granitic and other primitive types, nothing can be clearer than the illustration which all this affords to the Mosaic narrative. The first clause of the second verse describes the state of the earth, such as it must have been during the existence of disorder and catastrophe. The second clause will be found to imply, on due ex- amination, their action in and upon the matrix of the secondary soils. The third, the progress towards a more perfect of things, the abyss having assumed the purely aqueous constitution, and commencing its re- NOTES ON LECTURE V. 223 cession from the eminences of the mountains formed amidst those primeval catastrophes ; see Hist. Eloge, ut supr. p. 10. I have regarded it as necessary to premise in this note an outline of the views which have suggested them- selves, on an attentive consideration of well-attested facts, and deductions from those facts by Geognosts of eminence. Others have been reserved for a more full investigation. In truth, to the latitude of discussion which presents itself in relation to those topics, the dif- ficulty consists rather in prescribing the limits, than in adding the circumstances, of illustration. The lan- guage which we have to consider is, it is allowed, mys- terious; caution must therefore be used in particularis- ing events ; yet not such caution, as may, through a distrustful analysis of facts, prove injurious to the Re- cord by overlooking its indications. Note (19). — See Comparative Estimate, p. 156. cited in Note (14) supr. Note (20). — The multiliteral ^aiir is the term used in the 22d verse. "]t£>fT, which occurs in the 23d, appears to indicate the whole of the attendant circumstances of the awful scene, and to be used in a sense partly figura- tive : I say partly, as its primary notion includes one of them. No usage is of more frequent occurrence in Scripture than that of -\ti?n in a figurative meaning, anguish, per- plexity, distress, etc. in the same manner as iru (Ps. xxxiv. 5. Conjug. Niph.) is used to express a contrary mean- ing. Compare for instances of the former, Isa. lix. 9. Jerem. xiii. 16. Lament, iii. 2. Now it seems fair to argue, that if personal or political ruin, with their at- tendant circumstances, (comp. Job. xv. 22. 3. Isa. v. 30.,) are shadowed forth in this term, that physical disturb - 224 NOTES ON LECTURE y. ance may, by parity of reasoning, be adumbrated by it ; particularly in a portion of revelation appropriated exclusively to its detail. That a sense analogous to this appeared to our Translators to be applicable, is manifest from their manner of disposing and rendering the clause lytu *iia *inm in the passage cited from Deu- teronomy. To the texts considered above, the reader may add Job, xx. 26. xiii. 17. Note (21). — Causes, namely, which contributed to the development of the strata termed sedimentary, and to the formation of the mountain-chains ; including the dynamical agencies which accompanied them. Vid. supr. Note (19). — This view was abandoned when I came to consider the word employed to express the agency of the nn viz. riDmD> which cannot but be re- garded as implying the operation of an Efficient Cause, not the effects of bare qualities superadded to Matter. For the same reason I should regard as inadmissible the ingenious exposition of Kirwan in his Geological Essays, p. 49. viz. " the evaporation that took place soon after the creation :" for though I am prepared to admit of the high degree of temperature of the earth at this period, and consequently of the rapidity with which the fluid surface proceeded in its assumption of the elastic form, yet all this was but an effect j a law of nature as it was constituted by the Creator ; an instru- ment, not an agent. Following therefore by direct con- sequence, according to such constitution, it seems scarcely worthy of so distinct a mention by the Sacred writer, in a verse devoted only to notices of the most leading circumstances. Independently of this, it is left to the reader to judge, whether the designation CUTiVn ni"l, expressed with an emphasis so decided, and placed NOTES ON LECTURE V. 225 at the commencement of such a narrative, is at all ap- plicable to this or any other physical effect. The interpretation proposed in the Comparative Es- timate (P. ii. Ch. iii. p. 153.) after Josephus, namely, " the breath of the word of God, by the effusion of which he pronounced his mandate," merits, as an ap- proach to the genuine sense, greater consideration. The author of that work connects the Mosaic ml with " the divine Aoros" on the basis of two texts, Job, xxvi.- 13. Ps. xxxiii. 6., to the last of which much weight seems to be attached, as giving " critical deter- mination to this passage of Genesis." Now the words of the Psalmist are as follow ; " By the word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all the host of them by the breath of his mouth (VD Jim)." It is clear from the nature of parallelism, that the corresponding parts of these members are to be receiv- ed as expressing the same sense. It will however scarcely be maintained that 11)1 expresses, in its present connection with nD, the same conception that it does when immediately joined with Cn^X ; or that it indi- cates any thing more than the determination of the Di- vine volition to a particular end, necessarily and in all its parts effective of that end. The phrase is to be received in a sense analogous to that which occurs in St. Matth. iv. 4. which appears to be nearly a literal transcript of the words of the Psalmist, and implies the efficacy of the Divine word in spiritual, not less than the former does in visible, creation. The scriptural doctrine of the Triune requires not that the word occurring in the latter text should be received as synonymous with the AOros, St. John, i. I. ; neither therefore is it necessary, or even admissible, t hat the tt)1 and the ")31 of the Psalmist should be re- garded as anthopopathically shadowing forth that conception. See Appendix. u 226 NOTES ON LECTURE V. From the passage in Job little confirmation can be derived for Mr. Penn's opinion. It is at least as natural to interpret nn here of the Spirit as of breath in the anthropopathical sense, and far more accordant with inmmi in the preceding verse ; both being pre- ceded by a prefix, which most probably implies their efficiency as causes, and is therefore most probably de- finitive of them as Personal Agents. I refer them with at least as much reason, and, as it may perhaps appear, with more propriety, to the third Person of the Trinity — " the Wisdom" which was " possessed in the beginning" (Prov. viii. 22) — the self-intelligent Spirit, Isa. xl. 1 3. Compare Wisd. vii. 7. 22—27. Yet I would not be understood as meaning to assert, that nn admits in no case the rendering, which has been thus proposed from Josephus and R. Salomon. Let us examine a particular instance which seems to bear much on the present question. The following passage occurs in Job; *ny"^>D"0 »B81 'jrb* Wll O 'npttfi (Ch. xxvii. vs. 3.). Now, accord- ing to the law of parallels the nn and the nDttf J in this verse are to be received as synonymous, which fixes the sense of the former to be the CD'M DOttfJ in Genes, ii. 7. This is rendered in our version e * the breath of life ;" doubtless however with a reference to something more than merely that which contributes to animal ex- istence. I conceive it to indicate the immaterial soul, and to be rightly designated by the Author of the Book of Job as " the Spirit of God," it bearing the same impress of the Divine nn that Man, at the same period, did of his Creator, having been made " in his image, and after his likeness." I conclude from the preceding reflections, that the nn of Moses in Genes, i, 2. is to be understood of NOTES ON LECTURE V. 227 the third Person of the Trinity,. ..no other acceptation being calculated to afford that doctrine the same degree of direct evidence; and that, completing as it does the references to the Divine Persons in this chapter, it presents the work of Creation as the joint result of distributed agencies, harmonising in this respect also with the other parts of Scripture. Compare Poole, Sy?iops. Critt. in loc. wherein it is added, after rejecting the absurd interpretation of the Targums,' Chald. OnJcel. viz. " ventus a Deo missus, ut exsiccaret aquas," that " Alii de Spiritu Sancto ac- cipiunt. Sic doctiores (V. Sic M. L. F. C a L. Bo. Me. T. A. Pi. D. G. E.J 3 et pene omnes Patres, et Rabbini recentiores." Again, " Dei consilium, mens, voluntas,"(Z,. F.,) in consistence with our citation in this note from Prov. viii. 1. 22. Amongst the " Patres" St. Augustine is very express as to his conception of this passage, indeed of the entire Record, as it respects the Trinitarian belief. His words are ; " Ut quemad- modum in ipso exordio inchoatae creaturae — Trinitas insinuatur Creatoris : (nam dicente Scriptura, In pri?i- cipio fecit Deus caelum et terram ; intelligimus Patrem in Dei nomine, et Filium in principii nomine, — dicente autem Scriptura, et Spiritus Dei ferebatur super aquam, completam commemorationem Trinitatis agnoscimus:) ita et in conversione atque perfectione Creaturae, ut rerum species digerantur, eadem Trinitas insinuetur; Verbum Dei scilicet, et Verbi generator, cum dicitur Dixit Deus ; et sancta bonitas, in qua Deo placet quid- quid ei pro suae naturae modulo perfectum placet, cum dicitur, Vidit Deus quia bonum est. De Genesi ad Lit. L. i. Cap. 6. Compare also Vol. vii. 294 F. Edit. Benedict. Of later Critics Rosenmuller Jun. adopts the exposi- 228 NOTES ON LECTURE V. tion of the ivegys** (cf. Crit. Sacr. i. 29.)? not in the per- sonal sense, but as an attribute or inherent vivifying power ; (Schol. in Genes. C. i. § 2.;) one, to which even the interpretation of Fagius is preferable. Note (22). — Compare Genes, vi. 17. vii. 15, 22. viii. 1. xxvi. 35. xli. 38. xlv. 27. Exod. vi. 9. x. 13, 19. xxviii. 3. xxxi. 3. xxxv. 31. Numb. v. 14, 30. xiv. 24. xxiv. 2. xxvii. 18. (23).— Vid. Note (21). Thus the Analyst dilates on the charms of his intellectual pur- suits, observing the beautiful correspondences which exist between the phenomena of nature, and the lan- guage in which he announces their several laws ; Lapl. Syst. etc. pp. 183 sq. May it not be allowed to the Christian to claim in behalf of his infinitely sublimer language a similar correspondence with the same phe- nomena, which attest, by their unity of purpose, that of the intelligence which oi'dained them ; at the same time that the diversity of their Modes of operation af- fords a presumption of diversity in the Persons pos- sessed of that intelligence. To pursue this latter part of the analogy would however be dangerous in the ex- treme, since beyond the general fact nature furnishes no means of ascertaining the Number of the Agents who concurred in order to its being : this is wholly mat- ter of Revelation ; it may perhaps be an analogy al- together impossible to be expressed in terms so definite, as to present the aspect of a probable evidence ; and in default of our capacity for appreciating it, Faith in- terposes its aid in effecting that result to which Reason alone is incompetent. Note (24). — Vid. Horce Mosaic^ ut supra, pp. 41 — 58. " Ovum mundi simulacrum Macrobio Satur- nalium lib. vii, cap. 16. «g%»i yeve«n^>K m*"), (compare Note (21) supr.) quae mundi hujus molem rudem adhuc et suis quasi secundinis involutam calore vivifico animasse, atque tanquam ad maturitatem pro- movisse putatur." Rosenmiiller, Schol. etc. Cap. i. § 2. " Numenius citatus a Porphyrio de NympJiancm antro ait, tov 7T£otpiiTY,v (Mosem) dgyctfiu i[t^>igSv6eu inuvu rov Vidros rov B-tov vrnvftx." Grotius, ubi supra. Compare the foregoing note. 2S0 NOTES ON LECTURE V. The Author of the Comparative Estimate objects (p. 154) to the rendering " incubabat," as conveying no real sense to the mind. It is not proposed as such, but, like other expressions occurring in Scripture re- lative to Divine agencies, and their modes, as anthropo- pathical. Thus in the New Testament, the Spirit is said to descend, and to rest upon, our Blessed Lord, as a dove: compare Matth. iii. 16. Mark, i. 10- Luke, iii. 22. John, i. 32. The phrase in the latter text is tpuvw he ecvrov, of the intelligibleness of which, regarded as an adumbration, little doubt can be entertained. It has always been allowed to illustrate, through the me- dium of Sensible things, the operations of Spirit ; and the analogy may be preserved in the present instance, provided it is not pursued so far as to materialise our conceptions of Divine agency. The rendering above- mentioned is therefore adopted as the most emphatic way of designating an effect, without attempting any explanation of the manner employed ; in precisely the same way as we attribute Creative power to God, with- out the least conception of its mode of effectuation. The passage referred to in S. John, in which the word used is spum, corresponds exactly with Numb, xi. 25, 26., in which the Spirit is said to be upon Moses, and to rest upon the seventy Elders ; rP33> «? ^ tuexmrxv- iox.vjs rot/ 7niii/fcetros lyinro pair' rovro rtn? Qxrtv lAw*. ot $1 vdctTC&ovs pittas e-J^v. x«; Ex ravm? iyiviro ncio-cc. the demiurgic agencies. The following passage from M. Humboldt's Geognostical Treatise, pp. 23. 4, may serve to illustrate the views entertained by a particular class of philosophers, as to the degree of information to be derived on this subject from the Sacred Record. NOTES ON LECTURE V. 239 " The attempts which have been made by the Hebraic geologists to subject the epochas to absolute measures of time, and to connect the chronology of ancient cosmogonic traditions with actual observations of nature, have proved fruitless. ' It has more than once been desired,' says M. Ramond, in a discourse abounding with philosophical views, ' that we could find a supplement to our short annals, in the monu- ments of nature. The historical ages might, however, have sufficed to teach us, that the succession of physical and moral events is not regulated by the uniform pro- gress of time, and cannot in consequence furnish its measure. We see, in looking back, a succession of creations and destructions, by the various arrangements of the beds that form the crust of the globe. They give us the idea of several distinct epochas; but these epochas, so fertile in events, may have been very short, compared to the number and the importance of the re- sults. Between the creations and the destructions, on the contrary, we perceive nothing, whatever might be the immensity of the intervals ; there every thing is lost in the mist of an undeterminable antiquity, the degrees of which cannot be appreciated, because the succession of phaenomena has no scale that can be referred to the division of time.' Memoires de V Institute 1815, p. 4-7." Comparing this with the concluding sentence of the Theory of the Earth, we possess a brief notice of the important doctrine of Revolutions, founded by the Baron Cuvier on his researches amongst the Tertiary Formations, and more fully developed in his " Os- semens Fossiles," a work which ranks amongst the pro- foundest of modern times, and which has established a new Era in Geognosy. Now, there is nothing, that I can perceive, in the 240 NOTES ON LECTURE V. Record of Moses, adverse to this theory, received as all such must be, in the present state of geological science, with limitation. The Record when duly con- sidered, opposes no counterstatement to the assertions of M. Raraond, relative to the creations and destruc- tions, which its strata disclose as having taken place on the surface of the earth, of which the reader who may take the trouble of referring to Note (3) Lect. iv. may convince himself. Nothing certainly occurs in it to define the epochas of these revolutions antecedently to a certain period ; it is not therefore surprising, that the authors to whom he refers have failed in the solution of difficulties, where they possessed no data. But when we arrive at the period, at which it pleased the Divine Being to reorganise the globe, having passed already through a series of antecedent operations, with a view to the creation of Man, the Record assigns distinct and positive epochs. The events which precede this we are left to deduce chiefly from the clauses of the Second verse. I cannot therefore but repeat the opinion elsewhere expressed, (vid. supr. Note (34). Postscript to the Pre- face, pp. xviii. etc.,) that the proofs of the objections urged by the Author of the Comparative Estimate against Cuvier's theory, on the grounds of its not abiding the test of examination, and of the adequacy of " a binary of revolutions" to account for the alternate origination and destruction of animal life, are insufficient to authorise its entire rejection. Nothing can be clearer than the fact, that our present earth is the last of a series, over each of which in succession was spread its appropriate organic productions ; and that more changes must be admitted than are consistent with Mr. Penn's hypothe- sis, to account satisfactorily for these successions. It is far from being likely, nay even possible, that the stony NOTES ON LECTURE V. 241 strata were deposited, and loaded with organic remains in the order we now behold them contemplated even in the most limited way, by the antediluvian Ocean, which, according to his system, occupied our present Conti- nents. Of the soundness of this theory, which has been adopted on the authorities of MM. Deluc and Cuvier, (Vid. Essay, § 5 sub fin. § 7. Note (1 1) Lect. iii. supra.) Prof. Buckland's recent work, Reliquice Diluvia?ice, seems to authorise much doubt, at least when understood in a generalsense. Observations separated by considera- ble intervals are detailed in this latter work, tending to prove the identity of the present continents, so far as they have been submitted to geological research, with the antediluvian. The evidence appears complete ; and added to other considerations, sufficient to overturn the hypothesis revived by Mr. Penn. Compare Kirwan's Observations on De Lice's theory, cited in Rees's Cyclo- paedia, Art. Deluge. Note (37). — " Et pourquoi Phistoire naturelle n'au- roit-elle pas aussi un jour son Newton ?" Cuvier, Thcorie etc. Disc. Prelim, p. 3. (38). — Supr. pp. 124. sqq. Note (39). — Laplace, in treating of the connexion between the density, the time of rotation, and the figure, of an homogeneous fluid mass, concludes with the follow- ing words; " apres un grand nombre d'oscillations, le fluide en vertu des frottemens et des resistances qu'il eprouve, se fixe a cet etat qui est unique et determine par le mouvement primitif; et quelles que soient les forces primitives des molecules, Paxe mene par le centre de gravite de la masse fluide, et par rapport auquel le moment des forces etait un maximum a Porigine, devient Paxe de rotation." Farther on, he states : " il est ne- Y 242 NOTES ON LECTURE V. cessaire pour la stability de l'equilibre des mers, que leur densite soit plus petite que la moyenne densite de la terre." Syst. du M. Livr. iv. Ch. 8. pp. 259 sq. Connecting these principles with what Frisi has de- monstrated, respecting the Rotation of Bodies round a Moveable axis, {Opp. Tom. ii. p. 134.,) we may suppose, that the assumption of a permanent axis was, in the case of our planet, not the immediate result of the agency at the Creation, but the last of a series of changes, which were accompanied by oscillations in the external fluid, producing in their turn their due effect on the several circumstances of rotation. According to this view, it is possible to connect the expressions in the Second verse, with principles purely mechanical, as we have before traced in them a reference to physiological agencies, (supr. pp. 1 14 sqq.,) and to suppose — that impulse incon- sistent with equilibrium having been at first imparted to the earth, disturbances took place in the fluid mass which enveloped it, causing successive irruptions and repeats of the waters, and terminating in the assumption of its present spheroidal figure. It may, perhaps, impart some light to the mysterious notices of the Second verse, to read in the 1PQ1 inn, the "Jl^rr, and the DDrno, allusions to the events which marked the foregoing series, by many of which, joined to the action of primeval forces, the disturbance of or- ganic nature (Cuvier, Essay etc. sub fin.) may have been effected. Nor does this view appear to me to derogate from the notion of Creative Power, as already laid down. Once matter had received its development, these very events, apparently chaotic, may have been employed by the Creator as the fittest instruments, to prepare our planet for the reception of its present races of inhabitants. NOTES ON LECTURE V. 243 Note (40). — See Laplace, ubi sujpr. Ch. 8. p. 256. Newton, Principia, Lib. iii. prop. 19. (41). — See Lect. iii. Page 71 etc. (42).— See Laplace, ubi supra, pp. 260—3. APPENDIX. APPENDIX. [Vid. Notes ; (15) Lect. iii. (21) (30) Lect. v. pp. 178. 225. 236.] The question has been much agitated respecting the degree of information derivable from the Scriptures of the Old Testament on the vital doctrine of Christianity, the plurality of Persons in the Godhead ; and without proceeding the length of asserting, that the Trinitarian belief was distinctly announced, it may furnish matter of interesting inquiry to examine into the grounds we have for stating that it was closely interwoven with, and was virtually announced in, the doctrines of the prior dispensations. The reference contained in the C3>n^K mi has been already examined into, and the grounds have been stated, on which the Author of the preceding Lectures has ventured to dissent from those Critics, who have supposed it to have been designative of the AO'ros (See Lect. v. pp. 124. 130. Notes (21) (29) ). He can- not but think, that the view he entertains as to the meaning of the ni"l in Genes, i. 2. introduces a much greater distinctness of reference into the Jewish Record as to the Christian doctrine, than can possibly arise from the former supposition. It is now proposed to extend this inquiry to the farther details connected with it. ..first, as to the validness of the inference deduced from the construction of O'n^* (p- ISO).. .secondly, as to the connection which is stated (p. 67) to subsist be- 248 APPENDIX. tween the Evangelist's expressions (S. John i. 1.) and those of the Jewish Lawgiver. The extent of the in- vestigation to which the subject has led, has rendered it expedient to separate it from the body of notes, and to offer it in the present form. The construction of CD'n^J< with verbs, adjectives, and participles, both singular and plural, it retaining under all these changes its reference to the true God, seems so different from any thing that we observe in the case of any other Hebrew noun, that it leads to the supposition of inspired writers' intending something more by it than the mere idiomatic usage of the plural in speaking of distinguished persons or things: and of all the suppositions which can be brought forward to explain this, none appears so satisfactory as that of its double reference, to the plurality of Persons in the Godhead, and their Hypostatical union. The expres- sions of some of the most learned Commentators are precise on this point. Thus Sebastian Minister; " Insinuatur ab exordio scripturae in deo esse et pluralitatem et unitatem, quan- tumlibet Judaei id hie conentur frivole refellere, etc." 'Not. b. Genes, i. Fagius observes, " Mosem in hoc loco usum esse O'n'pN, quo vocabulo ineffabilis Dei poten- tia...significatur. Hoc enim in usu habet Scriptura, at ponat vocem CD'H^X ubi singularis Dei potential et vir- tutis se in aliqua re exerentis mentionem facit." Critic. Sacr. Cap. i. p. 5. To which add his note to Genes, i. 26. in which he concludes..." nos syncerius et verius (Juda?is sc.) interpretabimur, faciamits dictum esse, ut agnoscamus Divinam Naturam in Personarum propri- etatc." The learned Vatablns also remarks, in his note on this passage... that TWyi is used in the plural," ut APPENDIX. 349 significaret (Moses sc.) plures subesse in Deo personas, et Patrem in creatione hominis advocasse in consilium Sapientiam suam, et Virtu tem s. Spiritum." Ibid. p. 17. Now, C3»n^N precedes this ; consequently, what- ever plurality is indicated by the Verb must equally at- tach to the signification of the Noun, with which it is connected in the way of reference. For additional au- thorities, and amongst the more modern Hebraists, the reader is referred to Parkhurst'.s Lexicon, under the head n^H, II. I. To these stands opposed the authority of the very learned Drnsius, who has alleged many reasons (see Not. Maj. in Critt. Sacr. p. 27. as also his treatise en- titled Elohim) for not understanding CD'PlVN »« the Trinitarian sense, that is, as at the same time expres- sing Personal distinction and Unity of Essence. The sum of what he observes is ; that there should be a dis- tinction made between the termination and the sense... the former being admitted to be plural, the latter being re- garded as partaking of both singular and plural, in illus- ration of which he compares it with the Latin usage in the cases Athena;, Salonoe, Theba?, etc. the Hebrew noun expressing one God as they^ respectively one city; that languages also have their distinct usages, ...one expres- sing in the plural what another does in the singular; thus tenebra, rxlnq. thus C=)»n, vita ; to which num- ber he adds CDM^N, Dens, expressed so, as he con- ceives, " ad amplitudinem Divinae majestatis" ; (this is neither more nor less than the 1)23 "]~n of the Hebrew Grammarians, of which frequent mention will occur in the course of our observations ; what lie adds how- ever..." nisi etiam n^N inveniretur".. .constitutes the great difficulty which embarrasses this expositor. Why should this latter be used at any time as expressive of z 1-250 APPENDIX. the Divine Being-, if its plural, used merely " ad ara- plitudinem" and retaining the singular sense exclusively were sufficient ? Have Athenas etc. a singular, as £Z3>n^K ? Are they ever, as. C=J>r6x, connected as sub- jects wilh singular verbs, etc. ? But of this more here- after ; he proceeds- )...Q>r6x understood in the Trinita- rian sense would introduce a plurality into each of the Persons of the Godhead ; Jesus Christ must then be conceived as born of himself, and the Holy Spirit as proceeding from himself... an alternative which he de- nounces in the following terms ; " Sabellii hseresis damnata fuit olim a Patribus, quod Personas in Divi- nitate confunderet. Ab hac non longe absunt isti qui nobis etiam tres Elohim, id est Deos, fabricant." [Crit. Sacr. u bi supr.) The latter doctrine we, as well as the learned com- mentator, disci aim... yet deny that any such conse- quence flows from our conception of the meaning of the Hebrew term. It is plain from this extract, that he confounds the term Person and God, meanings to be kept as distinct as possible, if we wish to derive from it in its full extent the illustration we desire. Those who maintain the plural sense of C3>n^N as to Personal dis- tinction would perhaps be the last to contend, for it in the unscriptural one of the Heretic of Ptolemais. Nor is the objection first alleged of greater weight ; for let us attend to the proof: the Holy Spirit is termed Q»n^ mn> but being also CD>n^N> must be the Spirit of Himself. The merest tyro may perceive the fallacy of this reasoning. ..the change of acceptation in the word CD'H^X, which in the first case refers to the essential union, in the second to the personal distinction, which coexist in the Godhead. Therefore is the Apostle guiltless of blasphemy, when he terms our Lord " the APPENDIX. 2.51 Son of God," and the Holy Spirit " the Spirit oi' God" ( Ephes. iv. 13, 30.); yet what advocate of the truth as it is in Christ would argue on these grounds, that either is not God ? Dismissing these objections for the present, I proceed to such observations on the Biblical usage respecting this term, as may serve to place in a clear light the il- lustration it conveys of our Trinitarian belief. It is manifest, that the principal point to be proved is, the Plurality of its reference. ..that it expresses in some particular sense a number. The Jews, holding as we do the Unity, but not receiving the Plurality, which subsist together in the Trinitarian belief, are forced to recur to grammatical subtilties and Rabbini- cal inventions to explain the coexistence of such con- structions as occur in Genes, i. 1, 26. It is clear how- ever, that if DTI^ can be proved to be essentially plural, the first of these arguments (we say nothing of the latter) falls to the ground; that if ' ; the Elegancy of language" is a sufficient reason for the construction of a Plural noun with Verbs, Adjectives, and Partici- ples in the singular, its connection with them in the plural remains unaccounted for on any known princi- ple ; unless it be maintained with Drusius, that the for- mer construction is determined by the Sense, the latter by the Termination.. .a refinement of syntactical usage to which it would be difficult to find a parallel. The Plural reference of CZPn^N is manifest both from its termination and its construction. Its Singular being supposed m^N, the change necessary to convert this into a Plural noun (Buxtorf, Gr. Hebr. i. 9.) is pre- cisely that effected in the case of D'H^K. Viewing it in reference to its points j...that the Pathach genubah should disappear in the Plural form, (and it does so in *25 c 2 APPENDIX. Ot6n, is in accordance with the Rules of punctuation. Ibid. i. 4. Again, if we examine it with respect to the Status Con- structus, and the changes usually attendant on the addi- tion of the Affix Pronozins, we shall find it subjected to the same laws with Plural forms. These are stated to be, respectively, the assumption of * m instead of the termi- nation CD* , and the excision of the final D. Ibid. if. 3, 7. The reader may compare for examples of the first. Genes, xxiv. 3. 7. 12. 27. 42. 48. Exod. iii. 6. Deut. i. 10. 21. Josh. xxii. 16. Judges ii. 12.; of the second, Genes, xxvii. 20, xxxi. 30. xliii. 23. Exod. viii. 10. x. 7- xxxii. 11. xxxi v. 15. 16. 17. Deut. i. 6. iv. 5. 2 Sam. vii. 23. xxii. 30. Ezra, viii. 23. Isaiah, lxi. 6. Jerem. ii. 19. The foregoing texts will be found to comprise examples of all its cases of connexion with the Affix Pronouns. Let us now examine it as to its syntactical connexion with Verbs, Pronouns, and Participles. The first text we shall allege (omitting for the present the consideration of Genes, i. 26.) is Genes, iii. 22. " And Jehovah Elohim said, Behold, the man is be- come 13DD inKD." In xi. 6. though CD'n^N be wanting, yet the plurality which it expresses is sufficiently at- tested by n!?331 n*ni, vs. sq. In xx. 13. we meet with E3>n^K placed subjectively to the plural verb lym... with no doubt possible to be entertained of its reference to the true God. Our present remarks may tend to prove how unfounded is Sebastian Munster's note on this passage, " Rarissime additur ill i verbum plurale," at least so far as to affect the conclusiveness of our present argument. On referring to xxxi. 53. we find exactly the same construction ; it is connected APPENDIX. %$$ with iBDttf', as also in xxxv. 7. with ^jj, in which in- stance the Targ. Onkel. interprets CDM^N of the angels of God, who appeared to Jacob an evasion not con- fined to this case, but usual amongst the Jewish Expo- sitors, as appears from the Targ. Jonath. Ben JJzziel on Genes, i. 26. Vid. in.fr. The Commentator last mentioned renders the clause Deut. iv. 7., in which it occurs in connexion with CD'n^N, " Cui sic appropin- quant Dii," i. e. literally ... as in Joshua xxiv. 19, — but with no intention, it is to be presumed, of depriving us of the benefit of the text, as it is scarcely probable that Moses would express himself thus whilst referring only to the Idols of the Nations. His evident meaning is, to contrast God's care of his chosen people with the alienation of the latter from his service and his imme- diate regards. The three next texts are similar in the constructions they present ; 1310 ED'Tl EDTlbx (See Parkhurst, Lucid ilTT § iv.) Deut. v. 23. ED>r6K Kin Q'ttHp Josh. xxiv. 19,— to avoid being pressed by the inference from which, the Jewish Grammarians as usual ascribe the use of the plural adjective to the pt^V mNDn, or Elegancy of expression. In 1 Sam. iv. 8. we meet with D'H^K connected with the plural tDHHKn ; and again, with the construction CnVxn DH n^K — words it is true, reported as uttered by the Heathen adversai'ies of Israel, but which it is most natural to suppose were recorded by the Hebrew annalist agree- ably to a phraseology in use amongst his countrymen. The three following, Ps. lviii. 12. Jerem. x. lO.xxxiii. 36, exhibit the same mode of construction. As to the text 2 Sam. vii. 23, in which CDTT^K occurs connected with the plural verb )2bn, the subter- fuges of the Jewish teachers plainly prove the diffi- culties which they experience in reconciling such con- ^54 APPENDIX. structions to their particular views. R. Salomon con- ceives them to refer to Moses and Aaron, but leaves unexplained how he accommodates this to the construc- tion which follows )b nilD^ etc., or to their connection with the preceding verse. The Targ. Jonath. presents another notable invention, (comp. infr. on text Genes. i. 26.,) that of the yn'bw or Messengers going forth from the presence of the Lord ; and Kimchi accounts for it as usual by the *mo "p*r — in the same way as we have seen Drusius refining away the appropriation of Cil^K itself. Such are the principal texts on which we ground our opinion, that the language of the Hebrews contained allusions to the Trinitarian doctrine : nor should we in this review overlook those, which, in speaking of the Divine power, acts, etc. present allusions confirmative of the opinion. Thus in Ps. cxlix. 2, we meet with an exhortation to Israel to rejoice Vtyyn, which, with the text Eccles. xii. 1. "J'N"i11 J"1N "DH, adds much em- phasis to such expressions as that occurring in Malach. i. 6. >3N O'JnN ; however it may be conceived that the 1)2D *T"H is a sufficient explanation of the latter. This argument for the plurality of n>n^K, derived from its construction with other Parts of speech, ac- quires much force when we consider that of others the application of which is sometimes similar. Such a word is C3>3nN the instance particularly al- leged by Robertson in his Clavis Pentateuchi (a), which contains the following passage relative to the present subject, subjoined to § 4. " Hie (sc. Genes, i. 1.) in plurali ponitur O'ri^K Numina, pro numine admodum colendo. Insignis est ilia sermonis Hebraei proprietas, qua pluralis tarn masculinus, quam faemininus, usurpari potest de una re, APPENDIX. 2.5.5 qua? in suo genere magna est et quodammodo excel- lens, ut CD'31N pro domino magno etpotente;" " Nomina pluralia significationem numeri singularis habentia, plerumque ut singularia construuntur, ut hie O'n^N N"in." !• v: T T Now, without objecting to the propriety of the gram- matical canon mentioned in the first of these passages, which is verified by repeated texts in which CDOHK or its variations occur, we object to the reasoning which explains the construction of CD'H^N solely on the prin- ciple of this canon. Its singular m^X may be proved to be always, excepting in cases which affect notour con- clusion, expressive of the true God : piN has no such unique signification, but is applied in its sense of Ruler to God and Man. Now, it will be found as I conceive most generally the case, that the plural of the latter when used ad amplitudinem is subjected to precisely the con- struction of its singular : there exists therefore a dif- ference between the constructions of the one, according as it respects a multitude, or is merely a term of ho- nour; whilst the other, preserving exactly the same re- ference, varies its construction according to no precise law (b). The inference from hence appears plain, that something more than " Numen admodum colendum" is intended to be expressed by the plural of m^X- Now, that such a difference exists may be satisfac- torily proved by a collation of the texts in which O'jnN occurs so connected with verbs, &c. as to afford means of comparison. With this, and the consideration of the primary and proper import of aM^>K we shall ter- minate this head of the present inquiry. The following texts are those which we regard as demonstrative of our position : Genes, xviii. 3. xix. 2. g$6 APPENDIX. xxxix. 16. 19, 20. Exod. iv. 13. xxi. 4. Deut. x. 17. Judges, iii. 25. xiii. 8. xix. 12. 27. 1 Kings, i. 11. 43. 2 Kings, viii. 14. xix. 4. Nehem. viii. 10. x. 30. Ps. viii. 2. xlv. 12. cxxxv. 5. cxxxvi. 2. 3. Isaiah, xix. 4. xxvi. 13. li. 22. Jerem. xxvii. 4. Malach. i. 6. The 23d of these presents the construction £3>3*m nttfp> which is that referred to by Robertson in sup- port of his opinion respecting CD>nVx. It may however be remarked, in the first place, that it is possible to receive DOTH here in a singular sense ; and more par- ticularly so, as it is followed by q^ b\DD> ?y ")^D)> re_ ferring to any one of the Rulers who were destined to afflict Egypt. Agreeably to this sense we find it ren- dered in the authorised Version, " cruel lord." We observe in the second place, that MSS. are not agreed in the reading nttfp CD'ttfp being found in One: Bp. Louth therefore (as the LXX. had already.... *v- gm trx.M$v) exhibits the version in the plural (c) The 24th connects Q>nK with a plural verb, )^yn » but the sense of the former is manifestly plural; this therefore is strictly according to syntactical usage. The 27th (and last) exhibits the construction already referred to, >jn O'inx, the application here being to the Supreme Being. This is in appearance conform- able to that alleged in the case of ESTtVn but only in appearance ; the analogy ceases altogether, un- less an instance can be produced of the first of these nouns being subjected to a Plural construction, in its present case of reference. The same reasoning applies to the 7th, 21st, and 22d of the preceding texts. In the first text, Genes, xviii. 3. it is clear from the punctuation that 0*TN was received as Plural : this con- sists with the number stated to have appeared to Abra- ham ; or, if it be observed from his expressions APPENDIX. 2.J/ "JO'Jtt, "ftyn etc. that the Patriarch addresses them as one, the TiaD *pT is here, as in ch. xxxix. 20., a sa- tisfactory solution of the difficulty. In the 2d (Genes, xix. 2.) ED>j*m occurs in connec- tion with a plural verb, because used in a plural sense. In the 5th its verb is in the singular... nVttf, for a con- trary reason, its reference being to the Supreme God. So also in the 13th (1 Kings, i. 43.) it is connected with the singular verb yton. Compare vs. 11. The construction already remarked, in which OOTN occurs appositively with mn», we meet with in many texts; the 9th, 17th, 18th, are instances... to which may be referred that in the 20th, as also in the 16th (Nehem. viii. 10.) compared with the preceding verse. Inlsa.li.22. both EDM^N and CD»31K occur with the same apposi- tion, and with verbs in the singular. On the contrary, in Jerem. xxvii. 4. the latter is used in a Plural sense ; and the Plural construction is preserved in' vss. 9. ss. because of the reference demanding it. The remaining texts present only instances of its Singular construction, some particular indivi- dual or personage constituting the reference in each case. Thus in the 19th, (the whole Psalm being predictive of the Messiah's kingdom (d),) we read *]>jtn Nin 'D«'«a construction identical with that which precedes, ijn 0^?iy C3>n^N 1KDD vs. 7. the Plural form designating the Divine Person who is the subject of this Prophetic ode. The preceding are nearly the entire number of texts in Scripture from which any thing can be in- ferred respecting the construction of C3>n«, and suf- fice to establish the idiomatic usage of the 1)33 "pi. But we never observe this usage consisting with that A A Q5S APPENDIX. Plural construction, of which so many instances have been alleged in the case of ED>iT?K. This appears most decidedly in the text Genes, i. 26., one on which alone the Trinitarian might repose his ar- gument in behalf of the construction referred to. The ex- pressions are, UniOID 130^3 OIK nW Q'H^K 1DK0... to which are subjoined in vs. 27. JIN CD>nbx N130 10^20 E3*TNn presenting an involution of con- struction, which occasioned no small exercise of their ingenuity on the part of the Hebrew Expositors to ac- count for (e). The Targum of Jonathan Ben Uzziel may serve as an instance of this, which paraphrases the first of these passages as follows : N»DN^D^ " 1DN1 ioy3 NDty svmh pn earn vinntn ooip ywnwoi ED*m, And the Lord said to the Angels who were mi- nistering in his -presence^ {who were created on the se- cond day of the creation of the World,) Let us malce Man. (Compare Targ. on 2 Sam. vii. 23.) Could this writer have read, or understood, Isaiah, xliv. 24 ? We pass from the consideration of the construction of E3»n^>N to that of its import it having been as- sumed that primarily and properly both it and its sin- gular n^H are used to designate the true God. I say primarily to guard against the supposition of any exclusive appropriation of the term to this meaning's being intended. ..examples having been alleged of its application to finite beings, ex. c. Angels, Rulers etc. and even to the false gods of the Heathen, of which three of the above-cited texts, Genes, xxxi. 30. Exod. xxxiv. 15 — 17. 2 Sam. vii. 23. are remarkable in- stances. Of the name rnn* there is never any such ap- plication. It is incommunicably appropriated to the Divine Being : and this circumstance affords some ground for the supposition of those, who conceive that APPENDIX. 259 the terms respectively import, the one the Essence, the other the External relations, of the Creator (/). If this be granted, the same figure of speech may be al- lowed in the case Q>n^K which applies to language in general, the Catachrestic ;... that by which we connect with a particular word, in the way of Metaphor, a sense analogous in a degree more or less remote to its true import. This figure is of very frequent oc- currence in Classical writers ; witness Homer's fartt»g*ieu /3«<7-io$.... Juvenal's Frai diis iratis^... .Virgil's Vir gregis caper: nor is it confined to them, as in the Sacred Writings we meet with such expressions as, The Blood of the grajie, the Daughter of the vine, etc. Yet no one doubts on hearing such, of the legitimate appli- cation of the terms Enjoyment, Husband, Blood, Daughter, which the propriety of language, when not intended to serve a particular purpose, demands. This supposes however, that in the great majority of instances the application of CDTJ^K is such as to justify our terming any other Catachrestical ; this a collation of texts will abundantly evince. Exclusively of those already cited, of which a very few are exceptions to our general rule, far the greater number of passages in Scripture present CD>n^N in the former of these senses : and even of those which are commonly alleged as instances of deviation, the number may be considerably diminished by an at- tentive examination (g). We select the following texts, for the purpose of shewing in how trifling a de- gree they affect the conclusiveness of our general argu- ment. It is used in Genes, xxxi. 30. synonymously with O'D^n in vs. 1 9., the rendering of which, f&tf>t*ftter#, has most probably been transferred by the LXX. and %(JQ APPENDIX. Aquila to the former verse, (Vid. Schleusner in voc. ftoflapct,) in accordance certainly with the sense. In Exod. xxi. 6. the rendering of our authorised version is quite unobjectionable, being in strict ana- logy with the primary meaning. We may remark however the translation of the LXX. xg«T«'gK, II. § 3. from Gusset's Comment. Ling. Hebr. A different interpretation is assigned from the Chaldaic Paraphrase in Munster's note.) Isaiah, xxi. 9. xxxvi. 18, 19, 20. If we add to these texts the following ; Genes, vi. 2. (in which however we may observe, that the version of Symmachus, Ivwrrivwrm, and the similar one of the LXX. are disputed), Numb. xxv. 2. 1. Kings, xi. 8. Daniel, iii. 18. M ...we possess nearly the entire of those in which the Plural form occurs in any other sense, than that of the Divine Being. Most of them we have found imposed according to a strictly analo- gical rule. As to the singular form mV*t...it has been conjee- APPENDIX. 261 tured (//) that it was confined to the Poetical li- terature of the Jews ; consequently that E3>nta is the proper word in which to seek for the true sense ex- pressed by the appellation... having been the one in com- mon use amongst them. An examination of the texts in which the former occurs, in number 57, of which 4>1 are to be found in the Book of Job, 4 in the Psalms, 1 in the Proverbs, and 7 in the Prophetical, appears to render this opinion very probable. The only instances of its occurring in the Pentateuch are those in Deut. xxxii, 15. 17. and a special reason may be assigned for its use in these texts, independently of the style of the composition, namely, to contrast with the strange gods (vss. 16. 17.) to whose worship Israel had apostatised. The remaining text is 2 Chron. xxvii. 15. n)bn is used therein to express One god, as its Plural is to express Many, according to the idolatrous conceptions of the speakers. Thus OD'n^K fdii vestri, Munst.) in the last clause of the verse (z). From those several particulars therefore combined, viz. the primary and proper application of m^K and its plural to designate the Divine Being ; the more frequent occurrence of the latter, affording grounds for suppos- ing that in some particular respect it was calculated to express that idea with more fulness and accuracy; from the variations in its construction, whilst preserving a uniformity of reference to the One True God, so en- tirely distinct from the case of other nouns, in which a change in the former will be found always accompanied by one in the latter; we seem authorised in drawing the conclusion, that a meaning of an important nature is involved in 0>n^K...one not limited to the relations of the Creator to his Universe, but extending to the 262 APPENDIX. most vital of Christian doctrines, and the subliniest of Christian mysteries. The preceding details lead us to the consideration of the subject adverted to in Lecture iii. p. 67. namely, the connexion between John,' i, 1 sq. and the Mosaical account of Creation by the Elohim ; for if it be granted as sufficiently proved, that a plurality of Per- sons is implied by this term, it only remains to be in- quired into, how far Scripture authorises the belief that the Divine and Pre-existent Word was one of them. Let us at present confine ourselves to the first chap- ter of Genesis. We are not, it is true, presented with any positive declaration in this of the agency of the AOr02 in creation ; yet that there is an implication of that agency, the words of the Evangelist very plainly indicate. It is very generally admitted that his intro- ductory expression h u^ is not only the translation of, but bears reference to the same period with, the Hebrew rvt£WO ; and the 2d verse, announcing dis- tinctly the creation of All things by the Word, is a decisive proof, that we are to seek in that Record which is especially appropriated to the history of the demiurgic period, some attestation of the doctrine to be afterwards more explicitly revealed. 'E> a^xy [cum primum rerum universitas cccpit creari, Grot, in loc.) wuvtx ?>i aCirou lytviro, (whence Philo. 2*' ov s i^vjAtovgyuro^ speaking of the Aa'yej, Alleg. i. 44. B, with which compare his expressions, rev B-itov Xoyov rh txvtu. 2c<>(r j ttsjV#i/'n*, de COSMOp. Mos. vol. i. p. 12. Ed. Pfeiffer.,) a doctrine further attested in APPENDIX. £63 I Cor. viii. 6. Ephes. iii. 9. Coloss. i. 16. Hebr. i. 2, 10. xiii. 10, 11. Nor is St. John to be regarded as the only one of the Evangelists who uses the term (Ao'yss) in this sense, though from the evident scope of his Gospel, which points decidedly to the cir- cumstances under which it was written, its Personal ac- ceptation is particularly his;. ..for the words vTr^irut roZ *oyov in Luke i. 2. admit of the same construction, " Ministers of the Word". ..of Christ, an interpretation which seems not inferior to the ordinary one, in point either of clearness or precision (k). Now, independently of the argument founded on the plural sense of Elohim, it appears reasonable to con- clude, that the introduction of each one of the demi- urgic details by the phrase CDM^N "IDK'1, illustrates this doctrine, and receives in return from it a sense peculiar- ly emphatic. Here we have announced to us the constant interference of the Divine Word ; are we to suppose the expression merely subservient to the symmetry of the detail, and as devoid of real meaning as such pleonastic forms usually are, and not rather as intended to shew the all-powerful efficiency of the Aiycq in material creation ? In confirmation of which we may observe, that the phrase "iBN'l has been in many cases paraphrased by the Jewish Expositors in such terms, as to present us with something more than the mere transmission of speech, or the an- nouncement of a Fiat. Indeed in frequent instances their language is so emphatical in this respect, as to evidence as strongly as expressions can the universal prevalence of this conception. Examples of this will shortly be alleged, not with the intent of attributing to the words of Rabbinical com- mentators an importance not their own, but with the view of ascertaining the extent to which this opinion <264> APPENDIX. had attained amongst them ; the grounds of which must be sought for elsewhere than in those vain imagi- nations, with which they have so frequently perverted Scripture. The doctrine of the Targumists of the »H K^Q'O was one, which, together with the Gnosti- cal tenet of the A«y«?, must be regarded as primarily founded in a right acceptation of Scripture, With reference to both these, more particularly the latter, the words of the Evangelist are particularly emphatic. He selects a term in common use amongst the Haeresiarchs of his day, for the purpose of exhibit- ing its true meaning. That meaning he connects with the Jewish Scriptures from their very outset; he at- tributes Creation to the same Divine Person, who af- terwards " became flesh" and introduced a spiritual dispensation, "dwelling amongst men." Yet St. John would never have allowed it a place in his Gospel, had not the term been sanctioned by higher authority, — even that of the Scripture itself. He found a selection ready to his hand. ..and has con- tinued it. ..of a word which expresses, as strongly as human language admits, the union which subsists be- tween the first and second Persons of the Holy Trinity. Reason, which is one of its significations, is not more allied to the mind of which it is a faculty, nor language, which is another, to the thought which it reveals, than He, in whom " is all the fulness of the Godhead"... " the only begotten"... to the Father, whose " image" he is declared to be. The Hebrew and Chaldaic terms therefore, as well as their Greek representative, are used (so to speak) anthropopathically ; and when we trace the analogy which has led to these denominations, we state it merely as such, without referring to a Mode of union beyond our faculties to conceive. APPENDIX. c 2§5 It has become the more necessary to enlarge on this point, as a plausible opinion has been adopted by some Critics, that, according to the usage of the Hebrews, the Abstract is here put for the Concrete, and that thus the Alyog (in John, i. 1. H.) is applied as designative of Christ in the sense of " a Teacher of the human race ;"...a refinement of interpretation which goes far, as I conceive, to deprive us of the benefit of this Scrip- ture in proving the Deity of the Aoyog, by interfering with the true analogy of the term, and the argument derivable from it. Vid. Schleusn> Lexif. in voc. hoy. § 18. The question however of the Personality of the Ao' y «s comes not so much within the scope of the present inquiry (/), as the possibility of inferring from the Jewish Scrip- tures, and the Record of Creation in particular, his existence h *g#»j a doctrine which in truth compre- hends the former. As yet this argument has been founded on the plural sense of OM^K, as well as on the improbability of the phrase "1QNM being limited to the mere announcement of a Fiat; and it remains now to be considered whether these arguments may not de- rive additional force from the concurrent testimonies of other Scriptures, and the Jewish Teachers. There ap- pears sufficient to convince us, that the mn> ")m of the former and the »H K")D>B of the latter, were assigned in frequent instances a Personality and a Divine power, which it is difficult to account for by any idiomatic usage... any thing but direct revelation, and the traces which remained of it after its true conception had been extinct (m). The following texts have been selected for particular examination; Genes, i. 26. iii. 22. xv. 1. 2. 4. 5. 1 Sam. iii. 7. 19. xv. 10. 1 Kings, xiii. 9. 17. xix. 9. Ps. ex. 1. Isaiah, i. 14. xlv. 17. QtiQ APPENDIX. The importance of the first of these texts is heightened by viewing it in connexion with the preced- ing verse, commencing as usual, "IBNM etc. of which the Targ. Jonath. B. Uzz. affords the absurd exposition mentioned above. The Targ. Hierosol. paraphrases the next verse K*ia»1 etc. by £=HK D* *n *On'» tflHl n'niD"D> And the Word of the Lord created Man in His likeness, etc. expressing thus as plainly as language can the meaning attached to -)DK>). Equally strong are the expressions in the Paraphrase of iii. 22. mil' lONM etc., namely n»131 OTNNn tSff?K 'H KID'O "IDKI, And the Word of the Lord Godsaid, Lo ! Adam whom I have cre- ated etc. Targ. Hierosol. In the next text, Genes, xv. 1, the personality of the -QT is plainly expressed in the Original and the Paraphrases; Orig. After these things the Word of the Lord (mil' "D*T) came unto Abram, saying, Fear not Abram: I am thy shield, etc. fllPl CD-DN by » ED*1p \0 nani CDjns (Targ. Hierosol.) The Woi-d of prophecy was from bejore the Loi'd to Abram, etc. "jb Dlpn >"1D>D (Onkclos), my Word (will be) strength to thee ; Dnn DID ( Targ. Hierosol. J, A re- ward (and) shield. The Personal reference which the first of these expresses is continued in the Targ. OnJcel. on vs. 6, as is plain from the paraphrase »H fcnD'DD |*Q»ni, And he believed in the Word of the Lord. In 1 Sam. iii. 7. the mn> "DT is (cf. supr. text, prec.) represented in the Targ. Jonath. by »1 n«ni CD^HD (cf. text. xv. 1 0. 1 Kings, xiii. 9. 17. 18.), words which appear to have a signification altogether analogous, as the second clause of vs. 19 in the same chapter is expressed, nnyon n»n *n NnD'BI, And the Word of the Lord was (in sustenfationem ejus) his support. The text referred to above, 1 Kings, xiii. 18., is remarkable from its relat- ing the ministry of the "\vblS, which we may regard APPENDIX. 267 consistently with the narrative as the nin' "JN^D of the Old Testament, esteemed by the most learned Com- mentators to be designative of our Saviour (Comp. Mr. Townsend's New Testament arranged etc. Ch. i. § 2. Not. (g)); an opinion expressly countenanced by the Prophet Malachi, who denominates him JVOfl *1N^0> The Angel of the Covenant, Ch. iii. vs. 1. from which passage it is evident that the adjunct HW, however it may aid us in proving the Divinity of our Lord, is not necessary to fix "]N^O to this signification. Again ; in ch. xix. vs. 9. we observe the Word per- sonally communicating with Elijah ; KHfV in nam *")BN>1 vbx. ..which with the ordinary change to NDJHD *H is preserved in the Paraphr. Chald. The well-known text Ps. ex. 1., which commences a series of predictions relative to the Messiah's kingdom, is paraphrased in the Chald. thus; rm»>On » "IOX, \\T\ >r\> urxwH, The Lord said by his Word that he will appoint me rtder. The Translation has it in verbo suo : but in the manner here expressed, it is conceived the agency of the Memra appears better defined ; one more- over, which is independent of the temporal applica- tion of the promise (namely, to David) in the Para- phrase. The passages which have been selected from Isaiah are perhaps more conclusive on this subject than any as yet adverted to : a circumstance to be naturally expected from a prophet, whose views of the nature, character, and office of our Lord were so distinct; and were expressed with the same accuracy that they were conceived. The 17th verse of the 45th Chapter commences thus mm JN2MJ ^Ottf>, the spiritual reference of which to the Redemption purchased by Christ is placed be- yond all doubt by the phrases employed ED'D^ty and 268 APPENDIX. 1? >0^iy iy (See Bishop Louth's Note in loc). Now, what is the language of the Paraph rast ? expressly such as attributes this Eternal salvation to the Memra... N'Bty tp-HD »1 N")D>Q3 pnsn* bltlW*, Israel is re- deemed by the Word of the Lord with Redemption to ever- lasting. What plainer evidence can there be than this, of the persuasion which existed amongst the Jews, of the inherence of Divine prerogative in the Memra ? In accordance with which, we meet with him express- ing abhorrence of the ceremonial observances of his degenerate people in the Paraphr. Ch. i. vs. 13. nD'O pm pSPhplDI, And your solemn festivals my Word abhors: it is Jehovah who speaks; comp. vs. 11. These texts, to which it would not be difficult to add many others, sufficiently prove, that the nVT "Q*T, the "JN^ft, the *»*? NtO'B (with perhaps the KOjnD, and the HN133 CDiDD, to be received as variations of expres- sion of the same leading idea... the latter particularly de- signative of him" to whom give all the Prophets wit- ness" (Acts, x. 43.),) and the Ao'ya? roZ &iev (Revel, xix. 13.) are referrible to one and the same Person, whose acts and attributes are those of the Divine nature ; and that we claim not for the first Chapter of the Pentateuch a too great latitude of meaning, when we assert, that in the repeated announcement of the Divine fiat in the work of Creation, indicating the extent of his agency throughout all the parts of this Universe, we are to re- gard the enumeration of the Persons of the Godhead as completed (»). (a). Edit. Kinghorn, 1824. He admits the Plurality of C3»nVK: " Nomen plurale a sing. n^N; apparently however in APPENDIX. 269 Drusius' sense..." quoad terminationem." This is followed by an Arabic derivation, in which he stands as opposed to Bp. Horsley's opinion (Biblical Criticism, Vol. i. pp. 21 sq.), as to that of Cocceius and the followers of Hutchinson. Vid. Cove- nant of the Cherubim, pp. 177 sq. Data etc. pp. 198. 247. (b). We observe however, that the last Editor of the " Cla- vis" has subjoined in a note..." Sed propter constructionem singularem hujus nominis, cum adjectivis, participiis, et verbis pluralibus, aliis aliter visum est." Then follows a citation of texts, all of which have been referred to in the preceding Dis- sertation, pp. 252 ss " E quibuslocis, cum aliis ejusmodi, eruditi multi putarant, hoc nomen adhiberi de Deo vero, ad insinuandum personarum divinarum pluralitatem." Compare Jewish Expositor, Vol. xi. p. 179. Bp. Horsley extends the principle of its construction farther even than this, conceiving that the whole doctrine of the Trinity is " concentred and wound up" in this term. Bibl. Crit. ut supr. p. 27- The opinion of the learned Grotius was, that the Singular construction of CD'ilVx is an " ellipsis regentis," which is con- troverted by Cocceius in his Lexic. ubi supr., a warm sup- porter of the Trinitarian view. " Plurale" (he adds) " non pos- sumus sine mysterio, sive recordatione mysterii trium, qui sunt unum, cui significando aptissimum est, et sine cujus intuitu insolens foret, exaudire usurpatur evs-iu^a? ut notet to B-itov numen, sive tres personas divinas ; vel v7foo-txtix,2^, ut notet aliquam aut certain personam divinam, indefinite aut definite." Comp. supr. p. 250. The texts which he alleges in addition to those mentioned in the preceding Appendix, are, Isaiah, vi. 8. lxvi. 5. Ezek. xxi. 10. 16. Hos. xii. 5., and Hos. xii. 1. (Vulg. xi. 12.) Prov. ix. 10. xxx. iii. Dan. vii. 18. for analogous usages in the cases ED'tlHp and pyty. Of the latter no doubt can be entertained; the first is not so generally received as an appellative of the Divine Being. !^70 APPENDIX. (c). See another solution of this difficulty, it' it can be termed so, in the Bibl. Crit. p. 26. We remark at the same time that the reference of tD'JTK to *T> proposed therein ap- pears somewhat forced. It is alleged to supersede a rule of the Jewish Grammarians, of which the Text of Scripture pre- sents us with numerous instances...that contended for in the case of EDM^X by Drusius. (d). " Tam secundum Hebraeos quam Christianos hie Psalmus agit de Meschia, etiam si quibusdam videatur expo- nendus de Salomone, qui typus fuit Christi." Seb. Munst. Prcef. ad Not. Ps. xlv. See the former part of this note, and the Exclusive application to the Messiah, insisted on at large in Four Sermons of the late Bp. Horsley, Vol. i. pp. 81—171- (e). " Premit hie locus mirum in modum perfidos Judaeos, et varia adferunt expositionum commenta. Nam sunt qui Deum cum angelis dicunt habuisse sermonem. Alii asserunt Deum cum seipso locutum, more illorum qui summis funguntur officiis, qui plurali numero loquuntur de seipsis. Autor hbn Nizahon miris sannis hie deridet Christum nostrum. Moses Gerundensis ait Deum locutum cum terra, quod scilicet terra produceret corpus hominis, ipse vero daret spiritum. Et quod sequitur : in imagine nostra : referendum quoque sit ad Deum et ad terrain. Sed mox sequitur quod Judaeorum confundit er- rorem : in imagine Dei creavit eum : non scribitur ibi, in ' imagine terras fecit eum." S. Munst. Not. m. Gen. i. 26. Compare with the Second of these Expositions the Obser- vations of the learned Prelate above-mentioned, in the First Volume of his Biblical Criticism, pp. 25 ss. (f). Thus Fagius in Crit. Sacr. i. 5. cited already in p. 248. This conception was also that of Abarbanel ; and has been derived from him, and defended by Bp. Horsley, ubi supr. pp. 43 ss. (g). Compare Parkhurst, Lexic. nV«- II- 3- on the fol- lowing texts; Exod. xxi. 6. xxii. 8. 9. 28. 1 Sam. ii- 25. Ps. lxxxii. 1. 6. exxxviii. 1. with Horsley, ubi supr. pp. 47—53- APPENDIX. 271 (k). Horsley, Dissertation on the Names Eloah and Elo- him, p. 4-3. (i). It has been supposed in this part of the inquiry, that the forms n^>K and ni^N are identical. This is evident from the Plural CD^N, which is equally referrible to both,. ..the • v: Cholem of the Penultima, excepting a very few instances, re- maining in the Plural (Buxt. Ubi. Supr. i. 9.). Indeed, MSS. very often vacillate between the two forms ; of which the text above-cited Deut. xxxii, 17- affords an instance, several read- ing m^N. Hence Punctuists seem very generally agreed on their identity. Vid. Buxt. Lexic. in fi^K- The distinction seems to have been introduced by Divines of the Hutchinsonian School, to favour their peculiar views as to the Etymon of 0»it^K- See these doctrines laid down in Parkhurst, Ubi supr. II. ink. and their validity examined in Bp. Horsley 's Dissertation, pp. 20 — 53. (Jc). Compare Acts, xx. 32. with Apoc. i. 2. xix. 3. It should be observed that Hammond (Not. Luke, i. 2.) inclines to the contrary opinion. Doddridge and Witsius leave the question in doubt. Whitby is adverse. Connecting however the texts already cited, with the opinions known to have ex- isted amongst the Jewish writers relative to the Word, the argument of Archdeacon Nares grounded on the force of the term v^v^m in Luke i. 2. appears to have the greater weight. See his Veracity of the Evangelists, pp. 40 ss. 2d Edit. Michaelis, it is true, is also opposed to the Personal accepta- tion of xiyog in this text... indeed in every part of Scrip- ture, excepting the writings of St. John. He extends this opinion so far as to suppose, that the word was borrowed by this Evangelist exclusively from the Gnostics, for the purpose of combating the error of Cerinthus respecting the diversity of the fievoyivvis and the xlyog ( Introduction etc. C. vii. $ 3.). It appears however hardly probable, that the inspired writer would disfigure his system of Divine truth with language de- %%2 APPENDIX. rived solely from the Zoroastrian philosophy... the source to which this writer traces the Gnostical nomenclature... had not there been a common bond of union, existing in the Records of Scripture itself, and transmitted from thence to its earliest Commentators. Such is the doctrine of the Memra ; than the Personal reference of which, notwithstanding the objec- tions of the learned Critic, amongst the Targumists, nothing can be clearer. Comp Not. (m) infr. It is true, this opinion may be carried too far ; and many Scrip- tural texts which ascribe efficacy to the Dabar Jehovah, may be overstrained into a reference to the Personal Word. Of this the text Ps. xxxiii. 6. mentioned in p. 225. is an instance. We agree with Michaelis in his opinion, that the Figurative sense is much less suitableto.it than the" Literal; that the Dabar and the Ruah are to be interpreted therein simply as the expressions of the Divine Fiat. Cf. supr. Note (21) Lect, v. (I). See the Socinian interpretation of the introductory verses of St. John's Gospel ably refuted by Beza, Glassius, and Lucas Brugensis, in the Synops. Critic. 114-8. 50. and amongst Modern writers, by those mentioned in Mr. Towns- end's valuable Note on John, i. 1. in his Neiv Testament ar- ranged etc. Vol. I. p. 25. to which may be added the names of Wardlaw (Discourses on the Principal points of the Soci- nian controversy, pp. 61 ss. Note C. p. 413.) and of the pious and learned Doddridge; Theological Lectures, Propp. cxxvi. cxxvii. Expositor, Sect. ii. Notes, a. b. c. withjhe au- thorities referred to. An article of considerable length has also been devoted to this important question by Archbishop Magee in his admira- ble work On Atonement and Sacrifice, the careful perusal of which is recommended to the Theological student. See Note, No. I, on the words iavrbv fa&wm, Philipp. ii. 7. and the Treatises enumerated in p. 79. ibid. In truth, to a candid reader of Scripture the use of the words ?v and &« in the first and third verses create no small difficulty, unless explained by the Pre-existence, and the Divine Nature, APPENDIX. 273 of the AOros. The most obvious interpretation of the second is, that it indicates an Efficient Cause : the questions then na- turally arise ; could such, at the period of Creation have been aught less than Divine ? or is the supposition compatible with the plainest declarations of Scripture ? Compare Isaiah, xliv. 24. with Hebr. i. 2. Abp. Magee, tibi supr. pp. 72 ss. It cannot but be observed also, that (granting even the utility of such illustrations to a certain extent) much confusion has arisen on this important point, from efforts to approximate the Christian doctrine to the tenets of ancient philosophers. Thus Tertullian, Adv. Gent. ; " Apud vestros quoque sapien- tes xiyov, id est, Sermonem atque Rationem, constat artifi- cem videri universitatis ;" the opinion to which he refers being that of Zeno, as expressed in his Treatise m(t evs-U? mentioned by Laertius. Thus also Gregor. Episc. Neocsesar... xiyoi;, $vva,/*t<; t?j o'ajj? xrliriwt; iromTtm in the same way as the Mosaic ni"» has been designated as a Kvxpn 2icc7r*etrTiXK. Grot, in Critic. Sacr. (m). Michaelis remarks (Note (k) in Ch. viii. $ 3.) that E3ltfil also, " the Name," is frequently represented by N")D»Q in the Chaldee Paraphrase. Now, this appears to militate against his view of the Constant acceptation of the latter in the Targumin ; and that by reason of the circumstance adverted to in his Note, namely, the use of E3J£>n to denote the Supreme Being. He refers also to Isaiah, xxvi. 4, and the Targ. Jonath. thereon ; an examination of which compared with xlv. 17. re- ferred to above, p. 267., will be found still more adverse to his opinion. The literal translation of the Paraphrase on the first of these texts is; Trust in the Word of the Lordjbr an age, and for ages of ages: so shall ye be saved through the fearful Word of the Lord, the Mighty of ages. Here we have the Divine Attributes predicated of the Mem- ra : of N^>rn (which I regard as the emphatic form of ^>,YT) there can be no doubt; and perhaps the K'OVy D'pn which ends the verse, and corresponds to the 0>oViy *113f of the cc 274 APPENDIX. text, may as justly be referred to the same, not »*T alone. If so, it is impossible not to recognise in this appellation of, the Paraphrasts the Being who existed h «§#»)... who is " Mighty to save". ..the "1134 bi< of the Prophet, ix. 6. («). Compare the quotation from St. Augustine in p. 227. rrinted at the University Pre«e, by R. GR AISBERRY.