It will probably be objected to this theory, that it is unjust to make animals suffer for man’s apostasy, especially before it took place.
I do not see why such suffering is any more unjust before than after man’s transgression; and we know that they do now suffer in consequence of his sin. But this suffering isnot to be regarded in the light of punishment; and if it can only be proved that benevolence predominates in the condition of animals, notwithstanding their sufferings, divine justice and benevolence are vindicated; and can there be any doubt that such is the fact? Death is not necessarily an evil to any animals. It may be a great blessing, by removing them to a higher state of existence. In the case of the inferior animals, it is but a small drawback upon the pleasure of life, even though they do not exist hereafter. We have endeavored to show that even the existence of carnivorous races is a benevolent provision. That animals are placed in an inferior condition, in consequence of man’s apostasy, is no more cause of complaint than that man is made a little lower than the angels.
Another objection to these views is, that it makes the effect precede the cause; for it-represents the pre-Adamic animals as dying in consequence of man’s transgression.
I do not maintain that the death of animals, before or after Adam, was the direct and natural consequence of his transgression. Nay, I am endeavoring to show directly the contrary. But, then, the certainty of man’s apostasy might have been the grand reason in the divine mind for giving to the world its present constitution, and subjecting animals to death. Not that God altered his plan upon a prospective knowledge that man would sin; but he made this plan originally, that is from eternity, with that event in view, and he made it different from what it would have been, if such an event had not been certain. If this be true, then was there a connection between man’s sin and the death that reigned before his existence; though, in strict accuracy of speech, one can hardly be called the cause of the other. And yet it was, as I maintain, occasioned by man’s sin, and shows the wide-spread influence of that occurrence, even more strikingly than the ordinary theory of death.
A third objection to this theory is, that it represents God as putting man in a place of punishment before he had sinned; or, at least, in a state where death was the universal law, and where he must die, though he should keep the law of God.
There are three suppositions, either of which will meet this difficulty.
We may suppose, with Jeremy Taylor, that the death threatened to Adam consisted, not in going out of the world, but in the manner of going. If he had not sinned, the exchange of worlds would have been without fear or suffering, and an object of desire rather than aversion. Christ has not secured to the believer the privilege of an earthly immortality, but has taken away from a removal out of the world all that constitutes death.
Or we may suppose, with Dr. J. Pye Smith, that, while man should continue to keep the divine law, he would be secured from that tendency to decay and dissolution, which was the common lot of all other creatures, until the time should come for his removal, without suffering or dread, to a higher state of existence. And that a means of immunity from death existed in the garden of Eden we learn from the Scriptures. For there stood the tree of life, whose fruit had the power to make man live forever, and, therefore, he must be banished from the spot where it grew.
Or, finally, we may suppose that God fitted up for man some balmy spot, where neither decay nor death could enter, and where every thing was adapted for a being of perfect holiness and happiness. His privilege was to dwell there, so long as he could preserve his innocence, but no longer. And surely this supposition seems to accord with the description of the garden of Eden, man’s first dwelling-place. There every thing seems to have been adapted to his happiness; but sin drove him out among the thorns and thistles, and acherubim and a flaming sword forbade his return to the tree of life.
Either of these suppositions will meet the difficulty suggested by the objection; or they may all be combined consistently. Let us now look at some of the advantages of the third theory above advanced.
In the first place, it satisfactorily harmonizes revelation with geology, physiology, and experience, on the subject of death. It agrees with physiology and experience in representing death to be a law of organic being on the globe. Yet it accords with revelation, in showing how this law may be a result of man’s apostasy; and with geology, also, in showing how death might have reigned over animals and plants before man’s existence. To remove so many apparent discrepancies is surely a presumption in favor of any theory.
In the second place, the fundamental principle of this theory is also a fundamental principle of natural and revealed theology, viz., that all events in this world entered originally into the plan or purpose of the Deity. To suppose that God made the world without a plan previously determined upon, is to make him less wise than a human architect, who would be charged with great folly to attempt building even a house without a plan. And to suppose that plan not to extend to every event, is to rob God of his infinite attributes.
In the third place, this theory falls in with the common interpretation of Scripture, which refers the whole system of suffering, decay, and death in this world to man’s apostasy. And although the general reception of any exegesis of Scripture does not prove it to be correct, it is certainly gratifying when a thorough examination proves the obvious sense of a passage to be the true one. For to disturb the popular interpretation is, with many, equivalent to a denial of Scripture.
In the fourth place, this theory shows us the infinite skill and benevolence of Jehovah in educing good from evil.
The free agency of man was an object in the highest degree desirable. Yet such a character made him liable to fall; and God knew that he would fall. To human sagacity that act would seem to seal up his fate forever. But infinite wisdom saw that the case was not hopeless. It placed him in a state of temporal suffering and temporal death, that he might still have a chance of escaping eternal suffering and eternal death. The discipline of such a world was eminently adapted to restore his lost purity, and death was probably the only means by which a fallen being could pass to a higher state of existence. That discipline, indeed, if rightly improved, would probably fit him for a higher degree of holiness and happiness than if he had never sinned; so as to make true the paradoxical sentiment of the poet,—
“Death gives us more than was in Eden lost.”
Misimproved, this discipline would result in an infinite loss, far greater than if man never passed through it. But this is all the fault of man; while all the benefit of a state of probation is the result of God’s infinite wisdom and benevolence.
In the fifth place, this theory relieves us from the absurdity of supposing that God was compelled to alter the plan of creation after man’s apostasy.
The common theory does convey an idea not much different from this. It makes the impression that God was disappointed when man sinned, and being thereby thwarted in his original purpose, he did the best he could by changing his plan, just as men do when some unexpected occurrence interferes with their short-sighted contrivances. Now, such an anthropomorphic view of God is inexcusable in the nineteenth century. It was necessary to use such representationsin the early ages of the world, when pure spiritual ideas were unknown; and hence the Bible describes God as repenting and grieved that he had made man. But with the light of the New Testament and of modern science, we ought to be able to enucleate the true spiritual idea from such descriptions. The theory under consideration does not reduce God to any after-thought expedients, but makes provision for every occurrence in his original plan; and, of course, shows that every event takes place as he would have it, when viewed in its relations to the great system of the universe.
In the sixth place, this theory sheds some light upon the important question, why God permitted the introduction of death into the world.
It is difficult for some persons to conceive why God, when he foresaw Adam’s apostasy, did not change his plan of creation, and exclude so terrible an evil as death. But according to this theory, he permitted it, because it was a necessary part of a great system of restoration, by which the human race might, if not recreant to their true interests, be restored to more than their primeval blessedness. It was not introduced as a mere punishment, but as a necessary means of raising a fallen being into a higher state of life and blessedness; or, if he perversely spurned the offered boon, of sinking him down to the deeper wretchedness which is the just consequence of unrepented sin, without even the sympathy of any part of the created universe.
Finally. This subject throws some light upon that strange mixture of good and evil, which exists in the present world. We have seen, indeed, that benevolence decidedly predominates in all the arrangements of nature; and we are called upon continually to admire the adaptation of external nature to the human constitution. A large portion of our sufferingshere may also be imputed to our own sins, or the sins of others; and these we cannot charge upon God. But, after all, it seems difficult to conceive how even a sinless man could escape a large amount of suffering here; enough, indeed, to make him often sigh for deliverance and for a better state. How many sources of sufferings there are in unhealthy climates, mechanical violence, and chemical agents; in a sterile soil, in the excessive heats of the tropical regions, and extreme cold of high latitudes; in the encroachments and ferocity of the inferior animals; in poisons, mineral, vegetable, and animal; in food unfitted to the digestive and assimilating organs; in the damps and miasms of night; and in the frequent necessity for over-exertion of body and mind! And then, how many hinderances to the exercise of the mental powers, in all the causes that have been mentioned! and how does the soul feel that she is imprisoned in flesh and blood, and her energies cramped, and her vision clouded, by a gross corporeal medium! And thus it is, to a great extent, with all nature, especially animal nature; and I cannot but believe, as already intimated, that Paul had these very things in mind when he said,The whole creation groaneth and travaileth together in pain until now, and waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God; that is, for emancipation from its present depressed and fettered condition. In short, while there is so much in this world to call forth our admiration and gratitude to God, there is enough to make us feel, also, that it is a fallen condition. It is not such a world as infinite benevolence would provide for perfectly holy beings, whom he desired to make perfectly happy, but rather such a world as is adapted for a condition of trial and preparation for a higher state, when both mind and body would be delivered from the fetters that now cramp their exercise.
Now, the theory which I advocate asserts that this peculiarcondition of the world resulted from the divine determination, upon a prospective view of man’s transgression. It may, therefore, be properly regarded as occasioned by man’s transgression, but not in the common meaning attached to that phrase, which is, that, before man’s apostasy, the constitution of the world was different from what it now is, and death did not exist. This theory supposes God to have devised the present peculiar mixed condition of the world, as to good and evil, in eternity, in order to give man an opportunity to rescue himself from the penalty and misery of sin; and in order to introduce those who should do this into a higher state of existence. The plan, therefore, is founded in infinite wisdom and benevolence, while it brings out man’s guilt, and the evil of sin, in appalling distinctness and magnitude.
But, after all, how little idea would a man have of the entire plot of a play, who had heard only a part of the first act! How little could he judge of the bearing of the first scene upon the final development! Yet we are now only in the first act of the great drama of human existence. Death shows us that we shall ere long be introduced into a second act, and affords a presumption that other acts—it may be in an endless series—will succeed, before the whole plot shall have passed before us; and not till then can we be certain what are all the objects to be accomplished by the introduction of sin and death into our world. And if thus early we can catch glimpses of great benefit to result from these evils, what full conviction, that infinite benevolence has planned and consummated the whole, will be forced upon the mind, when the vast panorama of God’s dispensations shall lie spread out in the memory! For that time shall Faith wait, in confident hope that all her doubts and darkness shall be converted into noonday brightness.
THE NOACHIAN DELUGE COMPARED WITH THE GEOLOGICAL DELUGES.
The history of opinions respecting the deluge of Noah is one of the most curious and instructive in the annals of man. In this field, Christians have often broken lances with infidels, and also with one another. The unbeliever has confidently maintained that the Bible history of the deluge is at war with the facts and reasonings of science. Equally confident has been the believer that nature bears strong testimony to its occurrence. Some Christians, however, have asserted, with the infidel, that no trace remains on the face of nature of such an event. And as this is a subject which men are apt to suppose themselves masters of, when they have only skimmed the surface, the contest between these different parties has been severe and protracted. Almost every geological change which the earth has undergone, from its centre to its circumference, has, at one time or another, been ascribed to this deluge. And so plain has this seemed to those who had only a partial view of the facts, that those who doubted it were often denounced as enemies of revelation. But most of these opinions and this dogmatism are now abandoned, because both Nature and Scripture are better understood. And among well-informed geologists, at least, the opinion is almost universal, that there are no facts in their science which can be clearly referred to the Noachian deluge; that is, no traces in natureof that event; and on the other hand, that there is nothing in the Mosaic account of the deluge which would necessarily lead is to expect permanent marks of such a catastrophe within or upon the earth.
If such be the case, you will doubtless inquire, what connection there is between geology and the revealed history of the deluge, and why the subject should be introduced into this series of lectures. I reply, that so recently have correct views been entertained on this subject, and so little understood are they; that they need to be defined and explained. And if the distribution of animals and plants on the globe come within the province of geology, then this science has a very important point of connection with the history of the deluge, as will appear in the sequel. And finally, the history of opinions on this subject is full of instruction to those who undertake to reason on the connection between science and religion. Obviously, then, my first object should be to give a brief history of the views that have been entertained respecting the deluge of Noah, so far as they have been supposed to have any connection with geology.
It is well known, that in the written and unwritten traditions of almost every nation and tribe under heaven, the story of a general deluge has been prominent; and probably, in all these cases, some attempt has been made to explain the manner in which the waters were brought over the land. But most of these reasonings, especially in ancient times, are too absurd to deserve even to be recited. Indeed, it is not till the beginning of the sixteenth century, that we find any discussions on the subject worthy of notice. At that time, some excavations at Verona, in Italy, brought to light many fossil shells, and awakened a question as to their origin. Some maintained that they were onlysimulacra, or resemblancesto animals, but never had a real existence. They were supposed to have been produced by a certain “materia pinguis,” or “fatty matter,” existing in the earth. Others maintained that they were deposited by the deluge of Noah. Such, indeed, was the general opinion; but Fracastoro and a few others maintained that they were once real animals, and could not have been brought into their present condition by the last deluge. For more than three hundred years have these questions been more or less discussed; and though decided many years ago by all geologists, not a few intelligent men still maintain, that petrified shells are mere abortive resemblances of real beings, or that they were deposited by the deluge.
The advocates of the diluvial origin of petrifactions soon found themselves hard pressed with the question, how these relics could be scattered through strata many thousand feet thick, by one transient flood. They, therefore, came to the conclusion, in the words of Woodward, a distinguished cosmogonist of the eighteenth century, that the “whole terrestrial globe was taken to pieces and dissolved at the flood, and the strata settled down from this promiscuous mass, as any earthy sediment from a fluid.” During that century, many works appeared upon cosmogony, defending similar views, by such men as Burnet, Scheuchzer, and Catcott. Some of these works exhibited no little ability, mixed, however, with hypotheses so extravagant that they have ever since been the butt of ridicule. The very title of Burnet’s work cannot but provoke a smile. It is called “The Sacred Theory of the Earth, containing an Account of the Original of the Earth, and of all the general Changes it bath already undergone, or is to undergo, till the Consummation of all Things.” He maintained that the primitive earth was only “an orbicular crust, smooth, regular, and uniform, without mountains and without a sea.” This crustrested on the surface of a watery abyss, and, being heated by the sun, became chinky; and in consequence of the rarefaction of the included vapors, it burst asunder, and fell down into the waters, and so was comminuted and dissolved, while the inhabitants perished. Catcott’s work was confined exclusively to the deluge, and exhibited a good deal of ability. He endeavored to show, that this dissolution of the earth by the deluge was taught in the Scriptures, and his reasoning on that point is a fine example of the state of biblical interpretation in his day. “As there are other texts,” says he, “which mention the dissolution of the earth, it may be proper to cite them. Ps. xlvi. 2.God is our refuge; therefore will we not fear though the earth be removed, [be changed, be quite altered, as it was at the deluge.]God uttered his voice, the earth melted, [flowed, dissolved to atoms.] Again, Job xxviii. 9.He sent his hand[the expansion, his instrument, or the agent by which he worked]against the rock, he overturned the mountains by the roots, he caused the rivers to burst forth from between the rocks, [or broke open the fountains of the abyss.]His eye[symbolically placed for light]saw[passed through, or between]every minute thing, [every-atom, and so dissolved the whole.]He[at last]bound up the waters from weeping, [i. e. from pressing through the shell of the earth, as tears make their way through the orb of the eye; or, as it is related, (Gen. viii. 2,)He stopped the fountains of the abyss and the windows of heaven,]and brought out the light from its hiding-place, [i. e., from the inward parts of the earth, from between every atom where it lay hid, and kept each atom separate from the other, and so the whole in a state of dissolution; his bringing out those parts of the light which caused the dissolution would of course permit the agents to act in their usual way, and so reform the earth.”]—Treatise on the Deluge, p. 43, (London, 1761.)
We can hardly believe at the present day, that a logical and scientific mind, like that of Catcott, could satisfy itself, by such a dreamy exegesis, that the Scriptures teach the earth’s dissolution at the deluge; especially when they so distinctly describe the waters of the deluge, as first rising over the land, and then sinking back to their original position. Still more strange is it how Burnet could have thought it consistent with Scripture to suppose the earth, before the flood, “to have been covered with an orbicular crust, smooth, regular, and uniform, without mountains and without a sea,” when the Bible so distinctly states, as the work of the third day, thatthe waters under the heavens were gathered together unto one place, and the dry land appeared; and thatGod called the dry land earth, and the gathering together of the waters he called seas; and further, that, by the deluge,all the high hills were covered. Yet these men doubtless supposed that, by the views which they advocated, they were defending the Holy Scriptures. Nay, their views were long regarded as exclusively the orthodox views, and opposition to them was considered, for one or two centuries, as virtual opposition to the Bible. Truly, this, in biblical interpretation, was straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel.
It is quite convenient to explain such anomalies in human belief, by referring them to the spirit of the age, or to the want of the light of modern science. But in the present case, we cannot thus easily dispose of the difficulty. For in our own day, we have seen these same absurdities of opinion maintained by a really scientific man, selected to write one of the Bridgewater Treatises, as one of the most learned men in Great Britain. I refer to Rev. William Kirby, evidently a thorough entomologist and a sincere Christian. But he adopts the opinion, not only that there exists a subterranean abyss ofwaters, but a subterranean metropolis of animals, where the huge leviathians, the gigantic saurians, dug out of the rocks by the geologist, still survive; and this he endeavors to prove from the Bible. For this purpose he quotes the passage in Psalms,though thou hast sore broken us in the place of dragons, and covered us with the shadow of death. His exposition of this text is much in the style of that already given from Catcott. Following that writer and Hutchinson, he endeavors to show, by a still more fanciful interpretation, that the phrase “windows of heaven,” in Genesis, means cracks and volcanic rents in the earth, through which air and water rushed inwardly and outwardly with such violence as to tear the crust to pieces. This was the effect of the increasing waters of the deluge; the bringing together of these comminuted particles, so as to form the present strata, was the work of the subsiding waters.
These views will seem very strange to those not familiar with the history of geology. But we shall find their origin, if a few facts be stated respecting what has been called the physico-theological school of writers, that originated with one Hutchinson, in the beginning of the eighteenth century. He was a disciple of the distinguished cosmogonist Woodward. But he attacked the views of his master, as well as those of Sir Isaac Newton on gravitation, in a work which he published in twelve octavo volumes, entitled “Moses’s Principia.” He there maintains that the Scriptures, when rightly understood, contain a complete system of natural philosophy.
This dogma, advocated by Hutchinson with the most intolerant spirit, constitutes the leading peculiarity of the physico-theological school, and has been very widely adopted, and has exerted a most pernicious influence both upon religion and upon science. It is painful, therefore, to find so learnedand excellent a man as Mr. Kirby so deeply imbued with it, so long after its absurdity has been shown again and again. It is devoutly to be wished that the cabalistic dreams of Hutchinsonianism are not to be extensively revived in our day. And, indeed, such is the advanced state of hermeneutical knowledge, that we have little reason to fear it. Nevertheless, its leaven is yet by no means thoroughly purged out from the literary community.
It was one of the settled principles of the physico-theological school, that, since the creation, the earth has undergone no important change beneath the surface, except at the deluge, because it was supposed that the Bible mentions no other event that could produce any important change. Hence all marks of changes in the rocks since their original creation must be referred to the deluge. And especially when it was found that most of the petrifactions in the rocks were of marine origin, not only were they supposed to be the result of the deluge, but a most conclusive proof of that event. And this opinion is even yet very widely received by the Christian world. The argument in its favor, when stated in a popular manner to those not familiar with geology, is indeed quite imposing. For if the land, almost every where, even to the tops of some of its highest mountains, abounds in sea shells, this is just what we should expect, if the sea flowed over those mountains at the deluge. But the moment we come to examine the details respecting marine petrifactions, we see that nothing can be more absurd than to suppose them the result of a transient deluge. Yet this view is maintained in nearly all the popular commentaries of the present day upon Genesis, and in many respectable periodicals. It is taught, therefore, in the Sabbath school and in the family; and the child, as he grows up, is shocked to find the geologist assailingit; and when he finds it false, he is in danger of becoming jealous of the other evidences of Christianity which he has been taught.
Another branch of the modern physico-theological school, embracing men who have read too much on the subject of geology to be able to believe in the dissolution of the globe by the deluge, have adopted a more plausible hypothesis. They suppose that between the creation and the deluge, or in sixteen hundred and fifty-six years, according to the received chronology, all the present fossiliferous rocks of our continents, more than six miles in thickness, were deposited at the bottom of the ocean. By that event, they were raised from beneath the waters, and the continents previously existing sunk down and disappeared; so that the land now inhabited was formerly the ocean’s bed. To prove that such a change took place at the deluge, Granville Penn and Fairholme quote the declaration of God, in Genesis, respecting the flood—I will destroy them, (i. e., men,)and the earth, or with the earth; also the statement of Peter—The world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished. The termsearthandworldmay mean either the solid globe, or the animals and plants upon it. If in these passages they have the latter meaning, then they simply teach that the deluge destroyed the natural life of organic beings. If they have the former meaning, then the inquiry arises, What are we to understand by the destruction here described? It may mean annihilation, or it may imply ruin in some respects. That annihilation did not result from the deluge is evident from the case of men, who suffered only temporal death, and even this was not universal; and we know, also, that the matter of the earth did not perish. We must resort, therefore, to the sacred history to learn how far the destruction extendedThat history seems very plain. There was a rain of forty days, and the fountains of the great deep were broken up; that is, as Professor Stuart happily expresses it, “The ocean overflowed while the rain descended in vast quantities.” The waters gradually rose over the dry land, and after a hundred and fifty days, began to subside, and at the end of a year and a few days they were gone. Such an overflowing could not take place without producing the almost entire destruction of organic life, and making extensive havoc with the soil, especially as a wind assisted in driving these waters from the land. But there is nothing in the narrative that would lead us to suppose either a comminution or dissolution of the earth, or the elevation of the ocean’s bed. The same land which was overflowed is described as again emerging. Indeed, a part of the rivers proceeding out of the garden of Eden are the same as those now existing on the globe. We must then admit that our present continents—certainly the Asiatic,—are the same as the antediluvian, or deny that the account of Eden, in Genesis, is a part of the Bible. The latter alternative is preferred by Penn and Fairholme. Surely such men ought to be cautious how they censure geologists for modifying the meaning of some verses in Genesis, when they thus, without any evidence of its spuriousness, unceremoniously erase so important a passage.
I might add to all this that the facts of geology forbid the idea that our present continents formed the bed of the ocean at so recent a date as that of Noah’s deluge, and that the supposition that all organic remains were deposited during the two thousand years between the six days’ work and the deluge is totally irreconcilable with all correct philosophy. Why, during the time when the fossiliferous rocks were in a course of formation, four or five entirely distinct races ofanimals and plants successively occupied the land and the waters, and passed away in regular order; and these races were so unlike, that they could not have been contemporaneous. Who will maintain that all this took place in the short period of two thousand years? I am sure that no geologist will.
But modern geologists have, until recently, supposed that the traces of Noah’s deluge might still be seen upon the earth’s surface. I say its surface; for none of them imagined those effects could have reached to a great depth. Over a large part of the northern hemisphere they found extensive accumulations of gravel and bowlders, which had been removed often a great distance from their parent rocks, while the ledges beneath were smoothed and striated, obviously by the grating over them of these piles of detritus. How very natural to refer these effects to the agency of currents of water; just such currents as might have resulted from a universal deluge. But the inference was a hasty one For when geologists came to study the phenomena of drift or diluvium, as these accumulations of travelled matter are called, they found that currents of water alone would not explain them all. Some other agency must have been concerned; and the general opinion now is, that drift has been the result of the joint action of water and ice; and nearly all geologists suppose that this action took place before man’s existence on the globe. Some suppose it to have been the result of oceanic currents, while yet our continents were beneath the waters; others think that the northern ocean may have been thrown southerly over the dry land by the elevation of its bed; and others maintain that vast masses of ice may formerly have encircled high latitudes, whose glaciers, melting away, may have driven towards the equator the great quantities of drift andbowlders which have been carried in that direction. In short, it is now found that this is one of the most difficult problems in geology; and while most geologists agree that both ice and water have been concerned in producing the phenomena, the time and manner of their action are not yet very satisfactorily determined. They may have acted at different periods and in divers manners; but all the phenomena could not have been the result of one transient deluge.
From the facts that have now been detailed, it appears that on no subject of science connected with religion have men been more positive and dogmatical than in respect to Noah’s deluge, and that on no subject has there been greater change of opinion. From a belief in the complete destruction and dissolution of the globe by that event, those best qualified to judge now doubt whether it be possible to identify one mark of that event in nature.
I shall now proceed to state, in a more definite form, the views of this subject entertained by the most enlightened judges of its merits at the present day.
In the first place, most of the cases of accumulations of drift, the dispersion of bowlders, and the polish and striæ upon rocks in place, occurred previous to man’s existence upon the globe, and cannot have been the result of Noah’s deluge.
From the arguments for sustaining this position I shall select only a part.
The first is, that the organic remains found in the alluvium considerably above the drift, which always lies below the alluvium, are many of them of extinct species. Whether the genuine drift—a heterogeneous mass of fragments, driven pellmell together—contains any organic relics, is to me very doubtful. But if the stratified deposits subsequentto the drift present us with beings no longer alive on the globe, much more would the drift. Now, the presumption is, that extinct animals and plants belong to a creation anterior to man, especially if they exhibit a tropical character,—as those do which are usually assigned to the drift,—since we have no evidence of a tropical climate in northern latitudes till we get back to a period far anterior to man.
Secondly. No remains of man or his works have been found in drift, nor indeed till we rise almost to the top of the alluvial deposit. Even ancient Armenia has now been examined geologically, with sufficient care to make it almost certain that human remains do not exist there in drift, if drift is found there at all; of which there may be a question.
Thirdly. The agency producing drift must have operated during a vastly longer period than the three hundred and eighty days of Noah’s deluge. It would be easy to show to a geologist that the extensive erosions which are referrible to that agency, and the huge masses of detritus which have been the result, must have demanded centuries, and even decades of years. Nor will any supposed increase of power in the agency explain the results, without admitting a long period for their action.
Fourthly. Water appears to have been the principal agent in the Noachian deluge; but in the production of drift, ice was at least equally concerned.
Finally. The phenomena of deltas, terraces, and ancient sea-beaches, make the period of the drift immensely more remote than the deluge of Noah, since these phenomena are all posterior to the drift period. I need not go into the details of this argument here, since I have drawn them out in my second lecture. But of all the arguments ever adduced to prove the great length of time occupied in geological changes,this—which, so far as the terraces are concerned, has never before, I believe, been adduced—seems to me the most convincing to those who carefully examine the subject.
We may be sure, then, that the commencement of the drift period, and the deluge of Noah, cannot have been synchronous. But the drift agency, connected, as nearly all geologists seem now to be ready to admit, with the vertical movements of continents, may have operated, and undoubtedly has, at various periods, and very possibly, in some parts of the world, long posterior to the period usually called the drift period. I agree, therefore, in opinion with one of the most eminent and judicious of the European geologists, Professor Sedgwick of Cambridge, when he says, “If we have the clearest proofs of great oscillations of sea level, and have a right to make use of them, while we seek to explain some of the latest phenomena of geology, may we not reasonably suppose, that, within the period of human history, similar oscillations have taken place in those parts of Asia which were the cradle of our race, and may have produced that destruction among the early families of men, which is described in our sacred books, and of which so many traditions have been brought down to us through all the streams of authentic history?”—Geology of the Lake District, p. 14.
Secondly. Admitting the deluge to have been universal over the globe, it could not have deposited the fossil remains in the rocks.
This position is too plain to the practical geologist to need a formal argument to sustain it. But there are many intelligent men, who do not see clearly why the remains of marine animals and plants may not be referred to the deluge. And if they could be, then all the demands of the geologist for long periods anterior to man are without foundation. But they cannot be, for the following reasons:—
First. On this supposition the organic remains ought to be confusedly mingled together, since they must have been brought over the land promiscuously by the waters of the deluge; but they are in fact arranged in as much order as the specimens of a well-regulated cabinet. The different rocks that lie above one another do, indeed, contain some species that are common; but the most are peculiar. It is impossible to explain such a fact if they were deposited by the deluge.
Secondly. On this theory, at least, a part of the organic remains ought to correspond with living animals and plants, since the deluge took place so long after the six days of creation. But with the exception of a few species near the top of the series, the fossil species are wholly unlike those now alive.
Thirdly. How, by this theory, can we explain the fact, that there are found in the rocks at least five distinct races of animals and plants, so unlike that they could not have been contemporaries? or for the fact, that most of them are of a highly tropical character? or for the fact, that as we rise higher in the rocks, there is a nearer and nearer approach to existing species?
Fourthly. This theory requires us to admit, that in three hundred and eighty days the waters of the deluge deposited rocks at least six miles in thickness, over half or two thirds of our existing continents; and these rocks made up of hundreds of thick beds, exceedingly unlike one another in composition and organic contents. Will any reasonable man believe this possible without a miracle?
But I need not multiply arguments on this point. It is a theory which no reasonable man can long maintain after studying the subject. And if it be indeed true, that neither in thedrift, nor in the fossiliferous rocks, can we discover any traces of the deluge, then we shall find them nowhere on the globe. But
Thirdly. There are no facts in geology that afford any presumption against the occurrence of the Noachian deluge, but rather the contrary.
The geologist says only, that if any traces of it exist, he cannot distinguish them from the effects of other analogous agencies that have operated on the globe at various periods. Some parts of the globe do not exhibit marks of any powerful aqueous action, such as high northern and southern latitudes do exhibit. But the sacred record, in its account of the access and subsidence of diluvial waters, does not require us to suppose any great degree of violence in their action on the surface; and although currents somewhat powerful must have been the result, yet they may not have existed every where, nor have always left traces of their passage where they did exist. On the other hand, the geologist will admit, as we have already seen, that in the elevation and subsidence of mountains and continents, and in volcanic agency generally, of which geology contains so many examples, we have an adequate cause for extensive, if not universal, deluges; nor can he say how recently this cause may have operated beneath certain oceans, sufficiently to produce the deluge of the Scriptures. So that, in fact, we have in geology a presumption in favor of, rather than against, such a deluge. Nay, some, who have examined Armenia, have thought they found there a deposit which could be referred to the deluge of Noah; but I have no access to any facts on this point.
Fourthly. There are reasons, both in natural history and in the Scriptures, for supposing that the deluge may not have been universal over the globe, but only over the region inhabited by man.
This is a position of no small importance, and will, therefore, require our careful examination. And in the beginning, I wish to premise, that I assume the deluge to have been brought about by natural operations, or in conformity with the laws of nature. I feel no reluctance in admitting it to have been strictly miraculous, provided the narrative will allow of such a conclusion. But if it was miraculous, then we must give up the idea of philosophizing about it, and believe the facts simply on the divine testimony. For how can we philosophize upon an event that is brought about by the direct efficiency of God, and without reference to existing natural laws, and, it may be, in contravention of them, unless, indeed, the history contains such contradictions as even infinite power and wisdom could not make harmonious? Some writers endeavor to show the conformity of the sacred history of the deluge to established natural laws, until they meet with some objection too strong to be answered, when they turn round and declare the whole occurrence to have been miraculous. This I conceive to be absurd, and I shall accordingly proceed on the supposition that the whole event was a penal infliction, brought about by natural laws; or, at least, if there was any thing miraculous, it consisted in giving greater power to natural operations, without interfering with the regular sequence of cause and effect. And does not the narrative leave the impression on the mind of the reader, that it was brought about by natural means? The sacred writer distinctly assigns two natural causes of the increase of the waters, viz., a rain of forty days and the breaking up of the fountains of the great deep, which doubtless means an overflow of the ocean; and, to hasten the subsidence of the waters, it is said that God made a wind to blow over the surface. It is no proof of miraculous agency, that the whole work is referred to theimmediate power of God, for it is well known that this is the usual mode in which the sacred writers speak of natural events.
The first difficulty in the way of supposing the flood to have been literally universal, is the great quantity of water that would have been requisite.
The amount necessary to cover the earth to the tops of the highest mountains, or about five miles above the present oceans, would be eight times greater than that existing on the globe at this time. From whence could this immense volume of water have been derived? A great deal of ingenuity has been devoted to give an answer to this inquiry. By some it has been supposed, that most of the earth’s interior is occupied by water, and the theorist had only to devise means for forcing it to the surface. One does this by the forcible compression of the crust; another, by the expansive power of internal heat; another, by the generation of various gases through galvanic action. Others have maintained that the antediluvian continents were sunk beneath the ocean at that time, though such find it hard to tell us why there was a rain of forty days upon land that was ready to subside beneath the ocean. Others have resort to a comet’s impinging against the earth, and throwing the waters of the ocean over the land. But they were not aware that comets are mere vapor. Others suppose (and surely theirs is the most plausible theory) that the elevation of the bed of some ocean, by volcanic agency, threw its waters over the adjoining continents, and the mighty wave thus produced would not stop till it had swept over all other continents and islands. But in this case, it is evident that the continent first overflowed must have been left dry before the wave had reached other continents, so that, in fact, all parts of the earth would not have been enveloped simultaneously; and besides, how unlike such a violent rushing ofthe waters over the land is the scriptural account! In short, so unsatisfactory have been most of the theories to account for the water requisite to produce a universal deluge, that most writers have resorted, in the end, to miraculous agency to obtain it. And that, in fact, is the most satisfactory mode of getting over this difficulty, if the Scriptures unequivocally teach the universality of the deluge.
A second objection to such a universality is, the difficulty of providing for the animals in the ark.
Calculations have indeed been made, which seemed to show that the ark was capacious enough to hold the pairs and septuples of all the species. But, unfortunately, the number of species assumed to exist by the calculators was vastly below the truth. It amounted only to three or four hundred; whereas the actual number already described by zoölogists is not less than one hundred and fifty thousand; and the probable number existing on the globe is not less than half a million. And for the greater part of these must provision have been made, since most of them inhabit either the air or the dry land. A thousand species of mammalia, six thousand species of birds, two thousand species of reptiles, and one hundred and twenty thousand species of insects are already described, and must have been provided with space and food. Will any one believe this possible, in a vessel not more than four hundred and fifty feet long, seventy-five feet broad, and forty-five feet high?
The third and most important objection to this universality of the deluge is derived from the facts brought to light by modern science, respecting the distribution of animals and plants on the globe.
It was the opinion of Linnæus that all animals and plants had their commencement in a particular region of the earth,from whence they migrated into all other parts of its surface. And had no new facts come to light since his day, to change the aspect of the subject, one would hesitate long before adopting views opposed to so distinguished a naturalist. But new facts, in vast numbers, have been multiplying ever since his day, and zoölogists and botanists now almost universally adopt the opinion, early promulgated by Dr. Prichard, in his admirable work on the Physical History of Man, that there must have been several centres of creation, from which the animals and plants radiated only so far as the climate and food were adapted to their natures, except a few species endowed with the power of accommodating themselves to all climates. Certain it is that they are now thus distributed; and it is inevitable death for most species to venture beyond certain limits. If tropical animals and plants, for instance, were to migrate to the temperate zones, and especially to the frigid regions, they could not long survive; and almost equally fatal would it be for the animals and plants of high latitudes to take up their abode near the equator. But even within the tropics we find distinct species of animals and plants on opposite continents. Indeed, naturalists reckon a large number of botanical and zoölogical districts, or provinces, as they are called, within which they find certain peculiar groups of animals and plants, with natures exactly adapted to that particular district, but incapable of enduring the different climate of adjoining districts. They differ considerably as to the number of these districts, because the plants and animals of our globe are by no means yet fully described, and because the districts assigned to the different classes do not fully coincide; but as to the existence of such a distribution, they are of one opinion. The most reliable divisions of this kind make twenty-five botanicalprovinces, and five kingdoms and fourteen provinces among animals.[10]
The fact that man, and some of the domesticated animals, and a few plants, are found in almost every climate, has, until recently, blinded the eyes of naturalists to the manner in which the great mass of animals and plants are confined within certain prescribed limits. But so soon as the general fact is stated, we immediately recur to abundant proof of its truth. We should be disposed to question the veracity of that traveller who should visit a new and remote country, and describe its vegetable and animal productions as essentially the same as in our own; and all because the analogy of other portions of the globe leads us to expect that a new geographical province shall present us with a peculiarfaunaandflora; that is, with peculiar groups of animals and plants.
It is obvious that the facts which have been stated have an important bearing upon the mode in which the animals were brought together to enter the ark, and were afterwards distributed through the earth, if the deluge were universal. Certain it is that, without miraculous preservation, they could never have been brought together, nor again dispersed. We have reason to suppose that the ark was constructed in some part of the temperate zone. Now, suppose the animals of the torrid zone at the present day to attempt, by natural means, to reach the temperate zone; who does not know that nearly all of them must perish? Nor is it any easier to conceive how, after the flood, they could have migrated into all continents, and islands, and climates, and how each species should have found the place exactly fitted to its constitution, as we now find them. Indeed, the idea of their collection anddispersion in a natural way is altogether too absurd to be believed. And we must, therefore, resort to a miracle, or suppose a new creation to have taken place after the deluge, or admit the flood to have been limited. If the latter supposition be not inconsistent with the Bible, it completely relieves the difficulty. If we suppose the limited region of Central Asia, where man existed, to have been deluged, and pairs and septuples of the most common animals in that region only to have been kept alive in the ark, the entire account will harmonize with natural history. The question, then, whether such a view is consistent with the Bible, becomes of great interest; and to this point I beg leave next to direct your attention.
If we understand the scriptural account to denote a literal universality, it is certainly very natural to inquire why such universality was necessary, since the deluge is represented as a penal infliction upon man. For it seems difficult to believe as some writers have attempted to prove, that the human family had become very numerous, or had extended far beyond the spot where they were first planted, in less than two thousand years; especially when we recollect how few were the children of patriarchs whose age amounted to many centuries, and how very probable it is that the extreme wickedness of most of the antediluvians tended to their extinction rather than their multiplication. Why, then, for the sake of destroying man, occupying probably only a limited portion of one continent, was it necessary to depopulate all other continents and islands, inhabited only by irresponsible animals, who had no connection with man? If the Scriptures unequivocally declare that such was the fact, we are bound to believe it on divine testimony. But if their language admits of a different interpretation, it seems reasonable to adopt it.
And here I am willing to acknowledge that the language of the Bible on this subject seems, at first view, to teach the universality of the flood, unequivocally.The waters, say they,prevailed exceedingly upon the earth, and all the high hills that were under the whole heaven were covered.Again:Behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and every thing that is in the earth shall die.If such language be interpreted by the same rules which we should apply to a modern composition, it could in no way be understood to teach a limited deluge or a partial destruction. But in respect to this ancient record, two considerations are to be carefully weighed.
In the first place, the terms employed are not to be judged of by the state of knowledge in the nineteenth century, but by its state among the people to whom this revelation was first addressed. When the earth was spoken of to that people, (the ancient Jews,) they could not have understood it to embrace a much wider region than that inhabited by man, because they could not have had any idea of what lay beyond those limits. And so of the phraseheaven; it must have been coëxtensive with the inhabited earth only. And when it was said that all animals would die by the deluge, they could not have supposed the declaration to embrace creatures far beyond the dwellings of men, because they knew nothing of such regions. Why, then, may we not attach the same limited meaning to these declarations? Why should we suppose that the Holy Spirit used terms, adapted, indeed, to the astronomy and geography of the nineteenth century, but conveying only a false idea to those to whom they were addressed?
In the second place, in all ages and nations, and especiallyamong ancient ones, “universal terms are often used to signify only a very large amount in number or quantity.”—Dr. Smith,Scrip. and Geol.p. 212, 4th ed.—The Hebrew כל, (kol,) theπας, and the Englishall, are alike employed in this manner, to signifymany. There are some very striking cases of this sort in the Bible. Thus in Genesis it is said thatall countries came into Egypt to Joseph to buy corn, because the famine was sore in all lands. This certainly could apply only to the well-known countries around Egypt; for transportation would have been impossible to the remotest parts of the habitable globe. In the account of the plagues that came upon Egypt, it is said thatthe hail smote every herb of the field, and brake every tree of the field; but, in a few days afterwards, it is said of the locusts thatthey did eat every herb of the land and all the fruit of the trees which the hail had left.This day, said God to the Israelites, while yet in their journeyings,will I begin to put the fear of thee and the dread of thee upon the face of the nations under all the heavens. But it is obvious that only the nations contiguous to the Israelites, chiefly the Canaanites, are here meant. In the New Testament, it is said that, at the time of the pentecost, there were dwelling at JerusalemJews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven. Yet, in the enumeration, which follows this passage, of the different places from which those Jews had come, we find only a region extending from Italy to Persia, and from Egypt to the Black Sea. It could have been a district of only about that size which Paul meant, when he said to the Colossians that thegospel was preached to every creature which is under heaven. In the First Book of Kings, it is said thatall the earth sought the presence of Solomon, to hear his wisdom;—a passage which requires as much limitation as the others above quoted. A similar mode ofexpression is employed by Christ, when he says of the queen of Sheba that she came fromthe uttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; for her residence, being probably on the Arabian Gulf, could not have been more than twelve or fourteen hundred miles from Jerusalem. A like figurative mode of speech is employed in the description of Peter’s vision, in which he saw a great sheet let down to the earth,wherein were all manner of four-footed beasts of the earth, and wild beasts, and creeping things, and fowls of the air. Who will suppose, since it is wholly unnecessary for the object, which was to convince Peter that the Mosaic distinction into clean and unclean beasts was abolished, that he here had a vision of all the species of terrestrial vertebral animals on the globe?
It would be easy to multiply similar passages. In many of them we should find that the phraseall the earthsignifies the land of Palestine; in a few, the Chaldean empire; and in one, that of Alexander of Macedon.
Now, so similar is the phraseology of the passages just quoted to that descriptive of the deluge, so universal are the terms, while we are sure that their meaning must be limited, that we are abundantly justified in considering the deluge as limited, if other parts of the Bible, or the facts of natural history, require such a limitation. Indeed, so obviously analogous are the passages quoted to the Mosaic account of the deluge, that distinguished writers have regarded the deluge as limited, long before geology existed, or natural history had learned the manner in which organic life is distributed on the globe; nay, at a period when naturalists, with Linnæus at their head, supposed animals and plants to have proceeded from one centre:—an opinion that seemed to sustain the notion of the universality of the flood. The inference, then,that it was limited, must have been made chiefly on exegetical grounds.
“I cannot see,” says Bishop Stillingfleet, more than a century ago, “any urgent necessity from the Scripture to assert that the flood did spread over all the surface of the earth. That all mankind, those in the ark excepted, were destroyed by it, is most certain, according to the Scriptures. The flood was universal as to mankind; but from thence follows no necessity at all of asserting the universality of it as to the globe of the earth, unless it be sufficiently proved that the whole earth was peopled before the flood, which I despair of ever seeing proved.”—Origines Sacræ, B. III. chap. 4, p. 337, ed. 1709.
Matthew Poole, well known for his valuable and extensive commentaries on the Bible, thus expresses himself: “It is not to be supposed that the entire globe of the earth was covered with water. Where was the need of overwhelming those regions in which there were no human beings? It would be highly unreasonable to suppose that mankind had so increased before the deluge as to have penetrated to all the corners of the earth. It is, indeed, not probable that they had extended themselves beyond the limits of Syria and Mesopotamia. Absurd it would be to affirm that the effects of the punishment inflicted upon men alone applied to places in which there were no men. If, then, we should entertain the belief that not so much as the hundredth part of the globe was overspread with water, still the deluge would be universal, because the extirpation took effect upon all the part of the globe which was inhabited. If we take this ground, the difficulties which some have raised about the deluge fall away as inapplicable, and mere cavils; and irreligious persons have no reason left them for doubting the truth of the Holy Scriptures.”—Synopsis on Gen.vii. 19.
Poole wrote nearly two centuries ago. In more recent times, we find authorities equally eminent for learning and candor adopting the same views. “Interpreters,” says Dathe, “do not agree whether the deluge inundated the whole earth, or only those regions then inhabited. I adopt the latter opinion. The phrasealldoes not prove the inundation to have been universal. It appears that in many places כל (kol) is to be understood as limited to the thing or place spoken of. Hence all the animals said to have been introduced into the ark were only those of the region inundated. So, also, only those mountains are to be understood, which were surmounted by the waters.”—Pentateuchus a Dathio, p. 63.
But no modern writer has treated this subject with so much candor and ability—and the same may be said of his whole work on the “Relation of the Holy Scriptures to some Parts of Geological Science”—as Dr. John Pye Smith. We can say of him, what we can say of very few men, that he is accurately acquainted with all the branches of the subject. Eminent as a theologian and a philologist, and fully possessed of all the facts in geology and natural history, he gives us his opinion, not as a young man, fond of novelties, but in the full maturity of judgment and of years. “From these instances,” says he, “of the scriptural idiom in the application of phraseology similar to that in the narrative concerning the flood, I humbly think that those terms do not oblige us to understand a literal universality; so that we are exonerated from some otherwise insuperable difficulties in natural history and geology. If so much of the earth was overflowed as was occupied by the human race, both the physical and the moral ends of that awful visitation were answered.”—Scrip. and Geol.p. 214, 4th ed.
“Let us now take the seat of the antediluvian population,”continues Dr. Smith, “to have been in Western Asia, in which a large district, even at the present day, lies considerably below the level of the sea. It must not be forgotten that six weeks of continued rain would not give an amount of water forty times that which fell on the first, or a subsequent day, for evaporation would be continually carrying up the water to be condensed, and to fall again; so that the same mass of water would return many times. If, then, in addition to the tremendous rain, we suppose an elevation of the bed of the Persian and Indian Seas, or a subsidence of the inhabited land towards the south, we shall have sufficient cause in the hands of almighty justice for submerging the district, covering its hills, and destroying all living beings within its limits, except those whom divine mercy preserved in the ark. The drawing off of the waters would be effected by a return of the bed of the sea to a lower level, or by the elevation of some tracts of land, which would leave channels and slopes for the larger part of the water to flow back into the Indian Ocean, while the lower part remained a great lake, or an inland sea, the Caspian.”—p. 217.
It is a circumstance favoring the above suggestions of Dr. Smith, that there is a tract of country ten degrees of latitude in breadth, embracing most of Asia Minor, ancient Armenia and Georgia, and part of Persia, extending at least as far east as the Caspian Sea, and probably much farther, in which volcanic agency has been in operation at a comparatively recent period. I am not aware that we have evidence of any eruption of lava in those regions, within historic times, except, perhaps, some mud volcanoes in the Caucasian range. The Katekekaumene, or Burnt District, of Asia Minor, and Mount Ararat, probably experienced eruptions at a date somewhat earlier, though at a comparatively recent date. Yet importantchanges of level may have been the result of volcanic agency in Central Asia, as recently as the Noachian deluge, without leaving any traces which would be obvious, without more careful observation than has yet been made in those regions. Especially might a subsidence of the surface have taken place, and not have left any striking evidence of its occurrence. Still more difficult would it now be to discover the marks of vertical movements in the bed of the Indian Ocean at the time of the deluge.
I will venture to add another suggestion. If the bed of the Indian Ocean was uplifted by volcanic matter, struggling to get vent, vapor enough might have been liberated to account, on natural principles, for the forty days’ rain of the deluge. For it is well known that in volcanic eruptions drenching rains are often the result of the sudden condensation of the aqueous vapor.
We are here met, however, by a serious objection to the hypothesis, which gives only a limited extent to the deluge. If the present Mount Ararat, in Armenia, is the mountain on which the ark first rested, a deluge which covered its top must, by its flux and reflux, have overspread nearly all other portions of the globe, for that mountain rises seventeen thousand seven hundred feet above the ocean. But we are informed by Jerome, that the name Ararat was given generally to the mountains of Armenia; (indeed, that is the meaning of the name;) and long before geology existed, Shuckford suggested that some spot farther east corresponds better with the scriptural account of the place where the ark rested. For it is said of the families of the sons of Noah, that, as they journeyed from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar. Now, Shinar, or Babylonia, lies nearly south of the Armenian Ararat, and the probability, therefore, is, that the true Ararat, fromwhose vicinity the descendants of Noah probably emigrated, lay much farther to the south. Again, if the ark rested upon the present Ararat, it is impossible, except by a miracle, that those who came out of it could have reached the plain below; for so exceedingly difficult of access is it, that it is doubtful whether, since the deluge, any one ever succeeded in reaching its summit, till the year 1829. Indeed, it is an article in the creed of the Armenian church that its ascent is impossible. That the almost universal tradition of Eastern nations should have fixed upon that mountain as the resting-place of the ark is not strange, considering that there is no mountain in all Asia so striking to behold.
But upon the whole, the probability is strong that some other elevation, less lofty and steep, was the radiating point of the postdiluvian races of man and other animals. The fact of Noah’s sending forth a dove from the ark, which came back in the evening with an olive leaf in her mouth, strengthens the preceding view. For neither upon the present Ararat, nor around it, does the olive grow, because it is too cold. Indeed, all its upper part is covered with perpetual ice. But if the Ararat of Scripture lay nearer the tropics, the olive might find upon it a congenial spot. A distinguished botanist adduced the fact about the olive as evidence against the Bible. But how easily refuted, if the theory now under examination be true!
In favor of this supposition, I might have urged another consideration, which, in my mind, has no little weight. It is impossible that the waters of the deluge should have covered the earth for a year, without destroying nearly all the existing vegetation. Yet nothing is said of the preservation of seeds in the ark; and if they had been preserved, certainly nothing but miraculous power, and that of the most remarkable kind,could have scattered them through the remotest continents and islands, so as to form distinct botanical districts, such as have been described. The olive, from which a leaf was plucked by the dove sent out of the ark, was probably situated upon elevated ground, and where it remained but a short time beneath the waters, and therefore did not lose its vitality.
It is probable that the theory which makes the deluge limited in extent will meet with more favor than any other, with candid and intelligent men, to meet the suggested difficulties of the case. But some, who are unwilling to abandon the idea of the universality of the deluge, avoid these difficulties by supposing a new creation to have taken place at that epoch. That such a new creation occurred at the commencement of several geological periods can hardly admit a doubt. And a presumption is hence derived in favor of a similar act at the beginning of the postdiluvian period, preceded as it was, like the other geological periods, by an almost entire destruction of organic life.
The principal objection to this view is, that no notice is taken of such a new creation in the Bible. And it would seem that an event of so much importance would hardly be passed in silence; and yet the bringing into existence new races of the inferior animals and plants could have but little bearing upon the object of revelation, which respects almost exclusively the spiritual condition of man. One, however, can hardly see why pairs and septuples of the animals, even in a limited district, need to have been preserved in the ark, if a new creation were to follow the coming catastrophe; nor why the creation of the antediluvian animals, so soon to perish, should have been so particularly described, while no notice was taken of the postdiluvian races, which were to occupy the earth so much longer time.
A third theory has been suggested by some, embracing both those which have been described. They admit the deluge to have been of limited extent, but suppose this limitation not to be sufficient to explain all the facts of revelation and of science, without a new creation also, at the commencement of the postdiluvian period. They suppose, indeed, that geology and natural history teach the occasional extinction of species, and the creation of others, even in our own times. And in regard to this latter view, it may at least be said that it is not contradicted by the Bible. Nay, one would almost suppose that the Psalmist were describing such a state of things when he says,Thou hidest thy face; they[animals]are troubled. Thou takest away their breath; they die and return to their dust. Thou sendest forth thy spirit; they are created; and thou renewest the face of the earth.The resemblance between this language and that employed to describe the original creation is striking. Indeed, the same word (bawraw) is used.
Without attempting to decide which of these theories has the highest claim upon our belief, it is sufficient to remark, that either of them reconciles the facts of geology and natural history with the inspired record; nor does the adoption of either of them require us to put a forced and unnatural construction upon the language of the Bible. Even then, if we should admit that a construction agreeing with these theories is not the most natural meaning, yet if the facts of natural history unequivocally require such an interpretation to harmonize the Bible with nature, it is assuredly one of those cases where science must be allowed to modify our exegesis of Scripture. In the view of sound philosophy, such modification at once disarms scepticism of its cavils.
With two remarks of a practical character, I close the discussion of this subject.
First. The history of opinions respecting the Noachian deluge furnishes a salutary lesson to those employed in the examination of analogous subjects. We have seen these opinions assume almost every possible shape; yet, until recently they have all been maintained with the most positive and dogmatic assurance; and each particular theory has been regarded as involving the essence of the Bible, as being thearticulus stantis vel cadentis ecclesiæ, and whoever denied it virtually denied the Bible. But all reasonable and truly scientific men are fast coming to the conclusion, that the deluge has had very little to do with the present configuration of the globe, and that it is doubtful whether any trace of its occurrence will ever be found in nature; so that, on the one hand, all the alarms and denunciations of misguided Christians on this subject might have been spared; and, on the other hand, if the hasty exultation of the infidel, in his supposed discovery of discrepancy between nature and Moses, had been suppressed until the subject was understood, he would not have experienced the mortification of entire defeat.
It is, indeed, very humiliating to human nature to find so many of the wise, the talented, and the religious so confident and zealous, yet so erroneous. But it is a salutary lesson. It shows us the vast importance of being thoroughly acquainted with a subject before we dogmatize upon it. It should not, indeed, discourage us, and produce a universal scepticism on all subjects not admitting a mathematical demonstration; but it should make us cautious in examining the grounds of our conclusions, and modest in maintaining them.
Secondly. It is interesting to observe how, amid all the diversities and fluctuations of opinion on this subject, the Bible has remained unaffected.