CHAPTER VI

.

THE MOSAIC RECORD—ACCOUNT OF CREATION.

The conclusion attempted to be established by the preceding mode of reasoning, is not of the kind, nor will it be so satisfactory as, many desiderate. The sacred chronology, according to the common interpretation, remains as it was; and no harmony can thus be established betwixt it and the deductions of geology. Bring down the epochs to thousands instead of millions of years, and still the DAYS of Scripture are not explained. The historical and the scientific accounts of the course of creation are just where they were, the one based on the word of its Author, the other resting on rash or doubtful interpretations of the phenomena of nature. Leave us, says the geologist, to grope our own way: mystical as our records are, we disturb no established truth, and imagination delights to lose itself in the far-distant past. Let not, says the divine, the speculations of a new science—a science of yesterday—be mixed up with more important matters of religion: we are within the sacred precincts of revelation, and our oracles give forth no dubious meanings—no isoteric doctrines for the initiated only.

The marvels of geology certainly are, in every view that can be taken of them, deeply interesting to the mind. The volume of creation, read in the light of its discoveries, is traced back through pages which have been long hid from day; and these now make known to us a story of life and death, of activities and enjoyments, of catastrophes and revolutions, which surpass in wonder the inventions of the mere romance writer, or all that regulated genius can pour “from pictured urn” of her most fascinating lore. But be the time occupied in the elaboration of these records what it may, the records themselves have an actual being, and a language of intelligence indelibly impressed upon them. They are genuine, authentic documents of their author. They may be misinterpreted. Inferences may be deduced from them for which there is no warrant; constructions put upon passages which they will not legitimately bear; or the true key of the volume, in its great leading truths, may not as yet have been found. Still the work is of God, wholly and entirely the writing of his own hand.

Revelation is also His work; and, claiming to be from the same authority as the other, rests its pretensions to be received as an authentic document upon the ground of creation. It gives details, and enters into explanations of the nature and origin of creation; and it declares that the same Divine Being who made the heavens and the earth, has also recorded their history and revealed his will to man. It is by no mere casualty, therefore, or as a matter of indifference, that the Bible commences its narrative by an account of creation. That account is there as the foundation of one of its own claims to belief, testifying to its credibility that it is of God; that He placed it there, not as a skillful writer would do his preface, but because of the fact, that the invisible things of his nature are to be seen and understood by the things which are made.—What is thus declared upon the subject of creation, is likewise liable to misinterpretation. It may not be read aright. But of the account itself there can be no question,—that it is given as a real, as it ever must be regarded a true one, of the Divine operations.

In order, therefore, to arrive at any just conclusions respecting the comparison to be instituted betwixt the geological and the revealed account of creation, we shall first inquire into the kind, as well as amount, of information contained in the Mosaic record. The rendering of the term “day” will then fall to be considered in relation to the order of events indicated in both accounts.

I. The narrative proceeds with a fullness and minuteness of detail, which clearly show a purpose in the writer. Did Moses actually mean to trace the whole of creation in its primordial course and outline? Assuming that he did, the phraseology is pointed and admirably suited to its subject. Admitted into the presence-chamber of the Creator, he sees the instruments with which he works, the rapidity with which he executes, the subserviency of all being to his will, the arrangement and disposition of all things at his pleasure. Knowing, as we now do from the highest authority, _what_ was the work of creation, and _whence_ it originated, the intelligent mind discerns also the suitableness of the description, and the Divine selection of words employed to record it. There is inspiration in the pencil, as well as omnipotence in the hand, which traced out the plan of creation, and brought it into existence. The Cause willed, and the effect immediately was,—IN THE BEGINNING GOD CREATED THE HEAVEN AND THE EARTH.

Here, betwixt God and his work there are no intermediate agencies,—no pause or rest in the act of coming into being. A material universe is designed, and the substance of it is instantly produced. The inspired historian proves that he was inspired, by the brevity of the history of the event, by the employment of words so perfectly adapted to the nature of the act. He proves farther, that we have here indicated the precise course of creation, and that he meant so to represent it—that the heavens and the earth are of one and the same act—that the physical universe, through all its dominions and remotest spheres, started at one and the same time into being. The sun, moon, and stars were now all formed, as well as our own planet. The stellar systems were everywhere arranged; and the worlds of matter had their places all assigned them through infinite space. This part of the Divine actings must not be confounded with the farther evolution of creation as described in the work of the fourth day, which has reference manifestly to the division of time and the appointment of the seasons, through the revolution of the planetary worlds.

The condition of the earth as it first came from the hand of its framer is next alluded to. It was “without form and void,” and involved in darkness; that is, the arrangements necessary to constitute a habitable globe, were not completed. There was no diversity of surface—no division into hill and valley, into seas and rivers; the air, the dry land, and the waters, had not yet assumed their respective places. Form was not yet stamped upon the matter of the globe. Consequently it was also VOID, or without inhabitants. Neither vegetables nor animals were there. They could not exist before these necessary adaptations for life were adjusted. Let the reader note this stage of the work. Marking the precise, definite phraseology of the inspired writer, let him seriously reflect whether he has here before him the first state of the new world, or the shapeless ruined aspect of one of its subsequent geological transformations? None of the elements, he will not fail to observe, have been described as yet existing in separation. The course of creation has not advanced so far; and, if it had done so, no geologist pretends to assert, that at the close of any one of his epochs, the laws of nature were abolished, and all things reverted to their pristine formless condition. With what propriety, then, may it be asked, can an opening be made in this part of the narrative wide enough to embrace, or to have intercalated into it, all the phases of an archaic earth under his numerous formations, and the vast cycles of time in which they had been evolving? The language employed admirably represents what we can well suppose the original physical state of the planet to have been; and that state accords better with the first than with the last, or any of the intermediate series of the geological changes. And the earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters; and thus gave shape and outline to the planetary mass.

The light was thereupon produced. We are not told whence, nor out of what. Like all the matter of the universe, it started into being at the call of the Creator, suddenly, as its own brilliant flashing emanations over the darkness at this hour. Then came day and night; and this implies, that there came along with them the revolution of the globe and the commencement of motion in the astral universe. The production of a firmament or atmosphere is next alluded to, and in immediate connection with this part of the work, whereby a medium was provided for the diffusion of the light and the play of all that beauty and variety of coloring by which the earth was to be adorned. “And God said, Let there be light: and there was light; and God divided the light from the darkness. And God called the light day, and the darkness he called night. And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.”

Light, the subtilest and fleetest of all elements, has nearly eluded every effort of man to detect or analyze its essence. It travels swift as thought through infinite space. It spreads its ethereal force over every opposing obstacle. It gives brilliancy to the gem, form to the crystal, color to the flower, health to animal life, and is so indispensable to every existing condition of existing physical nature, that, were the mandate of its creation revoked, we know just as much of its principle as to see in its annihilation a relapse into that state of chaos when all things were without form and void. Not only the beauty of organic structure, but the molecular arrangement of the mineral mountain masses of the earth, would, in all probability, have been an impossible condition of matter without the existence and agency of light. And light, whether glowing in the solar disc, gleaming in remotest stars, or breaking and sparkling in the rain-drop, what revelation has science made of it beyond its properties of luster and activity?—We trace its effects; we discern its influence upon all bodies; but when we would go deeper, and seek to know it essentially and in itself, we can only speak of it as the utterance of Him who said,—LET THERE BE LIGHT.

Nor has science made any attempt, at least no successful one, to account for the origin of the atmosphere. Its constituent elements are known. They are every day made the subject of direct experiment. The solution and ascent of water in the air is also a matter of daily visible occurrence. But by what process this great mass of impalpable fluid was brought together, enveloping the entire earth, and suspended as a curtain over our heads, no ingenuity or dexterity of man has been able to determine. There is no evidence by which to explain it upon the principles of natural law, slowly elaborating the materials, and piling them high in the starry vault. The atmosphere, indeed, must ever stand in the original formation, the result of the immediate creative act, brought together in all its volume and vast incredible capacity of receiving and holding in its grasp the gaseous residue of all earthly things. And what of its electricity, its magnetism, the aurora and its streaming meteors,—its thunder, lightning, clouds, and rain,—all, shall we say, the instantaneous effect of the authoritative command? AND GOD SAID, LET THERE BE A FIRMAMENT IN THE MIDST OF THE WATERS!

We every day see the conversion of water into steam, and steam into air; and the air, like the ocean, receiving every substance into itself. But, nevertheless, it is not inferred that there is any augmentation to the volume of the atmosphere, any increase or essential change upon its original mass. Without the existence of this fluid, the earth would have been no suitable place for any of its living inhabitants, vegetable or animal. Therefore was it created; therefore does the account of its creation stand in the order in which we find it in the Mosaic narrative; and, therefore, from this very circumstance, are we not warranted to infer that we have before us a description of the actual genesis of things—that it is not a remodeling or transformation of the old, but the veritable course under which all creation was at first brought into being, form, and parts, that the inspired writer intends to record?

We cannot refuse, by parity of reasoning, to conclude the same as to the immediately succeeding act in the Divine operations. The arrangement of the surface of the earth was now to be effected; and, just as one portion of the waters was lifted and expanded into air, so, in consequence of a different proportion in the elements, and evolution of new principles, the seas were formed and gathered into the depressions occasioned by the raising up of the dry land, its consolidation into rocks and mountains. This is the starting point of geology. The science can get no deeper. It begins all its researches, and builds all its calculations, upon that crystalline crust which is termed primary, which is co-extensive with the superficial area of the globe, which is found in every region, and beneath which no explorations have anywhere been made. And wherefore not assume this as an immediate formation, as a direct preparatory arrangement, like the seas and atmosphere, for the life that was just to be provided with a habitation upon it? A beginning for organic bodies is demonstrable upon geological evidence. The lowest fossiliferous rocks have been reached, and everywhere they are found to maintain the same relative position. The inference, therefore, is legitimate, nay, probable, that the primary formations of geologists constituted the first dry land, as herein described; and that Time, calculated according to the operations of natural mechanical laws, can enter in no way into our speculations as to their origin. “And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together in one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.”

The course of creation proceeds. “And God called the dry land earth, and the gathering together of the waters called he seas.” The globe was thus divided into land and ocean. An atmosphere embraces the whole, tempering the heat and cold of the one, receiving the exhalations of the other, and both prepared for the ministrations required of them. The dry earth is represented as being first the seat of organic life. The new and bare surface is covered with herbage. The grasses, shrubs, and trees all start into being, prepared each for the diffusion and continuance of their kind, by yielding seed and fruit. And then commenced on the theater of our globe the successive evolution of the _principle of life_, subtile,

## active, prolific, in all the boundless prodigality of nature, and

mysterious still as the essence and fount of all-creative Being.

At this part of the narrative it is generally supposed, according to the common reading, that there is a retrograde step, as it were, introduced. The day and night have been made to precede the creation of the sun and moon; and now to supply the deficiency we are told of the appointment of these luminaries in the heavens “to give light upon the earth.” But three days and three nights have already revolved. Doubtless they have, but not without light, for light has been created; and not without a provision for the night, for the light has been divided from the darkness. The earth has been revolving upon its own axis; that occasioned the succession of day and night then as now. Another motion is communicated, whereby it revolves in its orbit and circles round the sun; that causes the variety of the seasons, and the divisions of the year. The luminous matter diffused through space, and equally shining upon all bodies, has been assembled into the great central orbs, to be the dispensers each of light and heat to their respective systems; and upon these arrangements being established, both days and nights, seasons and years, are all dependent upon, as they all arise from, the revolution of the planets round the central luminary. “And God said, Let there be 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 for years.”

“And God _made_ two great lights; he _made_ the stars also.” The original does not bear out the sense of there being in these instances an act of creation; neither does the English term itself always imply that meaning. Light-bearers, or the depositories of illumination, is the true rendering of the Hebrew. The Septuagint translators have used similar relative terms, and in our own language the expression “made” often signifies fashioned, formed, used, constrained. And so the phrase here refers not to the creation, but to the uses of bodies already described as being in existence, and created along with all matter in the beginning. But now they are invested with new properties, are arranged so as to perform new functions, and stand in relations each to each, at the bidding of Him who brought them into being. Next to the summoning of the universe into existence, this was the most stupendous act of Divine power, and we know as much of the one as of the other. Some of the properties of matter we are acquainted with. The laws of motion we can define in some measure, and calculate also their effects. But whence the one, and _how_ the arbitrary appointment of the other, through all the infinite diversity of systems and spheres—precise, harmonious, and orderly—baffles all the ingenuity of science to determine. Mark, too, the order of the introduction of this new class of facts, just in the due course and regulation of nature. When life is mentioned, and the earth is clothed with verdure, the seasons begin their round, and the divinely-instructed historian acquaints us with the cause. “And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth; and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness.”

The waters are now replenished with their stores of animal life, and by the same act of creation the air receives its stock of winged tribes. Then follows, as the work of another distinct period of time, the introduction of the terrestrial races—the living creature after his kind—the cattle—and creeping thing—and beast of the earth after his kind. The description here is general. The orders, genera, and species are not named. Still the catalogue is large and amply descriptive. The various types of organic structure are alluded to, and each term or epithet of the quadruple list is elastic enough to embrace one and all the diversified families of the most methodical naturalist. “And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth, each after his kind.”

Such is the account, the order, and course of creation, as set forth in the inspired record. The description of the various generative acts is simple, distinctive, and consonant with the energies of the Will by which they are performed. The whole narrative is one of many, within the compass of the sacred volume, in which a strict adherence to the letter leads to a sound interpretation. The wisdom of man will be confounded when it tries to fathom the methods and devices of the divine Artificer in originating his works. His safety will often be in distrusting his own understanding, in not magnifying overmuch the ingenuity of his own speculations, and in sometimes believing that even science will be exalted by approximating to, rather than by departing from, the literalities of Scripture.

II. Compare now the epochs of geology with the DAYS of Scripture, and there will be observed at least a remarkable coincidence between them. The fossiliferous systems of the one are nearly the same in number with the descriptive paragraphs in the other. The order in the creation of organized bodies, the progression of life upon the earth, are also wonderfully striking in the records of both. The lowest of our fossiliferous deposits contain the impressions of plants—these stand at the beginning of the Mosaic list. The same groups, and the whole of the next in succession, are characterized by the prevailing abundance of marine tribes—the waters, according to the sacred narrative, then received their command, and multiplied abundantly the moving creature that hath life. Vegetables and animals, still of _the waters_, continue to increase during the carboniferous era, when a new system succeeds, and in this the foot-prints of birds are distinctly traced—so it was in the same order of succession that the winged fowl is sent forth into the open firmament of heaven. The Lias and Oolite formations immediately follow, filled with monsters of the deep, saurians and flying lizards,—the text speaks of the “great whales” of the period, as distinguished among the productions of the waters. The Wealden Chalk, and Tertiaries are replete with all kinds of reptiles, mammals, and quadrupeds—the horse, urus, and other forms of cattle—and so, in like manner, the last in the Mosaic list, as the highest in the geological strata, are the types of every beast, cattle, and creeping thing.

Now, can this running parallel be accidental or intended? Did the writer of the one record know anything of the contents of the other? Does the course of creation, as detailed in the strata of the earth, follow as a necessary consequence from the nature of things? or as the arbitrary appointment of Him who made them? Would plants, fishes, reptiles, fowl, mammals, all emerge in this precise order of succession, by any known law of organic structure? Or could not the first and last, or any of the intermediate kinds, have been at once, and as adaptively, brought together in one and the same period of time? Was the writer of the Genesis acquainted with the rich exuberant flora of the carboniferous age? and was it meant as a true exposition of its history that there were as yet no beasts or quadrupeds upon the earth to enjoy it? And knowing of it, as well as of all the other superficial arrangements,—the upheaval of the crust, the rise of mountains, the alternate shifting of sea and land,—does he describe the progress of organic creation precisely as it occurred, and as the changes of the planet became ADAPTIVE?

The series of creative acts terminates in the introduction of Man upon the stage of terrestrial being. “And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.”

Here both narratives are completely at one as to man’s place in the course as well as system of creation. No fragment of his race has been detected in any of the rocky strata of the earth. Every other organic thing, of every class, and order, and tribe, has its representative in one or other of the geological epochs. Man stands apart and alone in the geology as in the history. No mere link in the chain of organic existence, not a being of mere earthy mold, but fashioned in the image of his Maker, and fitted to explore, to understand, and to exercise dominion over the works of his creation. How much, again, in all this last and highest evolution of creative might, is the conclusion confirmed, and arrived at from so many converging lines, that the sacred record was INTENDED to embody an actual account of the creation of our globe, in its various primordial arrangements as well as in all its consecutive events, until its majestic close in the human epoch? For, looking back and comparing the whole narrative with the facts of geology, is it not highly probable that we have in that account distinctly shadowed forth the progressive researches of the science, the great physical truths of creation, as symbolized in the rocks? The brilliant vista through millions of untold ages, and upon scenes supposed to be unnoticed and unrecorded, vanishes indeed at the admission of this principle of interpretation. But a more consistent view of the world’s history—of the comparative longevity of its successive tribes—of the various changes and alterations which its surface has undergone—and a less violence far to the obvious import of the sacred text—form no unpleasing substitutes on which, amidst such lures to doubt, bewilderment, and error, faith and reason will equally incline to repose.

III. The conclusions which have been, or which may be, deduced from a comparative examination of geology and the Mosaic record, fall to be noticed.

1. In order to preserve the literal rendering of the six days of creation, it is maintained that the Mosaic record takes no account whatever of any of the geological formations described. After the intimation, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth; and the earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep”—the close of the EPOCHS, with all their complement of strata and fossils, was accomplished; and then, as descriptive of the era of man, with all his living cotemporaries, and the several days with the works therein accomplished, the new order of events referred to in the text commences with the declaration, “and the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.” The discoveries of geology are thus all cast back upon unrecorded anterior periods, and with regard to which the sacred record is silent; while of the new series of events, in precisely the same order of succession and enlarged amount of normal organic being, there is a defined literal account. This may be regarded as the generally received interpretation among the leading geologists as well as of a large class of eminent divines. It was early and eagerly adopted by Dr. Chalmers. The proof of its soundness is made to hinge upon certain ingenious criticisms regarding the terms _bara_, _asah_, _yatzan_, which in the common version of the Hebrew text are translated _created_, _made_, _formed_. According to the new rendering, wherever any of these words occur in any of the verses _after_ the second, they are to be restricted to the simple act of fashioning, arranging, and constructing new bodies out of pre-existing matter. Hence, all the initial and secondary actings noticed in the narrative are in this manner clearly distinguishable. It is farther argued, that all the secondary class of arrangements are distinctively pointed to, and separated from the primordial, by the formula of expression, “and God said,” which is introduced at the commencement of each of the six days, but not prefixed to the initial creative act of all matter in the beginning.

Now, against this mode of argument it may be objected that much of it does not bear upon the question at issue. The discrepancy is one more of things than of words. It is the physical solution, rather than the critical, that is the important matter of inquiry; and this no mere verbal emendations of the text will altogether and consistently help out. Observe the character of the acts spoken of after the second verse and introduction of the expression, “and God said;”—the calling light into being, the separation of the darkness, the division of day and night, the formation of an atmosphere, the fixed position of the firmament above and the waters beneath, and the separation of the dry land. These are the acts of the first and second days. But what of them _before_ this? These elements and their arrangement were all required, and must have all existed, during the epochs recorded in geology. That is admitted. The light needed no renewal after any geological transposition of the land and sea. The revolutions of the heavenly bodies would be equally unaffected, and days, seasons, and years would remain and proceed in the same order of succession. The firmament and atmosphere would continue to occupy their relative positions. And so, according to the _usus loquendi_ and legitimate import of all the terms employed in the text, we are reading of things that were neither in being nor in operation _before_, but which now for the first time are represented as being summoned into existence. We are equally unprepared for the admission made by some of the friends of revelation, that Moses knew not the full amount and nature of the knowledge conveyed in his narrative, just as “he was not aware of the profound spiritual meaning of much of the ritual which he was employed to institute. It was an obscure text, which awaited the Divine commentary of the christian dispensation.”[16] There is no analogy between the subjects. The law was confessedly a preparatory, incompleted dispensation. The order of creation as traced by Moses embraces substantively everything which creation contains—the elements, disposition, and collocation of its parts—and that he saw not through the whole of a future, unfulfilled plan, furnishes no good ground for the assumption that he was ignorant of or purposely passes over the history of millions of years of the very subject on which he was inspired to write, and on which he was to build his whole system of theism and of grace. This mode of interpretation, beside, assumes a _hiatus_ in the text for which there is no just warrant, either in the verbal structure of the narrative, or in the physical character and order of the events described. It has always appeared to us to proceed upon principles of explication which violate all the canons of a pure and severe criticism, which indulgently gives way to new and gratuitously assumed difficulties, and which would leave nothing in any writing except what the reader chooses to find in it.

2. The principle of interpreting _the days_ in Genesis as periods of indefinite time, and within which the several geological _formations_ were successively evolved. They who adopt this hypothesis can plausibly argue that the _order_ of creative acts as revealed in the sacred record, harmonizes in a very remarkable manner with the course of creation as detailed in the researches of geology. Hereby a comparison can be distinctly instituted, and a parallelism observed betwixt the peculiar work of each day and the leading phenomena displayed in the earth’s crust—from the first appearance of dry land, when organic bodies had not been as yet created, and the primary rocks in which none have been detected—up through the silurian, devonian, and carboniferous series, in all which plants and marine organisms only are found—and onward until we reach the tertiary strata, where, in succession, the revealed order of animal life is so remarkably coincident. The details of the science are not indeed to be all, and minutely, read in the narrative. But the main truths and the leading dogmata are there; and if any departure from the literal rendering of the text can be permitted, so as to fit in and adjust the geological phenomena, it may be justly contended that there is less of violence and straining by the substitution of periods for days, than by casting aside the whole genetic description as having no bearing whatever upon the primary cosmogony of the globe. Then the various events, it may be farther argued, as recorded in the text—the creation of light—the formation of a firmament—the division of day and night—the appointment of seasons and years—the gathering together of the waters, and the elevation of the dry land—are all so described and placed in such juxta-position as can only be applicable to primary creative acts, to things which were not before, and which now for the first time were brought into being and condition.

The abettor of this view and mode of reconciliation will likewise avail himself, in defense of its being an orthodox interpretation, of the latitude of meaning ascribed to the term “day,” in the Scriptures themselves. Even in the second chapter of the Divine word, and applied to the very subject in question—the order of creation—he finds the term to be used in an indefinite sense: “These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth, when they were created in the DAY that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, and EVERY PLANT of the field.” The solemn announcement at the close of this world’s drama will not fail also to be adverted to—“in the last days perilous times shall come”—wherein periods of longer or shorter duration are implied as existing in the midst of days. Frequently too there occur the expressions: the day of grace—the day of salvation—the day of the Lord—the day of trial—the day of redemption—terms all of unlimited import and not to be defined by the planetary diurnal calendar, but to be determined by the arrangements of a dispensation in which man is viewed as a moral accountable being, and not by any necessities in which his physical condition and the world he inhabits are concerned. Thus by adopting this hypothesis, which assumes the entire narrative as a consecutive description of the order of creation, every day as bearing the initiative of its own class of phenomena, the plan and quality of the Divine works as all delineated and shadowed out, the progressive succession of the whole organic and inorganic historically described, and the phenomena, and the terms descriptive of them, are asserted to be in their proper places, and in harmony each with each.

3. There is another mode of defending the text in consistency with the general facts of the science, by assuming that the course of creation indicated through the epochs was in all its characteristic features _reproduced_, and substantially represented in the cosmogonic period of the Mosaic account. We have noticed from time to time, in the different stages of our description, in what the analogies consisted. In the earliest, as well as in the last, organic fossil types, there is the most perfect identity with all the vegetable and animal forms described in the narrative. The order of their reappearance is likewise similar. Moses, it is here supposed, saw the casting of the same molds, the agency of the same hand, and the “day” to be successively the period for the reproduction of the work.

Read now consecutively the whole account, and observe how the Historian passes in review the entire series of the Divine acts, and runs over again the great master-keys of this harmonious system. He is present, so to speak, when, in the beginning, the matter of the heaven and the earth was created. He witnesses the arrangement of the parts, which before were without form and void. He hears the command,—LET THERE BE LIGHT. And now, as the mighty structure expands in vision before the eye of his mind, the firmament and the waters and the dry land separating and drawing off to their respective places, he introduces a record of the period within which the several operations were effected. How long is that period? Just the division of time with which he was acquainted, and which he knew was amply sufficient for the completion of all the operations in question. The acts are successive. The will that performed them is omnipotent. Everything followed in its order and in the time that all creative power commanded it to be. Hence the days, with regard to all the initial acts, both of creation and arrangement, were literally of the duration assigned in the text. After the introduction of organic life on the third day, geology speaks definitively as to the successive order of the kinds and families of the structural forms created. But it gives no sign, and can give none, as to the portion of time required for their creation. It may have been an instant or a day,—a week or a period. The revealed account speaks positively upon the point; and shows how, at the bidding of the Divine will, the various elements—the water, the earth, the air—were replenished with their respective tribes in the old as in the new world, and under all the phases and epochs of their being.

The inspired narrative, it may be alleged, according to this view, is not only consistent with itself, but becomes a sublime illustrative introduction to the book of revelation. The matter of the heaven and the earth was the effect of a single command. The separation of its elements was the instantaneous effect of another.—Upon the creation of light, a division is given to time, and the morning and the evening hours were established. The arrangements of the second day followed, and were all completed in the period assigned. So with the remanent days and their respective included operations. The eye of the historian sees nothing intervening betwixt the cause and the effect; his mind is fixed upon the

## action, not the manner of its accomplishment; and knowing the whole to be

the result of the same power and the arrangement of the same providence, he combines in one cycle or WEEK the entire series of events, one day of which unto the Eternal is as a thousand, and a thousand, but as one day. The work all accomplished, the immediately revolving period of time was established as the Sabbath of the Lord. Having made man in his own image, with knowledge to apprehend and adore the author of his being, the divine Architect RESTED; he ceased from any farther acts of creation; nothing of any material existence, nor of any living thing, has been added to his works since the completion of the six days, and so the rest has continued and will continue to the end of time—a Sabbath hallowed by the structure of the globe and the beneficence of the Creator.

These are some of the methods by which the geologist aims in bringing the conclusions of his science within the scope of the Mosaic record, and in freeing his speculations from all their incumbrances and responsibilities. There is still a great deal to be accomplished, even with all these approximations, toward a right and full and literal comparison with the sacred text. There is indeed no real conflict between the discoveries of geology and the declarations of the divine oracles; and, with so many doors of retreat from or avenues of approach into the inviting fields of its research, no friend of the truth need be afraid of an excursion through the most intricate depths of creation’s works. Meanwhile, the metaphysicians have all been driven from the field, with all their untenable dogmas about the eternity of matter. Geologists repudiate the doctrine, and their science refutes it. But there is such a thing as others rashly rushing to conclusions, wherever they can see tendencies or leanings to countenance their impious materialism. In this direction, many think that geology, however falsely, wholly inclines. And even now it is better, infinitely better, to rest with unhesitating confidence in the received interpretation of Scripture than be borne away by sweeping generalizations, built most certainly somewhere upon loose conflicting elements of calculation. Countless millions of years are, we admit, as nothing in the records of eternity—of no account with the Everlasting of days. Nevertheless, if the time can be reduced, as unquestionably there are data for the reduction, the epochs and the days approximate all the closer; the speculations of the science are brought into better keeping with the dicta of revelation; farther discoveries will lead to farther adjustments; until what was done for the interests of the one by detecting the miscalculations of Hindoo astronomy, will again be effected for the other by scanning more intelligibly the geological horoscope.—And thus removing every ground of suspicion or offense, will serve to bring this interesting branch of knowledge from the outer court of the Gentiles to the innermost shrine of the TEMPLE OF TRUTH.

The father of the Inductive Philosophy thus expresses his views: “In the works of creation, we behold a twofold emanation of the Divine virtue; of which the one relates to its power, the other to its wisdom. The former is especially observed in the creating the material mass; the latter, in the disposing the beauty of its form. This being established, it is to be remarked, that there is nothing in the history of creation to invalidate the fact, that the mass and substance of heaven and earth was created, _confusa_, undistinguishable, in one moment of time; but that the six days were assigned for disposing and adjusting it.”[17] This was emitted at a time when geology was in its nonage; the strata of the earth and their singular fossil contents were as yet unexplored;—still it is the oracular voice of one who had looked through the physical universe with the glance of science and of genius, and who knew and sought it only in relation to the Creator and his Word.

CONCLUSION.

THE CREATOR.

The magnificent work of creation, whose course we have been tracing in some of its primordial arrangements, in the geological phenomena of the earth’s crust, and in its relations to the vast planetary system of which it is a member, is the result over all of design and intelligence. The changes wrought in the earth’s structure and framework, from period to period, have not been brought about by merely mechanical changes of physical conditions. There are order and method in the inorganic, no less than in the organic forms, into which matter in any of the earth’s revolutions has been cast. There is prospective contrivance each for each. The alterations made in the outward surface, whether of sea or land, have been always such as were best adapted to the habits and requirements of successive living tribes. And the whole amount of change, in both departments of nature, has ever been in such measure and degree as to show, from the beginning, a persistent principle of stability in the system, and a wise, all-controlling arm to be regulating and directing everything. The invisible things of God, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen; and we cannot, if we would, rid ourselves of the thought, that somewhere and beyond, there is, not a “primitive cause”[18] only, but a Divine Being, the master of the universe, potentially in and present through all things.

Aristotle concludes his treatise “De Mundo,” with observing, that to treat of the world without saying anything of its Author would be impious, and he proceeds to show, on various grounds, the traces of an all-governing Deity. Newton concludes his great work, the “Principia,” by some reflections on the nature of the Supreme Cause, and infers from the structure of the visible world, “that it is governed by one almighty and all-wise Being, who rules the world, not as its soul, but as its Lord, exercising an absolute sovereignty over the universe, not as over his own body, but as over his work; and acting in it according to his pleasure, without suffering anything from it.” Speaking of the laws by which God governs the world, and giving his definition of the term LAW, Boyle says, “I look upon a law as a moral, not physical cause, as being, indeed, but a rational thing, according to which an intelligent and free agent is bound to regulate its actions. But inanimate bodies are utterly incapable of understanding what it is, or what it enjoins, or when they act conformably or unconformably to it: therefore, the actions of inanimate bodies, which cannot incite or moderate their own actions, are produced by real power, not by laws.” “Hence,” says Whewell, in his Bridgewater Treatise, “hence we infer that the intelligence by which the law is ordained, the power by which it is put in action, must be present at all times, and in all places where the effects of the law occur: that thus the knowledge and the agency of the Divine Being pervade every portion of the universe, producing all action and passion, all permanence and change. The laws of nature are the laws which He, in his wisdom, prescribes to his own acts; his universal presence is the necessary condition of any course of events, his universal agency the only origin of any efficient force.”

The researches of science, the deeper they go into the secrets of nature, issue in the surest and brightest disclosures of the Divine Architect of the universe. We are enabled, by the lights which are furnished by the various branches of ascertained knowledge, to read in some degree the mind and purpose of God in the creations of his hand. We see in many instances what is actually intended by certain arrangements and combinations,—why, and for what end, objects are constructed in a

## particular way, and how it is that trains of events are made to follow in

one uniform order rather than in any other. The universe, we discover, is not only bound by laws permanent and unchanging: the laws themselves have an end to serve, a particular result to accomplish. Accumulations of matter are brought together with a definite precise view; living substances are constructed with organs suited to their conditions of existence; relations of air, earth, and water, are established, which nicely answer the functions to be performed; and in ten thousands of cases are manifested the form, size, position, qualities of hardness, softness, and cohesion in the individual parts which can best secure their own special well-being along with the general conservation of the framework to which they are attached. How admirably, from age to age, do the organic as well as the inorganic structures of the geological narrative illustrate the truth of these remarks, where the manifestations of design are as numerous as the objects of creation, and as legible as if God had written their import by his own finger? The oldest, equally with the newest, book of nature, discloses the records of his will. We read them in the varied language traced and stereotyped upon their stony leaves. And in perusing the diversified contents of this wonderful volume, we cannot rise without the conviction that the being, attributes, and character of its Author, are brightly and indelibly impressed on every page.

The argument for the existence of a DESIGNING AGENT in the creation and arrangements of a material world, may be thus illustrated: A rude, unshapely piece of stone—say the “stone upon the heath”—does not at once impress the spectator with the conviction that it was made and placed where it is, by a designing intelligent being. But let it be chiseled into form, give it symmetry and proportion, and he immediately concludes that this is the result of skill and intention. Look at a piece of machinery—its framework of wood—its springs of iron—its wheels, beams and axles, composed of different metals, and arranged in different forms—and the inference is irresistible, that neither the forest, nor the quarry, nor the mine, yielded the materials in their present shape, nor combined among themselves to put them together.—Reason seeks for a different kind of agency, and experience tells that the mind and the hand of man have been there. We see water converted into steam, the steam brought into contact with a piece of metal, the vapor confined within an inclosure and acted upon by a condenser; and through means of this simple arrangement and the application of this natural power, duly regulated and sustained, we discern the triumph of mind over matter—the marvels which human industry and intelligence have been able to achieve. This combination of materials is not a thing of life.—Chance has produced none of these arrangements. The whole is the result of design, of aiming intention, of calculating intelligence. Examine the telescope, its apparatus of lenses, reflectors, and mirrors: look through that narrow tube as it is pointed in a clear starry night to the azure vault; and your shout of astonishment, when you first behold the increased magnitude of these orbs—their separation into systems and clusters—firmaments ascending in gradations of brilliancy, one above another—and the infinitely remote, studded and glowing with higher and higher galaxies—will partake of a mingled feeling of admiration at the immensity and grandeur of the universe—the wisdom and skill which combined to frame the instrument that brings within your ken, and enables you to gaze on, the glorious vision.

Now, in nature, we find the same indications of design, the same surprising combinations of skill, instruments framed with matchless wisdom and the most exquisite contrivance. Nay, all here, in every department of creation, leaves human ingenuity at an immeasurable distance. No statuary can rival that which is exhibited in the rocks, gems, and crystals of the earth. Machinery is transcendently surpassed, in the forms of every organic thing beneath or around, in minuteness, adaptation, and balancing of parts,—the steam-engine in energy and power—the ship by a more refined and skillful equipment of ropes, pulleys, and sails—and the telescope is not for a moment to be compared with the human eye in the beauty of its construction, the power of its movements, the amazing swiftness and variety of its glance.—But there is design and intelligence manifested in the works of man. They could not arrange themselves. They must have had an artificer. Draw near, look unto the works of creation, what cumulative evidence of their intelligent author, conclusive as the severest demonstrations of science. Man asks for a sign from heaven. Ten thousand intimations are given—millions, indeed, of miraculous contrivances meet him in every department of the universe.

This earth, however, is not an isolated body in the universe; it forms one of a system of worlds, and its geological history cannot be regarded as complete until we have viewed it in some of its more extended relations. The course of creation is traced in the planetary system, a series of masses of matter assuming one form, moving in one plane, following in one orbital path, revolving around a common center, enlightened and warmed by a common sun, and obedient, one and all, to the same great law of gravitation. The mighty problem of the universe has been solved upon the simple assumption, that a piece of our earth is like a piece of the other planets; that the properties of matter here are as the properties of matter above; and as the laws of motion and attraction below, so are they on high, and throughout infinite space. Astronomy thus derives all its achievements as a science from the earth, and the cause of the motions of the heavenly orbs is ascertained from experiments on the matter of the earth, which first led to the knowledge of regular dynamical laws. The field of astronomical research, in consequence, is not only the most wonderful, but it is also that in which our knowledge is the most accurate. Distant and infinitely remote as are the objects of the science, there is yet in no other department of natural philosophy results of investigation so completely satisfactory. With the precision of geometry, and the minute accuracy of numbers, the astronomer calculates the particular place of every one of the bodies of the solar system, at any particular hour and moment of the day. He determines the precise rate of their motions, and positions which they occupied in relation to the earth, in every past period of their history however remote, and even corrects the notations of former observers. He shows their relative distances, weights, dimensions, and influences upon one another; estimates the length of their days and years, eccentricities and perturbations; and describes the orbits in which they severally move, in their steady unwearied march through the heavens.—The undeniable effect of results like these, is to impress deeper upon the inquiring mind the conviction of foresight, method, and design in the vast system of which the earth is but a part; and as the earth gives lead to, and indicates some of the first lessons in, astronomy, so we derive in return a fuller knowledge of its various relations and past history than its own single geological tables can unfold.

When we proceed to speculate about the _manner_ of Deity’s actings, difficulties at once meet us in every quarter, partly from our utter incapacity to comprehend and partly from the imperfections of human language to express—even were our comprehension adequate to the task—the essential qualities of Deity himself. As the _anima mundi_, the ancients represented the Divine Being, as both the active and self-moving principle in nature, and likewise as passive, and acted upon by the external world. Newton, in order to express his idea of the Divine omnipresence, employed the term _sensorium_, as denoting the mode in which he was enabled to perceive whatever passed in space fully and intimately. And while nothing was farther from the mind of the great philosopher than the ascription of bodily organs to the Divinity, he had to defend himself from much bitter and vehement controversy in consequence. Equally liable to misrepresentation, and from the sane cause—the imperfection of language—was the manner in which Newton spoke of the eternity or infinity of the Supreme Being, as if he regarded him as present in all parts of time and space by _diffusion_: whereas his notion simply was, that since He is necessarily and essentially present in all parts of space and duration, space and duration must also necessarily exist. Durat semper, et adest ubique, et existendo semper et ubique, durationem et spatium constituit,—is the tenet which he held.

No less difficult is it to express correctly the inference which we may legitimately deduce of the PERSONALITY of the Godhead from the works and course of creation. And yet the idea is immediately consequent upon the conviction of a Divine existence, and is inseparable from it. The conception of both is necessarily involved in the same process of thought. Wherever we trace the actings of mind or of intelligence, the impress of design or the operations of a discriminating, discerning cause, reference is at one and the same instant made to a distinct personal subsistence. Power, wisdom, and goodness, may, indeed, be regarded in one way as abstract qualities. We can reason about them, and hold them up to our contemplation, as something distinct or different from the bodies in which they reside. Hence all our speculations respecting the laws of nature, the primary and secondary qualities of matter, the relations of cause and effect, to which principle of abstraction in man the various sciences owe their origin. The inductive philosophy is entirely built upon it. The creations of poetry, the peopling of the streams, groves, and mountains, with the ideal impersonations of fancy, are derived from the same source; while, by lifting us above the dominion of mere sense and attention to our physical wants, our spiritual energies are thereby awakened, and the soul enabled by its own inner visions to hold communings with new worlds, and to anticipate a new life.

But the principle of abstraction does not stop here. It both separates and combines. While it deals with the inferior manifestations of ideal qualities, it unites and embodies into one—links the universe to its Creator—represents him as the cause of all causes, the source of all power, and the fountain of all life; out of whose boundless, illimitable essence is the efflux of all being and existence. The ancients erroneously clothed their conceptions of Godhead in human shape, and multiplied the number of divinities to accord to the varieties of human passion, making gods many, as there were principles of good or evil in their own hearts; but still their superstition had a reality and foundation in nature. Their mythology had its origin in a true, though corrupted, theism; and giving form and locality to their numerous divinities, they but obeyed the dictates of that sentiment of the inner man, which, in unison with the voice of all creation, proclaims the existence of a Being whose personal subsistence and personal superintendence we necessarily associate with the laws and management of nature. HE is there among his works, their Director as well as author.

The UNITY of the Divine Being follows, in like manner, from an extended observation of the course of creation. There is but one God, as there is but one system of nature—one universe where the same law which acts upon all terrestrial bodies pervades all space, rules over the planets, and guides systems of worlds in their courses. Our deepest researches into the structure of the earth show, that the same forces have been operative there, as are still traced in passing changes on the surface. Similar organic forms were from the earliest periods in being, endowed with similar instincts, performing the self-same functions in the economy of nature, with their living types of the present day. The air, the sea, the earth; plants, animals, and man, are under one scheme of providence. The seasons are uniformly successive. Year to year we see the same causes in operation. Time rolls on; changes, vast and progressive, have been effected in the moral as well as physical aspect of the world, while bodies remain essentially what they were before, the conditions of sentient existence unaltered, and man occupies the same high intellectual position in the great scale of being. The same government thus maintains over all; the parts shifting and changing, the whole stable and collectively advancing; bound together by one invisible chain, and moving in obedience to one great principle of destiny and superintending will. Hence, upon the presumption that the character of the works determines the character of their author, the intelligent power which presides over all this must necessarily be ONE. Since creation in its elements, arrangements, and means of general harmony, is constructed upon a plan, and since that plan manifests the most perfect order—deviations controlled within limits, and convulsions only contributive to its greater stability—the inference cannot be resisted, that the Creator is essentially one in his being, as he is undivided in his purposes and

## actings.

When we narrow the field of inquiry, and look to man alone, in his relation to the external world, and the character of his moral constitution, the conclusion becomes still more decided and apparent. Here we see that the last of created beings is not only the highest in the scale, but likewise in the most perfect and extensive unison with the general scheme of nature. He spreads himself over the whole face of creation, is capable of enduring all climes, of deriving sustenance from the products of all countries, conveniences and the means of improvement from the rocks of all ages. If we cannot demonstrate that this earth was made exclusively for man’s use, we can still clearly show that he

## participates more largely in its various products than any of its other

inhabitants, while it furnishes, not only to the individual, but to the race, generation after generation, the amplest field of mental and moral cultivation of which their natures are capable. The God of the outward world is also, and pre-eminently, the God of man’s inner being. He who created the light, likewise formed the human body. The potter of the clay fashioned and quickened the immaterial spirit. The controller of universal nature reigns supreme in the dominion of the soul. The power that binds the planets in their orbits, gives law to the conscience, constraining it to acknowledge in its perception of truth and homage to virtue the reverence that is due to the One Righteous Governor over all.

Contemplated under this latter and most important aspect of our nature, we are brought, in fact, into immediate communication with the undivided Author of our being. The idea of many is excluded in the conviction that truth and duty are one and unalterable. The gravitating principle in matter is not more universal in its operation, nor more distinct in its constraining influence over all bodies, than is the principle of CONSCIENCE in referring the good and evil of all actions to the standard of rectitude and tribunal of a righteous judge. Tribes, the most remote from each other—the most debased in ignorance—the most polluted in guilt—agree in this common attribute of humanity. Mankind do not, indeed, acknowledge one and the same standard of morality, and in religious observances there is the utmost diversity of opinion and practice. But the sense of duty, the feeling of moral and religious obligation, is universally discriminative of the human family; the sentiment of right and wrong is engraven indelibly on all human hearts. And, amidst all the ignorance or misconceptions that may prevail as to the merit or demerit of particular actions, the moral principle points but to one foundation of truth—the One Supreme—the Lord of conscience as of creation.

The PERFECTIONS of the Supreme Being are, in like manner, as distinctly notified in the works of creation as the fact of the mere existence of a designing Creator. The immensity of the universe clearly demonstrates the _power_ in which it originated, and by which all its movements are still sustained, guiding the infinite systems of celestial bodies and the geological revolutions of our own planet with the same ease that it watches over and upholds the minutest objects in existence. There is no exhausting nor wearing out of the energies of nature: the arm that reared, still directs the stupendous fabric; and as skill and contrivance are manifest in every part, the greatest simplicity combined with the most exquisite adjustments, the utmost regularity prevailing in every department, and no failure in the operations of a single law throughout the vastness of creation, the conviction of consummate _wisdom_ and of infinite _omniscience_ irresistibly strikes upon the mind. No less clear and convincing are the evidences of _goodness_ in the system of creation which we have been contemplating. The works, formed by the Divine hand, and which now occupy the Divine care, are boundless in extent, and of infinite variety; and they appear, to the eye of the common observer, as well as to the searching intellect, all formed for use, all rich in beauty, all indicative of beneficence. There is not utility alone interwoven, but an inimitable loveliness painted on the face and stamped on every department of nature; while creatures innumerable, of various orders and of different structures, present themselves to our view, which, by their creation and preservation—by the powers they possess, and the enjoyments they attain—proclaim the liberality of their author to be boundless. Nay, the inanimate parts of nature bear testimony to the same truth; the sun warms and fertilizes the earth; the earth affords nourishment, and furnishes a convenient dwelling-place to the various living creatures that inhabit it; and thus dead matter, in all its arrangements and under all its past changes, by being framed in subserviency to the happiness of living and intelligent beings, clearly evinces the goodness of its Creator. But to Man, in addition, the inspiration of the Almighty has given understanding, and has constituted him supreme in this lower world. Whoever considers his nature and condition, the make of his body and the constitution of his mind, the provision that is furnished for the supply of his animal wants, the objects that are provided for the improvement of his intellectual faculties, and the scope that is afforded for the exercise of his moral affections, must acknowledge that, if the goodness of God be manifestly displayed in the other works of his hands, it shines with peculiar luster in the creation and preservation of man.

Thus, step by step, we rise to the loftiest conception which the human mind can embrace—the conception of a God—the personality, unity, and perfection of his being. How the conception of a Creator is formed, we cannot otherwise describe than by saying, that it springs up in the mind immediately upon the perception of an external world. It is not so much an exercise of reason, or elaborate effort of the understanding; but is rather a direct impression, traced at once upon the soul, as the image of Deity reflected from his works. All men possess it, for all men are so constituted, that they cannot look upon creation without the idea of a Creator accompanying and flowing from the act. The conception will be obscure, vague, and indistinct, according to the capacity, improvement, and general knowledge of the individual. But the conception is there, as necessarily as the effect follows the cause, the shadow the substance, the image the object which occasioned it. The heavens DECLARE the glory of God, the firmament SHOWS his handiwork, the earth bears the traces of his path. And just in the degree in which we study and examine his works—their uses and adaptations—their infinite variety, proportions, regularity, and magnitude—are our convictions of his existence deepened, our admiration of his being and attributes enhanced, our feeling of security under his rule strengthened, and our sense of obligation and responsibility increased and solemnized. Ignorance does not obliterate the sense of Deity; it confuses and multiplies the image of his existence: it leads to polytheism. Knowledge brightens the picture, and represents the Creator, as reflected in his works, EXCELLENT, GLORIOUS, AND INFINITELY PERFECT.

FINIS.

FOOTNOTES

[1] Playfair.

[2] Playfair.

[3] Works, vol. i, page 189.

[4] Dr. Dieffenbach’s New Zealand.

[5] The diamonds found in the Ural chain are supposed to be connected with the carbonaceous grits of the devonian and carboniferous periods, which have been transmuted into metamorphic micaceous rocks, and contain the diamonds between the flakes of mica, just as garnets occur in mica-schist. Captain Franklin discovered diamonds in Bundelkund, imbedded in sandstone, with coal beneath, and supposed to belong to the true carboniferous system.

[6] Westminster Review, No. LXXIX.

[7] The strata in which these tracks occur have since been carefully investigated by Prof. H. D. Rogers, who has ascertained that they belong truly to the carboniferous red shale, and are, therefore, of an age essentially later than that attributed to them. In a communication made to the American Association, Prof. Rogers says:—They occur, indeed, in a geological horizon, only a few hundred feet below the conglomerate which marks the beginning of the productive coal series, in which series similar foot-prints, attributed to batrachian reptiles, had been previously met with in Western Pennsylvania. Instead, therefore, of constituting a register of the antique life earlier than any hitherto discovered, by at least a whole chapter in the geological book, they carry back its age only by a single leaf. The surfaces upon which these interesting foot-prints abound are the smooth, divisional plains separating the beds of red sandstone, and are invariably coated with a fine impalpable material of a once slimy and soft mud; and everything in the texture of these surfaces goes to prove that they were in contact with the air, and were the stages of rest between the alternate depositions of the strata. Many of them are covered with ripple-lines and water-marks, suggestive of the shelving shore, and, with few exceptions, they are spotted over with little circular impressions, imputed to the pattering of rain. All over the successive floors of this ancient world, as delicate and impressible in their texture as so much wax or parchment, are the footsteps and the trails of various creeping things,—the prints of some unknown four-footed creature, thought to be reptilian in its nature, but of whose true affinities the Professor expressed his doubts, trails analogous to those of worms and molluscs, and various other marks, written in hieroglyphics too ancient to be interpreted. The larger foot-prints are, for the most part, five-toed, alternate in the steps, and with the fore feet as large nearly as the hind ones; marks of the scratching and slipping of the feet, and the half effacing passage of the tail, or of some soft portion of the body, are often distinctly legible.

Prof. Agassiz stated his doubts as to the reptilian character of the foot-prints noticed, and, after describing the difference in the arrangement of the locomotive organs of the modern and the ancient fishes, gave it as his belief, that in those early periods there were fishes of a structure which permitted them to walk upon all fours.

[8] Rapport sur les Poissons Fossiles de l’Argile de Londres.

[9] Lyell’s Principles of Geology, vol. i, p. 269.

[10] Restitution of Decayed Intelligence, by Richard Verstegan. London, 8vo, 1605. Noticed in “Chambers’ Journal,” June, 1846.

[11] Dr. Pye Smith on Scripture Geology.

[12] This branch of the argument has also been minutely and ingeniously extended in the last work of Mr. Hugh Miller, “Foot-prints of the Creator,” where the author dwells particularly on the comparative measurements of the different fossils found in different formations; a masterly and felicitous addition to the side of truth.

[13] “There is no doubt that coral, under favorable conditions of growth, increases to an enormous extent, and very rapidly: and although there are many instances on record of reefs which have not increased for many years, there are others telling a very different tale. The case of Matilda Atoll, described by Captain Beechy, is quoted as an example of this latter kind, this atoll having been converted in thirty-four years from being a reef of rocks into a lagoon island, fourteen miles in length, with one of its sides covered nearly all the way with high trees. Some experiments were also mentioned, in which it has been attempted to measure the rate of increase of different kinds of corals, and as one result of these, is an instance of a growth of two feet thick of coral, accumulated on the copper bottom of a vessel in the course of twenty months.”—_Geology of the Voyage of the Beagle, by Charles Darwin._

[14] Mrs. Somerville’s Physical Geography.

[15] Mr. Davis.

[16] The Pre-Adamite Earth.

[17] 1. De Augm. Scien. L. I.

[18] La Place.

GLOSSARY OF SCIENTIFIC TERMS.

ACCRETION. Increase of size or growth by the mechanical addition of new

## particles.

ACLINIC LINE. The magnetic equator.

ACOTYLEDONOUS. Plants having no seed-lobes. Mosses and ferns belong to this division, and most of the coal plants are acotyledonous.

ACTYNOLITE. A green mineral found chiefly in primitive formations often crystallized in six sided prisms.

AEROLITES. Stones which appear to have fallen from the higher parts of the atmosphere. They are sometimes called Meteorites.

ALGÆ. A division of plants including the common sea-weeds.

ALUMINOUS. Containing alumina, or rather silicate of alumina, which is the base of pure clay. Thus, aluminous means _clayey_. The word is, however, sometimes used in the sense of containing _alum_, a sulphate of alumina and potash.

AMMONITE. A fossil genus of many-chambered shells allied to the Nautilus, named from their resemblance to the horns on the statues of Jupiter Ammon.

AMORPHOUS. Without regular form.

AMORPHOZOA. Animals without definite form—sponges.

AMYGDALOID. Almond-shaped. Any rock is called by this name which contains rounded or elongated minerals imbedded in some simple mineral or base.

AMYGDALOIDAL (in mineralogy). A conglomerate.

ANALCIME is found in granite and gneiss rock—generally in cubes of various colors.

ANANCHYTES. A genus of fossil echini or sea-urchins—in the chalk, &c.

ANCHYLOSIS. (Gr., crooked), a joint is said to be anchylosed, when so diseased as to become, or when it becomes, stiff or immovable.

ANNELIDÆ. (Annulus, a ring)—Lamarck’s worm-shaped animals, as Serpula, vermilia, &c.

ANOPLOTHERIUM. The name given to a characteristic genus of a group of extinct quadrupeds found fossil in the older Tertiary deposits, and nearly allied to the tapir and pig.

ANTICLINAL. Or _Anticlinal axis_. A saddle-shaped position of rocks, the result of disturbance.

APIOCRINITE. Pear-shaped crinoidea—lily-shaped animals.

AQUEOUS. That which is dependent on water. Aqueous rocks are those produced by deposit from water.

ARBORESCENT. Branching like a tree.

ARENACEOUS. Sandy.

ARGENTIFEROUS. Containing silver.

ARGILLACEOUS. Clayey.

ARTICULATA. A natural division of animals having their limbs articulated or jointed together, like the lobster.

ASAPHUS. An obscure genus of trilobites.

ASBESTUS. A fibrous mineral of which an incombustible cloth is sometimes made.

ASTEROLEPIS. (Gr., star scale). It is the largest fish yet found in the _Old Red Sandstone_.

AUGITE. (Gr., luster)—a mineral.

BASALT. An igneous rock, often columnar and supposed to be ancient volcanic lava. It is the most common of the group called _Trap-rocks_.

BED or STRATUM. A layer of material the whole of which exhibits some common character.

BELEMNITE. A dart-shaped shell, probably the ancient representative of some of our cuttle-fish. The shell is conical and chambered.

BELLEROPHON. A small chambered-shell like the Nautilus.

BOTRYOIDAL (in Mineralogy). Clustered like a bunch of grapes.

BRACHIOPODA. A group of shell-bearing animals having two long spiral arms serving to assist in locomotion and for other purposes.

BREVIPENNATE. Short-winged.

CÆLACANTHUS. A fish of the Devonian formation.

CALAMITE. A fossil from the coal-measures resembling a gigantic reed.

CALAMUS. A fossil reed-like plant.

CALCAIRE GROSSIER. A coarse limestone of the Older Tertiary period, found in the Paris basin.

CALCAIRE SILICEUX. A compact silicious limestone sometimes replacing the calcaire grossier.

CALCAREOUS. Containing lime.

CAMBRIAN. Belonging to Wales. The “Cambrian system” in Geology, is a name suggested by Professor Sedgwick, to designate part of the Silurian series of North Wales.

CARAPACE. The upper shell of reptiles.

CARBONIFEROUS. Containing carbon.

CARNIVOROUS. Flesh-eating. The “Carnivora” in Zoology consist of a group of animals eminently carnivorous.

CAUDAL. Connected with the tail.

CEPHALOPODA. A group of animals of which the Nautilus and Cuttlefish are examples, having the locomotive apparatus immediately over the head and stomach.

CEPHALASPIS (Buckler-head). A fish.

CESTRACION. A fish, a genus of an extinct family of sharks.

CETACEANS. The whale tribe.

CHALCEDONY. A silicious mineral, like Cornelian.

CHALYBEATE. Water holding iron in solution.

CHARA, CHARACIDÆ. An aquatic plant fossilized.

CHEIROLEPIS (Thorny scale). A fossil fish.

CHELONIA. Sea tortoise.

CHERT. A silicious mineral, resembling common flint, but of coarser texture.

CHŒROPOTAMUS. An extinct quadruped found in the Eocene of England.

CHEIRACANTHUS (thorny hand). A fish of the Old Red Sandstone.

CIRRHIPEDA (hair feet). Balanus-Coronula; Anatifa are of this family.

CLINOMETER. An instrument for measuring the dip and determining the strike of beds or strata.

COAL-MEASURES. The whole group of deposits, consisting chiefly of sands and shales, with which coal is usually found.

COCCOSTEUS. (Gr., berry on bone)—a Ganoid fish.

COLEOPTERA. Beetles whose wings are covered with a hard sheath.

COLUMNAR. Arranged in columns.

CONCHIFERA. One of the great divisions of Conchology.

CONCHOIDAL. Resembling a shell. Used in Mineralogy to designate a

## particular kind of fracture.

CONDYLE. A knob at the end of a bone, a joint.

CONFORMABLE. When the planes of bedding of two successive beds or strata are parallel to each other they are said to be _conformable_; when not parallel they are _unconformable_.

CONGENERS. Species belonging to the same genus.

CONGLOMERATE or PUDDINGSTONE. A rock made up of rounded water-worn fragments of rock or pebbles cemented together by another mineral substance.

CONIFERÆ. Trees that bear cones, as the pine.

COPROLITE. The fossil remains of excrement.

COSMICAL. Relating to the universe.

COSMOGONY. The word formerly applied to speculations concerning the earth’s age and history.

COTYLEDONOUS. Plants whose seeds have but one lobe.

CRAG. The name given to certain Tertiary deposits in Norfolk and Suffolk.

CRETACEOUS. Belonging to the chalk.

CRINOID. Belonging to the encrinite family.

CROPPING OUT. The _out-crop_ of a bed is its first appearance at the surface.

CRUSTACEANS. Belonging to the crab or lobster family, &c.

CRYPTOGAMOUS. Plants without apparent flowers.

CRYSTAL. The regular form in which a mineral is presented when that form can be described mathematically. A mineral is said to be _crystalline_ when its atoms are arranged with reference to some definite form.

CTENACANTHUS. Belonging to the Placoids.

CTENOIDS. Fishes with comb-shaped scales.

CTENOPTYCHIUS. A fish of the chalk formation.

CULM. An impure kind of coal.

CUMBRIAN. Occurring in Cumberland. The “Cumbrian System” of Prof. Sedgwick is a part of the Silurian series of the Lake district of Cumberland and Westmoreland.

CYCADEÆ. Fossil plants of the coal-measures.

CYCLAS. A small bivalve shell recent and fossil.

CYCLOID. Marginated scales.

DEBRIS. The fragments of rocks removed by the action of weathering or by water.

DECORTICATED. Stripped of bark.

DEFLECTION. Deviation from a straight course.

DEGRADATION. The wearing away of rocks, generally effected by aqueous

## action.

DELIQUESCENT. Becoming fluid by the attraction of water from the atmosphere.

DELTA. The alluvial land formed by a river at its mouth, usually expanded in a fan shape like the fourth letter of the Greek alphabet (Δ), and thence called _Delta_.

DENUDATION. The act of laying bare rocks formerly covered up, the removal of the overlying masses being effected by water.

DERMAL. Belonging to the skin.

DETRITUS. Matter rubbed off by mechanical action from other rocks.

DIALLAGE. A mineral.

DIDELPHYS. A pouched animal, as the Opossum.

DINOSAURIA. Land lizards—only found fossil.

DIP (in Geology). The angle of inclination which the plane of a bed makes with the plane of the horizon.

DIPLOPTERUS, DIPLODUS, and DIPLOCANTHUS. Fishes of the Devonian or Old red sandstone.

DIPTERUS (having two wings). A fish of the Old red sandstone.

DODO. A large bird once found in the Isle of France, but now extinct.

DOLOMITE. Crystalline carbonate of lime and magnesia.

DYKE. A rock, generally crystalline, occupying a rent or fissure in some other and older rock. A dyke differs from a mineral vein chiefly in its greater magnitude and in the absence of ramifications.

DYNAMICS (Gr., power). Used in mechanics.

ECHINODERMATA. Having a skin like a hedgehog.

EFFLORESCENCE. The term used to describe the falling to powder of certain minerals on exposure.

EMBOUCHURE. The mouth of a great river.

ENALIOSAURIA, PLESIOSAURUS and PLIOSAURUS. Marine Saurians, as the Ichthyosaurus.

ENCRINITE. Stone lily.

ENDOGENOUS. Plants that increase from within, as lilies, grasses, and among trees, palms.

ENTOMOSTRACEA. One of Cuvier’s sections of Crustaceans.

EOCENE. The name given by Sir C. Lyell to the lowest and oldest division of the Tertiary series of rocks.

EQUISETUM. A plant, fossil and recent.

ESCARPMENT. The steep face of a mountain chain or a ridge of high land.

EXOGENOUS. Plants which increase their wood by external additions or rings of growth.

EXUVIÆ. A name sometimes given to all fossil remains found in the earth’s crust.

FAUNA. The whole group of animals peculiar to a country or natural region at some one period.

FELDSPAR. A hard silicious rock.

FERRUGINOUS. Irony, or containing iron.

FERN. (Lat., Felices), a class of cryptogamous plants.

FISSILE. Capable of being split asunder.

FLUSTRA. A parasitic zoophyte or polyparia, which covers sea-weeds and shells.

FÆCAL SEDIMENT. Dregs, excrement.

FORAMINIFERA. The name given to a group of many-chambered shells, generally microscopic, the chambers communicating by a small open orifice (_foramen_).

FOSSIL. A word originally applied to all substances dug out of the earth, including therefore all minerals, but now limited in its application to the remains of organic beings, whether vegetable or animal, buried beneath the surface.

FOSSILIFEROUS. Containing fossils or organic remains.

FRITH. A deep and comparatively narrow arm of the sea.

FRONDS. The leaf of a fern is called a frond.

FUCOID. That which resembles a _fucus_, or seaweed:—fossil remains of fuci are called fucoids.

FUSIFORM. Spindle-shaped.

GALENA. Sulphuret of lead.

GANOID. A group of fishes having enameled scales.

GASTEROPODA. A group of shell-bearing animals covered by one valve, and having a fleshy foot attached to the belly.

GAULT. A bluish clay underlying the Chalk and Upper green sand in England.

GAVIAL. A species of shark found in the Ganges.

GEODES (in mineralogy) a round hollow stone whose cavity is usually filled with crystals.

GLACIS. A gently sloping bank.

GLYPTOLEPIS. (Gr., carved scale.)

GLYPTOPOMUS. A Devonian fossil fish.

GNEISS. The name given to mixtures of quartz, feldspar, and mica, in which there is a laminated arrangement of the different ingredients.

GONIATITES. Chambered fossil shells.

GRANITE. A rock consisting generally of crystals of feldspar and mica imbedded in a quartzy base.

GRAMINÆ. Grasses.

GRAPTOLITES or SEA-PENS. Fossils of the lower Silurian system.

GRAUWACKE or GRAYWACKE. The name given by German geologists to some of the older fossiliferous rocks, and generally of a gray color, sandy composition, and fissile nature.

GRYPHIÆ. Fossil bivalve shells found in the Lias, &c.

HABITAT. The natural district to which a species of animals or vegetables is confined in its distribution.

HEXAHEDRAL. Having six equal sides.

HETEROCERCAL. Applied to the tail of a fish, means that the upper lobe extends farther than the under.

HETEROPODA. An order of univalve molluscs, whose feet form a kind of fin.

HOLOPTYCHIUS. A Ganoid fish of the coal-measures.

HORNBLENDE. An important mineral in the composition of some rocks.

HOMOCERCAL. Applied to fishes having equal lobed tails.

HORNSTONE. A variety of quartz found in volcanic districts.

HYALINE. Transparent like glass.

HYBODENTES. Fossil fish.

HYLÆOSAURUS. Fossil lizard of the Wealden.

HYPERSTHENE. A mineral.

HYPOGENE ROCKS. Rocks formed beneath others or which are assumed to have obtained their present aspect underneath the earth’s surface.

ICHTHYODORULITE. The fossil spine of certain fishes resembling sharks.

ICHTHYOLITES. Fragments of the bones of fossil fishes.

ICHTHYOLOGY. The study and description of fishes.

ICHTHYOSAURUS. A marine reptile (fish-lizard), whose remains are very abundant in rocks of the Secondary period.

IGNEOUS ROCKS. Rocks, such as lava, trap, and some others which have been fused by volcanic heat.—Granite and other porphyritic rocks are sometimes called crystalline.

IGNIGENOUS. Produced by fire.

IGUANODON. Extinct gigantic lizard.

IMBRICATED. Covered with scales overlapping each other like tiles on the roof of a house.

INOCERAMUS. A bivalve of the chalk formation.

INORGANIC. Not produced by vital action.

INVERTEBRATA. Animals not furnished with a back bone.

JUNCUS (in botany). A rush.

LACERTIANS. Lizards.

LACUSTRINE. Belonging to a lake.

LAGOON. A salt-water lake, or part of a sea nearly inclosed by a strip of land.

LAMINATED. Arranged in thin plates or _laminæ_.

LENTICULAR. Lens-shaped.

LEPIDOIDES. Extinct fish of the Oolite formation.

LLANDEILO FLAGS. A division of the lower silurian formation of Murchison.

LIAS. A provincial name now generally adopted to designate the calcareous clay or clayey limestone occurring between the Upper new red sandstone and the Oolite.

LIGNEOUS. Woody.

LIGNITE. Wood converted into an imperfect kind of coal.

LITHOLOGY (lithos, a stone; logos, a discourse). Description of stones.

LITTORAL. Belonging to the shore.

LOPHIODON. A fossil animal allied to the tapir.

LYCOPODIUM. A cryptogamous plant.

MACAUCO. A four-handed animal allied to the Ape family.

MAMMALIA. Animals that suckle their young.

MARL. A mixture of clay and lime.

MARSUPIAL. An animal having a pouch, as the kangaroo.

MASTODON. A gigantic extinct quadruped resembling the elephant.

MATRIX. The earthy or stony matter in which a mineral or fossil is imbedded.

MECHANICAL ROCKS. Rocks formed by deposition from water.

MEGALOSAURUS. A gigantic extinct lizard.

MEGALICHTHYS. Megas, great; ichthus, fish.

METAMORPHIC ROCKS. Rocks that have undergone change or metamorphosis since their original formation.

METATARSAL. The part of the foot between the ankle and toes.

METEOROLOGY. The science of the phenomena of the atmosphere.

MICA SLATE. Is the lowest stratified rock except gneiss—it is unfossiliferous.

MIOCENE. The middle of the three divisions of tertiary rocks, according to Sir C. Lyell.

MOLASSE. A provincial name for a sandstone associated with marl and conglomerates, found abundantly in the great valley of Switzerland. It belongs to the middle tertiary period.

MOLECULES. The ultimate particles or atoms of bodies.

MOLLUSCA. A division in Conchology.

MONOMYARIA. Bivalve shells having but one adductor muscle.

MORAINE. A Swiss term for the débris of rocks brought down into valleys by glaciers.

MYRICACIÆ. Plants of the Gale family.

MYTILUS. A marine shell, the mussel.

NEUROPTERIS. A fossil fern of the coal-measures.

NODULE. A rounded irregular-shaped mass.

NUCLEUS. The solid center, about which matter is often collected to form solids.

NUMMULITES. A group of foraminiferous shells, some of them of large size and very abundant, occurring in rocks chiefly of the oldest tertiary period.

OOLITE. A limestone composed of rounded particles, like the roe of a fish. The name _Oolitic_ is applied to a considerable group of deposits in which this limestone occurs.

ORGANIC. Exhibiting organization, or the results of vital force. _Organic remains_, or _fossils_, are the remains of the animals and vegetables of a former state of existence found buried in rocks.

ORNITHIC. Relating to birds.

ORNITHORHYNCHUS. A singular animal, found in New Holland, called also the water-mole.

ORTHOCERA. A straight-chambered shell of the Silurian formation.

OSSEOUS. Bony: _Osseous breccia_ is a conglomerate made up of bones cemented together by lime, and mixed with earthy matter.

OSTEOLEPIS (bone-scale). A fish of the Old red sandstone.

OSTEOLOGICAL. Relating to bones.

OUTCROP. The line at which a stratum first shows itself at the surface in inclined deposits.

OVIPAROUS. Egg-laying animals.

PACHYDERMATA. A group of animals so called from the thickness of their skin. The elephant and pig are well known examples.

PALÆONISCUS. A fossil fish of the Magnesian limestone of England.

PALÆONTOLOGY. The science which treats of fossil organic remains; it is the zoology and botany of the ancient conditions of the earth.

PALÆOTHERIUM. A genus of Pachydermata allied to the Tapir.

PECOPTERIS. A fern of the coal-measures.

PELAGIAN. Belonging to the sea.

PENTACRINITE. A stone lily with five-sided foot-stalk.

PETROLEUM. Mineral pitch.

PHÆNOGAMOUS, or PHANEROGAMIC PLANTS. Those in which the reproductive organs are apparent.

PHRYGANEA. A family of insects which breed in water.

PHYLLOLEPIS. Leaf-scale.

PHYSICAL. Literally _natural_, but used in scientific language in treating of the higher and wider views of various departments with reference to the whole external world, and not to mere human objects.

PHYTOLOGY. The department of Natural History which relates to plants. Botany.

PLACOID. A group of fishes, so called from the structure of their scales.

PLANORBIS. A fresh water univalve. Fossil and recent.

PLATYGNATHUS. (Greek; platus, wide, and gnathos, jaw or mouth.)

PLESIOSAURUS. An extinct genus of reptiles.

PLIOCENE, OLDER AND NEWER. The upper part of the Tertiary series, so called by Sir C. Lyell from the preponderance of recent shells in them.

PLUMBAGO (Black lead). The name commonly given to _graphite_, a form of carbon.

PLUTONIC ROCKS. Rocks supposed to be due to igneous action at great depths below the earth’s surface, have been thus named by older geologists. The igneous action is not manifest in such rocks, but presumed, as in the case of granite.

POLYPARIA. A group of animals of which the _coral animal_ is a well known example.

PORCELLIA. The papaw, a plant now called asimina.

PORPHYRY. Any rock having crystals imbedded in a base of other mineral composition. Thus granite is a porphyritic rock, having crystals of feldspar and mica imbedded in a quartz base.

PREDACEUS. Preying upon other animals.

PREHNITE. A mineral.

PRIMARY, or PRIMITIVE. This name is commonly applied to the rocks which underlie those that are manifestly of mechanical origin and contain fossils.

PRODECTUS. A bivalve shell.

PTERICHTHYS. (Winged fish.) A fossil of the Old red sandstone.

PTERODACTYL. A remarkable genus of reptiles adapted for flight; its remains have been found in a fossil state throughout the Secondary rocks.

PTEROPODA. Marine animals having wing-like fins.

PUDDING STONE. The name often given to coarse conglomerates in which the fragments or pebbles are rounded.

PYRITES. A name given to the combinations of certain metals with sulphur.

QUA-QUA-VERSAL. The dip of beds in every direction from an elevated central point. The beds on the flanks of a volcanic cone dip in this way.

QUARTZ. The common form of silica; rock-crystal and flint are examples.

RACEME (in botany). When the florets are arranged along the sides of a general peduncle.

RADIATA. A division of the animal kingdom so called because the body is frequently presented in a radiated form like the common star-fish.

RETICULATED. A structure of crossed fibers, like a net, is said to be reticulated.

ROCK (in Geology). Any mass of mineral matter of considerable or indefinite extent and nearly uniform character, is called in geological language a rock, without regard to its hardness or compactness: thus, loose sand and clay, as well as sandstone and limestone, are spoken of under this name.

ROCK SALT. Common salt occurring in a crystalline state in rocks.

ROE-STONE. The name sometimes given to _Oolite_.

RUMINANTIA. An important group of quadrupeds including those which chew the cud, as the ox, deer, &c.

SACCHAROID. Having the texture of loaf sugar.

SALIFEROUS SYSTEM. The new red sandstone system, so called from the salt with which it is associated in parts of England.

SAURIAN (reptilian). Any animal of the lizard tribe, and many extinct reptiles only distantly allied to these.

SAUROIDS. Marine fishes resembling lizards.

SALMONOIDES. Resembling the salmon.

SCHIST. A name often used as synonymous with slate, but more commonly, and very conveniently, limited to those rocks which do not admit of indefinite splitting, like slate, but are only capable of a less perfect separation into layers or laminæ. Of this kind are gneiss, mica-schist, &c., often more or less crystalline.

SCIRPUS (in Botany). A rush.

SCORIÆ. The name given to volcanic ashes. The word means any kind of cinders, but its scientific use is thus limited.

SHALE. An indurated clay, less fissile than schist, but splitting with tolerable facility in plates parallel to each other, and to the original planes of bedding.

SHELL MARL. A deposit of clay, peat, and silt, mixed with shells, which collects at the bottom of fresh-water lakes.

SERPULA (in Conchology). A worm-like marine shell.

SERRATED. Having points like a saw.

SIGILLARIA. Fossil plants found in the coal-measures.

SILEX, SILICA. The name given by Mineralogists to a pure earth, more commonly spoken of as _flint_, and, when crystallized, called rock-crystal.

SILT. The name usually given to the muddy deposit found at the bottom of running streams.

SILURIAN. The name given by Sir R. Murchison to an important series of fossiliferous rocks well developed in, and first described from, a district in Wales and Shropshire formerly inhabited by the _Siluri_, a tribe of Ancient Britons.

SIPHUNCLE. A small tube passing through an orifice in the septum of a chambered shell.

SPHENOPTERIS. Fossilfern (leaf wedge-shaped).

SPHEROID. Having a shape nearly resembling that of a sphere or globe.

SPIRIFER. An extinct bivalve.

STALACTITE and STALAGMITE. Concretions of carbonate of lime and sometimes of other minerals, as quartz or even malachite, deposited by water dropping from the roof of a cavern or other vacant space.

STEATITE. Soapstone.

STIGMARIA. A coal fossil, an aquatic plant.

STRATIFICATION. The condition of rocks or accumulated minerals deposited in layers, beds, or _strata_.

STRIKE. The line of bearing of strata, or the direction of any horizontal line on a stratum.

SUPERPOSITION. An expression very commonly employed by Geologists to describe the order of arrangement when one bed or stratum reposes upon another.

SUPRA-CRETACEOUS. A term applied by Sir H. de la Bèche to rocks overlying the chalk. The term Tertiary is now universally adopted for this group.

SYENITE. The granite of the quarries of Syene in Egypt. It is usual to call by this name any combination of quartz, feldspar, and hornblende.

SYNCLINAL AXIS. The line of depression between two anticlinal axes.

SYNCONDROSIS. Connection of bones by cartilage.

TEREBRATULA. A fossil shell.

TERTIARY STRATA. The series of sedimentary rocks overlying the chalk, or other representative of the Secondary period, and extending thence to the rocks of the Recent period.

TESTACEA. Molluscous or soft animals having a shelly covering.

THECODONT. A fossil saurian or marine lizard.

THERMAL. Hot. _Thermal Springs_ are springs whose temperature is above the mean annual temperature of the place where they break out.

TETRAPTEROUS. Four-winged.

TIBIA. The principal bone of the leg.

TOAD-STONE. The name given by miners to beds of basalt, occurring in Derbyshire.

TRACHYTE. A feldspathic variety of lava.

TRAP. Crystalline rocks, composed chiefly of feldspar, augite and hornblende, combined in many ways, and exhibiting great varieties of aspect, are frequently called by this name.

TRIAS. The name given on the continent to the beds of the New red sandstone series.

TRILOBITE. A common fossil in the Dudley limestone, so named from the characteristic species having the body divided into three lobes. Trilobites are the remains of a remarkable extinct family of Crustaceans, of which the crab, lobster, &c., are modern representatives.

TRIONYX. A genus of tortoise, having three claws.

TUFACEOUS, TUFF. An Italian name for a variety of volcanic rock of earthy texture, and made up chiefly or entirely of fragments of volcanic ashes.

TURBINATED. Shells which have a spiral or screw-like structure are thus named.

UNCONFORMABLE SUPERPOSITION (instratification). The condition of strata when one has been deposited horizontally upon the upturned edges of those immediately below.

UNIO. Fresh water bivalve.

VERTEBRATA, or Vertebrated Animals. A large and most important division of the animal kingdom, including all those animals provided with a back bone. Each separate bone of the back is called a _vertebra_.

VERTEX. The summit or upper part of a solid.

VITREOUS. Glassy. Used in Mineralogy to designate a peculiar luster.

VIVIPAROUS. Bearing young alive.

WARP. The deposit of muddy waters.

WEALDEN. The name given to an important fresh-water formation, occurring between the Cretaceous and Oolitic rocks, chiefly in the Wealds of Kent and Sussex.

WHIN-STONE. A provincial term applied to some trap rocks.

ZAMIA. A plant allied to the palm, plentiful east of the Cape of Good Hope.

ZEOLITE. A group of minerals which swell and boil up when exposed to the blow-pipe flame.

ZOOPHYTE. The term applied to some animals of low organization, which, during the greater part of their lives, are attached to some foreign substance, and are incapable of locomotion.