diate support, but for the continuance of their species the herb "yielding seed after its kind," and the "tree yielding the fruit" which contained the seed," after its kind." The wild and bare globe exhibited a sudden clothing of colour and beauty, vivid, prolific, and perpetual.

to

Another extraordinary change was now begin, extending through the Universe-the motion of the heavenly bodies in their orbits.

THE FOURTH DAY.-GOD SAID, LET THERE

BE LIGHTS IN THE FIRMAMENT OF HEAVEN TO DIVIDE THE DAY FROM THE NIGHT, AND LET THEM BE FOR SIGNS AND FOR SEASONS, AND FOR DAYS AND YEARS. AND LET THEM BE FOR LIGHTS IN THE

AND GOD MADE

FIRMAMENT OF THE HEAVEN TO GIVE LIGHT UPON
THE EARTH, AND IT WAS SO.
TWO GREAT LIGHTS, THE GREATER LIGHT TO RULE
THE DAY, AND THE LESSER LIGHT TO RULE THE
NIGHT; THE STARS ALSO.

The distinction of day and night had been made on the first day. That distinction implied the revolution of the earth on its axis; for, without it, evening and morning could not have existed. But another species of motion was now to be communicated to the planetary system, and, so far as our knowledge extends, to all systems-the movement of the inferior orbs round their suns. On this day the lights of heaven were appointed to distinguish seasons and years, as well as days. But

seasons and years altogether result from the revolution of the planets round the central luminary: the seasons depending on the approach to or recess from the sun, combined with the position of the axis, and the year being only the name of the period employed in that circuit. That the Deity could impress the motion round the axis on the first day, and withhold the motion round the sun until the fourth, is as conceivable as that they are totally separate in their direction, and given for palpably distinct purposes. This was the first communication of those influences which, in the want of clearer terms, we call centrifugal and centripetal. Needless perplexity has been produced by the common error of conceiving, that on this day the sun and stars were formed. The text refers, not to their creation, but to their uses. The heavens were called into being on the first day; an expression destitute of all meaning, if it does not mean the heavenly bodies. Those bodies on the fourth day were invested with new qualities for a new character: they were rendered the measures of time. The sun and moon alternately illumining the earth, were now especially appointed as the dividers of the year and the month-" the stars also." The words he made, in our translation, are not warranted by the original. true meaning is, that the stars were, in their degree, now employed in the same character with the two luminaries peculiarly presiding over night

The

and day they were also givers of light, and dividers of seasons'. In our vapoury skies, the stars are comparatively obscure; but in three-fourths of the earth, and eminently in the regions near and between the tropics, their use has been felt from the first ages; there, they not merely give a light sufficient for night travel, but by their risings and settings, both dependent on the daily motion of the earth, they supply an unerring dial of the night hours; and, by their place in the heavens, announce the seasons, and even designate periods of those seasons highly important to man. In the east, they are the silent and lovely friends of the

The distinction between the light of the heavenly bodies, and the use to which it was first applied, on the fourth day, is perfectly marked in the original. In the former instance, the word is, N, simply light; in the latter, it is ND, lightbearers, depositories of illumination. The Septuagint has pwc and wornpes, which bear the same relation. Rosenmuller is decided on this appropriation of the stars to the fourth day, merely as to their uses: "De determinatione astrorum ad certos quosdam usus orbi terrarum præstandos esse sermonem (constat) non de eorum productione.”—p. 61.

That the sun and moon were created on the first day is the Hebrew opinion. "Hebræi dicunt solem et Lunam creatos fuisse primo die. Hebræi solis fuisse (primam) lucem intelligunt, quod sol sit fons et origo lucis. (Critici Sacri, in Gen. 3.)

The ingenious conception of Frank (Chronologia Fundamentalis) that on the fourth day alone the moon could be visible for the first time to the earth, depends on the supposition, that on the first day the moon was directly in a line between the sun and the earth, of which we can have no knowledge.

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traveller, the mariner, and the husbandman; as they are to us, the book of the sublimest science of the philosopher; and to all, the writing of the finger of God in the skies.

THE FIFTH DAY.-Another admirable evidence of the Divine power was now to be giventhe connexion of animal life with matter.

"And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven.

"And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good.

"And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth. And the evening and the morning were the fifth day."

The connexion of animal life with organized body instantly overthrows the whole modern and mechanical system of aggregation. The construction of a living body cannot be gradual. The frame must be formed in all its parts at once, before it can exercise the common functions of life. The whale, that, with its fins finished, must wait a hundred or a thousand years for the finishing of its lungs by the "course of nature;" must

wait for ever.

or move.

The infant, born with half a brain and half a heart, must die before he could think The living machine may increase in size, strength, or faculty, but it must be set in action complete, or not at all. And this completeness, in the first instance, was Creation, the result of a primary and direct volition of the Deity.

THE SIXTH DAY.-A higher rank of existence was now to follow, in the tribes of terrestrial animals.

"And God said, let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind; cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it

was so."

The earth thus filled with plants, and with living forms and embodied minds, was next to witness the perfection of living form united to the highest order of earthly mind. Man was to be created, the sovereign of earth, its products, and its animals.

"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. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he

them."