presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming?" The highest office on earth shall have the highest reward in glory." And they that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever." How sublime the spectacle of Paul, as he stood on the brink of the grave, beyond which he looked through the fires of martyrdom, with the language of triumph on his lip, urging fidelity upon the youthful Timothy!" But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an envangelist, make full proof of thy ministry. For I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith: henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall give me at that day; and not to me only, but unto all them also that love His appearing."

BIBLE LIGHT AS TO THE EXTENT OF THE DELUGE.* (Continued from page 581).

OBJECTIONS TO THE UNIVERSALITY OF THE deluge.

HAVING already adverted to several lines of the strongest kind of evidence for the universality of the Noachian Deluge, and shown that the supposed local deluge, for which some men of science plead, is, on their own principles, utterly inadmissible, it now remains that some leading objections to the universality of the Flood be considered. In offering some reply to these objections, two great questions require to be discussed; first, that of species, and, second, the possibility of all tribes of animals on this earth at the present time having spread over the globe from one centre. The Bible does not seem to recognise more than one centre, whence all the earth's inhabitants, rational and irrational, have emanated. This centre, in relation to the post-diluvian world, is the Ark. There is only one passage of Scripture which seems to indicate any shade of variance with this (Gen. ix. 9, 10)— "And I, behold I establish my covenant with you and with your seed after you; and with every living creature that is with you; from all that go out of the ark, TO EVERY BEAST OF THE EARTH." To this passage we will advert afterwards, and are willing to give it all the weight to which it has a legitimate claim.

THE CAPACITY OF THE ARK CONSTRUCTED BY NOAH.

It is denied by the opponents of a universal deluge, and the advocates of a local one, that the ark could contain pairs of all the species of animals now diffused over the earth, and septuples of each of the kinds of creatures denominated clean. It is admitted by all that the ark was a vessel of large dimensions. The data for calculating the size

Biblical Natural Science; being an Explanation of all References in Holy Scripture to Geology, Botany, Zoology, and Physical Geography. By the Rev. John Duns, F.R.S.E. William M'Kenzie, London, Glasgow, and Edinburgh.

of the ark furnished in the Scriptures are distinct and full. It was so formed, also, as to be adapted in the best way for carrying a very large cargo. The length of the ark, taking the cubit to be one foot nine inches, was five hundred and twenty-five feet; the breadth eighty-seven feet; and the height fifty-two feet. Again, it was divided into three stories, and these into compartments or rooms; while each story was some seventeen feet high. It is not easy to calculate how many animals-the greater part of them of small size-could be located in these three capacious stories, each having a floor of forty-five thousand six hundred and seventy-five square feet, and being seventeen feet in height, so that various tiers of the smaller creatures could be placed above each other in the upper story, and located in shelves in the other stories above the classes of larger animals. Provision was no doubt made for ventilation in various ways. As has been suggested by an anonymous writer lately, in the Witness newspaper, a large stock of provisions might be stored on the roof of a structure of such vast dimensions.

It may be admitted, however, that were the different species of creatures to be gathered into the ark at the Flood as numerous as they are said to be now on the earth by some naturalists, it could not furnish room for them all. But this is a subject regarding which men of science are greatly divided among themselves, and on which a great increase of light is desiderated.

"In fact," says Sir C. Lyell, "zoologists and botanists are not only more at a loss now than ever how to define a species, but even to determine whether it has any real existence in nature, or is a mere abstraction of the human intellect; some contending that it is constant within certain narrow and impassible limits of variability; others that it is capable of indefinite and endless modification." *

"As to the alleged absence," says the same writer, "of intermediate varieties, connecting one species with another, every zoologist and botanist who has engaged in the task of classification has been occasionally thrown into this dilemma, -If I make more than one species into this group, I must, to be consistent, make a great many. Even in a limited region like the British Isles, this embarrassment is continually felt."

'Scarcely any two botanists, for example, can agree as to the number of roses, still less as to how many species of brambles, we possess. Of the latter genus,

Rubus, there is one set of forms respecting which it is still a question whether it ought to be regarded as constituting three species or thirty-seven. Mr Bentham adopts the first alternative, and Mr Babington the second, in their well-known treatises on British Plants."+

"In proportion as materials of comparison have accumulated, the necessity of uniting species, previously regarded as distinct, has become more and more apparent."+

"It is manifest, therefore, that science has not yet been able to determine the question as to species with such certainty as to decide the collateral question whether the ark of Noah was or was not capable of holding pairs and septuples of the different species of creatures by which the earth is now overspread. But closely connected with this, it is a well known and established fact, that, through + Ibid, p. 425. + Ibid, p. 427.

* 66
"Antiquity of Man," p. 389.

a variety of causes, from one original stock an almost endless variety has sprung, which are manifestly of one species. It is not only the unquestionable fact, that among domestic animals different breeds are being produced, but it is also generally admitted that these are lineal descendents of the same class of creatures who once existed or still exist in a wild state.

"From the year 1493, when the island of St Domingo was discovered by Columbus, pigs were at various epochs introduced there. A great number of these, from various causes, have returned to the wild state, and anatomical changes, of a noteworthy character, have supervened. The form of the skull has changed in a manner which, to a transcendental anatomist, would suggest the difference between a European human skull and one of some of the Negro tribes; the proportion of the limbs have altered; and, what is perhaps still more decisive, they have lost the varieties of colour which the domestic presents, and have become uniformly black. They have, in short, resumed nearly the formation of the wild boar, from which they were doubtless originally descended." *

*

"No naturalist," says Blumenbach, "has carried his scepticism so far as to doubt the descent of the domestic swine from the wild boar. It is certain that, before the discovery of America by the Spaniards, swine were unknown in that quarter of the world, and that they were first carried there from Europe. Yet, notwithstanding the comparative shortness of the interval, they have in that country degenerated into breeds wonderfully different from each other and from the original stock. These instances of diversity, and those of the hog kind in general, may therefore be taken as clear and safe examples of the variations which may be expected to arise in the descendents of one stock. +

There is equally little cause to doubt that the wild buffalo and the different breeds of domestic cattle are of the same stock. And what variety of size, of shape, and of colour, is there amongst them! Some with spacious horns; others wholly without horns. Some of gigantic bulk; others so dwarfish as to be little larger than sheep. Some black, some white, and others red, and others party-coloured in endless variety. How various the sizes, shapes, and breeds of horses! No one doubts that the puny Shetland pony belongs to the same species as the massive English draught-horse or the majestic war-steed, whose neck is clothed with thunder. Equally little reason is there to question that the all but endless variety of dogs, from the mastiff to the terrier or the lap-dog, are all sprung from one stock, notwithstanding the wide difference in shape and disposition between such varieties as the bull-dog and greyhound. Similar remarks apply to sheep, and domestic and wild fowls of various kinds; while, through various causes, this endless variety is progressing, rendering it more and more difficult to say positively where the line is to be drawn, on the one side of which there is species that certainly sprung from an original stock altogether distinct from that on the other.

"The common wolf," says Dr Smith, "the most bold and savage of the canine family, stretches over the greater part of the old Continent, and is found in the new, from Behring's Straits to near the Isthmus of Panama. Under these immense limits he often seems so changed, that he can scarcely be referred to the

* "British Quarterly" for January, 1860, p. 166.

† See Pritchard's "Researches into the Physical History of Mankind,” vol. i. p. 353.

same specific type. The bear extends from Norway along the limits of the arctic regions, and thence to the Caucasus, and all eastward, wherever woods suited to his habitudes exist, but so changed, that he can scarcely be identified with the brown bear of the Norwegian Alps. In these and other cases the changes produced furnish continual matter of debate to zoologists, whether the animals are to be regarded as distinct species, or as varieties of the same species. The changes produced on animals in a state of nature by different circumstances-as the nature of the country they inhabit, the means of obtaining their food, temperature and altitude-are often very great; but it is when they are reduced to the domesticated state that all the changes which they are capable of undergoing are manifested in the greatest degree. The wild hog, which extends over the greater part of the old Continent, is the undoubted progenitor of the common domesticated races of Europe. In the wild state, he has six incisor teeth in the upper, and six in the lower jaw; but under the domesticated state, the number is generally reduced to three in each jaw. The number of his dorsal, lumbarsacral, caudal vertebræ vary so much, that it may be asserted that he differs far more from the hog in a state of liberty than many animals, regarded as distinct species, differ from one another.* And if we turn from quadrupeds to the feathered tribes, we shall find the like proofs of the power of food and habitudes to change the form, and with it the very instincts of the animals. The domestic goose is derived from the wild, of the same species which inhabits the boundless marshes of northern latitudes. This noble bird visits us on the approach of the arctic winter, in those remarkable troops which all of us have beheld, cleaving the air like a wedge, often at a vast height, and sometimes only recognised by their shrill voices amongst the clouds. When the eggs of this species are obtained, and the young are supplied with food in unlimited quantity, the result is remarkable. The intestines, and with them the abdomen, become so enlarged, that the animal nearly loses the power of flight; and the powerful muscles that enabled him in the wild state to take such flights, become feeble from disuse, and his long wings are rendered unserviceable. The beautiful bird, that outstripped the flight of the eagle, is now a captive without a chain. The wild duck, too, affords a similar example. . . The swan, the noblest of all the water-fowls, becomes chained, as it were, to our lakes and ponds, by the mere change of natural form."+

Dr Smith also adduces ample illustration of the power of climatic influences in producing marked changes in races of animals, from which we give the following excerpts:

"In the warmest regions, the domestic sheep produces scarcely any wool; in temperate countries, he has a fleece, properly so called; and in the coldest of all, his wool is mixed with long hair, which covers it externally. The wool, an imperfect conductor of heat, preserves the natural temperature of the body, and thus protects the animal from cold; while the long hair is fitted to throw off the water which falls upon the body in rain or snow. But in the warm season, the wool, which would be incommodious, falls off, to be renewed before winter, while the hair always remains. The dog, too, has a coat of wool, which he loses in

*For how much less diversity of form do many of our keen advocates of multiplied species affirm that certain classes of animals, having the most striking likeness to each other, must be reckoned different species. For instance, this is held to be decisive evidence, that the elephants of Africa and Asia are not sprung from one original stock.

+ Dr Smith's "Unity of the Human Races," pp. 382–386.

countries of great heat, but which, in colder countries, grows so as to form, along with the hair, a thick fur; so that, in certain cold countries, there have been found breeds of dogs to produce wool for clothing. The dogs of Europe, conveyed to warmer countries, frequently lose even their hair, and become as naked as elephants; and in every country their fur is suited to the nature of the climate.

"Similar to the effects of temperature is that of humidity—the hair becoming longer and more oily in the moister countries. Even within the limits of our own islands, the ox of the western coasts, exposed to the humid vapours of the Atlantic, has longer hair than those of the eastern districts. Even the effects of continual exposure to winds and storms may modify parts of the animal form. There are certain breeds of gallinaceous fowls which are destitute of the rump, so called. Most of the common fowls of the Island of Arran, in Scotland, have this peculiarity. This little island consists of high hills, on which scarcely a bush exists to shelter the animals which inhabit it from the continued gales of the Atlantic. The feathers of a long tail might incommode the animals, and therefore, we suppose, they disappear."*

This induction of facts might be enlarged to almost any extent. Such changes are not to be accounted for by mere natural causes, but traced to the highest source as their spring. I God has thus been pleased, in His wisdom and goodness, to adapt the animal inhabitants of different countries to the external circumstances of heat or cold, moisture or drought, in which they have come to be placed. This cause has not been duly recognised by Dr Smith in his ample illustration of facts, expressed in the best use of language. And this great truth furnishes one of the best arguments to meet the allegations of men of science, that it is impossible that the different animal inhabitants of the different regions of the globe could have spread from one centre. Here, perhaps, the tables may be turned against the distinguished anatomist Professor Owen, who, quoting the words of Jesus to the Sadducees-"Ye do err, not knowing the Scriptures, and the power of God,"-applies them to those who, from deference to the Bible, refuse to adopt his theory of the origin of man and the animal inhabitants of the earth from numerous centres of creation. In making this application of the words, he insinuates that it is through ignorance of the power of God that such persons do not understand the Scriptures. This, however, is a charge for which there is no ground, except in the imagination of the great anatomist. The parties referred to set no limit to the power of God; but they believe that His power was never put forth in His works in any way which is not in harmony with the record given of His operations in His word. We are not sure, however, but Mr Owen and his coadjutors display ignorance of the power of God, inasmuch as they would limit its operation to what is in harmony with their hypothesis, as if it were impossible that the effect of this power, which they find in His works, could have been produced in another way than that which they conjecture; and then err, again, in refusing to understand the Scriptures except in accordance with their preconceived opinion as to the mode of the Divine operation; as * "Unity of the Human Races," pp. 387, 388.

+ Professor Owen's "Lecture on the Power of God, as manifested in the Animal Creation," p. 44. 1864.