some false and arbitrary period of indefinite length? But, that "rending of the globe" is not left merely for rational and necessary inference; it is expressly and distinctly declared, as one of the great features in the transaction of Creation: "The Lord, by wisdom founded the earth; by intelligence He established the heavens; 66 by His knowledge the depths were rent - εν αισθήσει aßvoros eggaynoav — wypas nipin in. And, to render that description perfectly free from all ambiguity, the antecedent circumstances are thus described: "The "Lord possessed Me (Wisdom) - from everlasting; before He formed the earth, and, before He made the depths" - – και προ του τας αβύσσους ποιησαι 66 . באין תהמות We all see, that the waters of the ocean are actually gathered into one place or part of this terrestrial surface; and, the precipitous cliffs, below which they are every where gathered, demonstrate to the most common as to the most scientific observer, that they have been rent," or cleft, to form that place3. I shall here, therefore, use my just privilege of withdrawing myself from the arena; and shall leave this sensitive champion 66 1 Proverbs, iii. 20. • Ib. viii. 24. 3 This universal impression is evinced in the very term cliff, anciently clift," high growing on the top of rocky clift" (Spenser), i. e. cleft, from cleave; as rupes, from rupi. That gny (Jaλacons) is to be understood with the same etymological sense, as denoting sometimes, "prærupta maris," the broken or cleft line of the sea-coast, sometimes" hiatus," the general "chasm" or fissure of the sea-bed; and not the breakers or waves breaking on the shore, for the word is used by Homer only in the singular; is shewn in the name of the city Rhegium, so called, because it was situated at the point where tradition reported a breach to have been made in the continuity of land which (it is said) anciently connected Italy and Sicily. Thus Strabo : Ωνωμασθη δε Ρηγιον, είθ', ὡς φασιν Αισχυλος, δια το συμβαν πάθος τη 4 of the Old Testament, in his capacity of "a reflecting part of mankind," to determine this question in conflict with the sacred historian. 66 26. Our Critic advances to a consideration of the phenomena of the Deluge. "As the channel of the primitive "ocean would be entirely emptied by the transference of "its waters into this new channel, We (says he) are at a "loss to perceive, how the skeletons of animals which were destroyed by this event, should be incrusted in lime"stone strata formed at the bottom of the ocean: this is a difficulty which Mr. P. has not attempted to remove 1." Yet, he professes by the second title of his article to have reviewed, and he actually quotes from, my " Supplement,' which Tract is employed on no other subject than the removal of the particular difficulty which he here gives himself credit for having just found out3. "As the "waters (he continues) are supposed to have rushed from "their present land, which was formerly sea; into the χωρα ταυτῇ ΑΠΟΡΡΑΓΗΝΑΙ γας απο της ηπείρου την Σικελίαν ὑπο σεισμων, αλλοι τε κακείνος ειρηκεν αφ' οὗ δη Ρηγιον κικλήσκεται. p. 396. (258.)—And Pliny: "Sicilia-quondam Brutio agro cohærens, mox interfuso mari avulsa.-Ab hoc dehiscendi argumento, Rhegium "(gnyov) Græci nomen dedère oppido in margine Italiæ sito. (N. H. lib.iii. cap. 8. (14.) When Homer makes his navigators disembark, to pass the night gay, it plainly signifies the breach or beach of the sea; when he speaks of the Badia gayev, it expresses the general chasm or profundity of the sea-bed. It is observable, that the words breach and beach occur as synonymous in our old English. Thus, Spenser's " utmost sandy breach" (F. Q. c. 12. book iii. st. 21. and notes, TODD,) is the same thing as Shakspeare's "beachy girdle of the ocean;" the former word having apparently been softened into the latter, which knows no other etymon. British Critic for April 1824, p. 400. 2 Ib. p. 397. "bed of the present sea, which was formerly land; is it "not to be presumed, that all the moveable substances "would obey the impulse of the current, and be carried "into the deep? It is therefore at the bottom of the present seas, and not on the land, that We should expect "to find the remains of antediluvian elephants, rhinoceri, " and hippopotami." When a skimming and a dipping censor requires elucidations and answers which are amply supplied to those who read the whole of a book, the author may reasonably give himself the repose of not listening to his requisitions. This questioning Critic would exceedingly enlarge the sphere of his own ideas, if he would make an excursion to Ramsgate, and dig in the mud of the harbour after the ebbing of the tide; he would then enable himself to answer his own questions, and to ascertain, whether the substances which he found imbedded within the mud were to be accounted moveable substances, and whether they had " obeyed the impulse of "the superficial current, and had been carried into the deep." 66 " 27. "Does the Mosaical record (he further asks) give any countenance to the supposition of such tre"mendous concussions and collisions, such force and con"flict of waves, and such oceanic vortices? Who, before, "ever imagined that the action of a troubled water would dislocate and fracture the bones of animals covered with "flesh and skin ?—a theory which requires such very improbable accommodation of circumstances, shocks Our belief, while it excites Our ridicule and contempt!" Quor! But who, I may ask, who knew what the sea is, was ever so extremely imbecile, before this Critic, as to question such" tremendous force and conflict of waves," 66 " when the diluvial" waters increased and prevailed ex 66 ceedingly upon the earth," and, until they were "assuaged1?" or who, that ever saw a boat staved by a wave, and reflected on what he saw, can doubt the power of waves to dislocate or fracture, by collision, animal frames congregated in vast compound masses? It would not be difficult to give our sceptical Critic experimental proof, in his own person, of the power of a wave to "dis"locate and fracture bones still covered with flesh and "skin". Yet, his mind can conceive nothing more in the momentum of the universal ocean in preternatural tumultuous action, than what his own personal experience may have chanced to witness in the " action of a troubled "water." And, even this "troubled water" is a great deal for him to grant; for, he elsewhere observes, with consistent sagacity: "On the smooth surface of the 1 See the description of this catastrophe by Philo, vol. ii. of this Work, p. 26. 2 The power with which a single wave is capable of acting upon a particular point, may receive additional illustration from the following example. On the 14th of October, 1822, a wave, which during a storm broke against the pier of Ramsgate, and was dashed upwards to a height of about 14 feet, fell again upon the stone pavement of the pierhead; and, by the force of its re-action, instantaneously raised a 36 pound carronade, with its carriage, over a stone ledge some inches high, and precipitated it into the sea. The harbour-men assured me, at the time, that it would have required the united efforts of 20 men to effect the same operation. A gentleman, on the same day, who apprehended no power in the apparently exhausted spray which occasionally surmounted the higher parapet, was driven by it against a granite-post with so much violence, as to be obliged to be conveyed home in a boat; having received some severe contusions. If this statement ever meets his eye, he will no doubt bear testimony to its truth. "waters on which the ark floated so many months, we "can no doubt easily imagine that the carcasses of "animals would also float; and, if we were told, that, "when the waters subsided, the remains of those ani"mals were deposited in the mud which, during the "continuance of the deluge, had formed at the bottom, we should not find it very hard to yield Our credence "to any hypothesis founded upon such a statement." This cautious philosopher must, in consistency, doubt, whether the offals thrown from the ark sunk and were deposited in the bottom; because he is not told so. But, I apprehend, that our reason is left to extend its credence a step or two beyond what it is told1. 28. In remarking on the inspired notification of the substantial difference between the antediluvian and postdiluvian earths, the Reviewer holds himself perfectly competent to pronounce at once-" there can be no doubt, we presume, that the perdition commemorated by St. Peter, "respected only the living creatures." The 2d and 3d Chapter of Part III. of the following treatise, will fully reveal the measure both of the knowledge and the presumption which have conspired to bring him so promptly to this easy and categorical conclusion. 29. The Reviewer, at length, turns his reflection to the Cave of Kirkdale, and to the controversy to which it has given rise; and he complacently remarks: " it is some"what puzzling to observe, that amidst the numerous "relics of the elephant, the rhinoceros, the hippopotamus, the ox, the horse, the deer, the hare, and the rabbit, there should be no skeletons of the hyanas them See above, p. xxv. |