to divide the day from the night. And let them be for figns, and for seasons, and for days, and for years. And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven, to give light upon the earth : and it was fo. And God made two great lights (d); the greater light to rule the day, and the leffer light to rule the night. He made the ftars alfo. And God fet 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: and God faw that it was good."

Let us obferve that God is here faid not only to have then first formed, but to have then firft placed thefe bodies, amongft which the stars are included, in the heavens. This is indeed contrary to the opinion of many philofophers, but is eafily explained if we fuppofe the great body of light to have been then firft divided into feveral bodies. Let us also take notice that here is a fecond divifion of night and day, and here for the first time the fun and moon are faid to regulate them; that is to fay, our prefent nights and days, which are thereby literally difcriminated from the first days. and nights, which belonged not to our earth and our fun, but to the abyss and the first created body of light, as foon as locally feparated towards the end of the firft period of creation. Though the author only mentions the utility of these bodies to the earth as luminaries and figns, he does not exclude other purposes for which they may be defigned. Thefe are the fecrets of the Moft High, which

man

man may reafon upon but cannot penetrate. In like manner, though the fun and moon are diftinguished as the two great luminaries, (N. B. it is not faid "bodies") yet he enters not into the difcuffion whether either of them is larger or less than the stars, which appear fo much less, and whofe formation is fimply mentioned as happening at the fame time. As luminaries to the earth, the fun is faid to be the largest, and the moon the next, though less; and in that light they certainly are fo. The real comparative magnitude of these bodies and the ftars, and the difcrimination of the fun, being a luminous body, from the moon, an opaque reflecting body, he was not ordered to inform us of. Thefe too are objects left to the difquifition of man. It is but lately that the fun was found to be the ftationary body round which the earth and planets depending upon it move; yet, without offence to science, even philofophers talk familiarly of the rifing and setting of the fun. But in all this chapter, where nothing but exact truths were to be delivered, Mofes fays not a word that may either favour the old or new opinion. In the poetical parts of fcripture, the apparent motion of the fun is often alluded to it is yet, and ever will be, the language of poetry and of common converfation; but here nothing is faid of it. The fun is fimply mentioned to divide light from darkness, and to regulate the day on earth. To declare his formation to be the work, and his functions to be the appointment of God, to fhew his particular utility to man, was the office of the facred legiflator. Beyond that, his charge extended not.

Upon the whole it will appear, that though Mofes, confining himself barely to fimple facts, difcuffes no philofophical queftions, yet, where truth and these require it, he hesitates not to run counter to received prejudices, or to more learned opinions. On the other hand, not a single word can be faid to be in contradiction to any certain rule or fact in nature, however they may be at variance with particular hypothetical fyftems.

Having now, I hope fatisfactorily, fhewn the impropriety of rejecting every attempt to explain the Mofaical account, under the general pretence of its not affording a fair and fufficient ground, work for philofophical enquiry, I fhall next advert to general or particular objections which may be made against the explication I have adopted.

As I have given it, not as a certainty, but as my opinion founded upon the words of Mofes, that the beginning he speaks of was the real era of the first existence of this visible material world, I must obferve that it is pretended by many, that it would be abfurd and even impious to fuppofe that the power and goodness of God were never exerted before the appearance of this world of yesterday.

I must first premife, that it is not in my thoughts to restrict to this very limited date the creation of fpiritual beings. The knowledge of their exiftence muft depend on revelation. The fame au

thor

1

thor gives us clearly to understand, that many fuch beings preceded the creation of man. How 'many thousands or how many millions of years before, or whether the creation of all thefe took place at one or at feveral epochs, we are not told; nor does it belong to us to know. But, however diftant, they too, if they were created, must have had a beginning; and that beginning must have had an anteriority in the depth of eternity.

But it is not to fuch creations that this argument is directed. By it, it should seem to be infinuated that the act of creation, even of material bodies, is fitting, or, what is in this cafe the fame thing, neceflary to the Divinity, and to the attributes which belong to it: but if the existence of any other beings whatever is neceffary to it, they are then co-existent and co-eternal with it-they are God. If there are fpiritual beings, as is generally believed, as well as material ones, of whofe exiftence we are certain, all are neceffary to him and a neceffary part of his effence. God would be a compofition of the one and the other; which is incompatible with the unity of his effence: or he would be matter only. In either cafe a part of the Deity would be inert and without intelligence. There would be in reality no God: and thofe works which disclose the most perfect combinations would be without an intelligent architect, By endeavouring to fathom beyond his depth, man may eafily confound and inextricably puzzle his limited understanding: but this abfurdity will always be manifeft to all who do not purposely seek to blind themselves.

If

If exterior production is a neceffary and effential quality of the Divinity without which it would be lefs, or lefs perfect; it is not one, or several acts of production, that could fatisfy it. Productions from it would have been inceffant from all eternity paft, and must be inceffant for an eternity to come. Every instant would be productive of new worlds or new beings. The perpetual motion of matter seems the pretence for this argument. Matter, indeed, on this earth is perpetually new-modified; it is constantly changing its forms. It is a law of preservation and reproduction. It has on this earth a constant rotation; but its limits are fixed, beyond which it cannot fwerve. The earth itself in its totality, and all the subftances it contains, are unalterable: we fee neither new worlds nor new beings arise. The fame beings, without effential changes, are inceffantly reproduced on its furface. Nothing is new under the fun, who himself fuffers no change.

If matter is not co-exiftent and co-eternal with the Deity; if God created it without neceffity at the moment which best pleased him; it imports little whether it had its first existence feven thousand or seven millions of years ago. The one and the other are equally points in eternity. If matter might have been created or not created, annihilated, or preserved, with perfect indifference to the power or grandeur of the Deity, it belongs not to us to fix to the Creator the times of thus manifefting his glory. Man, who cannot diffemble to himself the narrow bounds of his own intelligence, fhould adore