bishop, I see, but I miss the names of some of our best men?" Has the mantle of Hugh Stowell fallen on no successor able to "cry aloud and spare not," as he would have cried aloud,"Consider of it, take advice, and speak your mind"? "Stand ye in the ways, and see, and ask for THE OLD PATHS!"

Σ.

CORRESPONDENCE.

GENESIS AND GEOLOGY.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

SIR,-I have been reading with much pleasure and approval the articles in your July number, entitled, Ecce Homo, Genesis and Geology, and Antichrist. At the risk of appearing to favour notions which will probably appear absurdly chimerical to others besides sceptical geologists, I send the following remarks, and must not be surprised should you hesitate to insert them.

The writer of the second of these articles says:-"The phenomena of Geology are established facts. The steps which have led to its conclusions are as rational, clear, and consecutive, as those of a Ruleof-three sum. These conclusions cannot be contradicted. It would be folly to deny them. You cannot persuade a geologist of the untruth of his position, in the face of the physical phenomena presented to the plain cognizance of his senses. His assertions remain to this hour uncontradicted."

Do not these conclusions of Geology rest not only on the view of "the physical phenomena presented to the plain cognizance of his senses," but also on the assumption that the fiat of Omnipotence must not be admitted as the producing or creating cause of some of the most stupendous of these "physical phenomena"?

I turn to the 1st chapter of the Book of Genesis, and find a remarkable fact; viz., that the man Adam was created or made complete at once. No previous stages of the embryo foetus, infancy, childhood, youth. At the fiat of Omnipotence, he appears at once in adult manhood. Connected with this is a similar fact: a rib is taken from the man's side; at once, by the fiat of Omnipotence, it becomes a human being in adult womanhood. We infer from these two facts with confidence, that the first beasts of the field and fowls of the air, spoken of in the chapter, were each created at once in an adult and complete state. So also of trees, shrubs, flowers and herbs. Trees of the pine or fir species would spring at once into life with the proper number of annual circles, so to speak, which if a geologist could now see, he would insist that they must have required for their growth and formation as surely a certain scanty number of years, as that enormous stratified masses and huge coal beds demanded millions

of years for their gradual production. He would smile at the notion of the intrusion of the fiat of Omnipotence in all three cases.

Let us not altogether ignore our Lord's miracles. There is one in the 6th chapter of St. John, which deserves our attention. Five thousand hungry persons were fed with five barley-loaves and two fishes. After all had eaten and been satisfied, twelve baskets were filled with the fragments of the five barley loaves; the fragments apparently exceeding in quantity the original five barley cakes. Must not the devout Christian believer regard these fragments (however scepticism may scorn his credulity) as created bread. And are we not powerfully taught how perfectly independent God is of time and means. Ploughing, sowing, months of growth, sunshine, breeze, rain, reaping, threshing, all these media are triumphantly set aside. Nor is this all. The labour of grinding, and the very culinary process of baking the bread by the aid of fire, are also set aside. Nor did the Son of God alone do this. The Most High was pleased to work a somewhat similar miracle through his servant Elisha. With such facts as these before him, is the devout believer in Holy Writ to renounce utterly all idea of the intervention of the fiat of Omnipotence? Because the eye sees distinctly the separating marks in stratified masses, and the microscope seems peremptorily to dictate the conclusion that huge coal beds were certainly gradually formed from vegetable matter, are we to renounce with scorn the thought that the Omipotent Creator, who created at once, in a full-grown and complete state, man, animals, birds, trees, ever brought into immediate existence, without the intervention of time and gradual increase, stratified masses, or even huge coal beds?

Nor is it perhaps safe altogether to reject the notion that the Creator, who is Omniscient as well as Omnipotent, may have had certain awful moral ends in view at the time of creation. Did He not, of His own sovereign will, place even in Eden the forbidden tree, as a moral test of Adam's faith and obedienc? May not, then, the Omniscient and Omnipotent God have created tests whereby to try the faith and obedience of Adam's descendants in these latter days? It is enough here to allude to, without dwelling upon, so awful a theme.

The writer of the article under our notice gives excellent advice when, after saying that neither the geologist nor the believer in the inspiration of the Pentateuch can yield, he adds,—“ What are we then to do? It appears right to do this, We must wait, and we must wait with patience?'

We may the more readily comply with this advice, if it be both possible and not improbable, that we may not have to wait very long. The article on Antichrist, in your July Number, thus closes :-" We have not the slightest doubt upon our mind, either that the 'Pope of Rome is Antichrist himself indeed, or that the 1260 years, so repeatedly assigned in the Scriptures of truth for the duration of his reign, are rapidly drawing to a close. And believing this, we desire with reverence, and watchfulness, and prayer, to be waiting for the terrible and glorious things which are to accomplish the approaching fall, and result from the final destruction of Antichrist."

Z.

REV. XVI. 19.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

6

SIR, At this time the attention of many will be directed to the prediction, in expectation of its fulfilment, "The great city was divided into three parts.' "But is it certain that this is the correct rendering? There is nothing in the original that expresses division: éyéveTo eis τpía μépŋ. May not this mean, became reduced to three parts'? The great city originally, and in its full extent, consisted of ten parts. The earthquake at the Reformation caused the tenth part (England) to fall. But the effect of the greater earthquake which preceded the fall of Babylon, is such, that three parts only are left standing. These may be Austria, Spain, and Portugal, the only three of the ten kingdoms that cordially uphold the Papacy.

L.

ON HUMAN FOSSILS IN AMERICA.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

SIR,-As there is much discussion in the present day relating to the existence of human fossils, will you allow me to make some observations on the subject?

Sir Charles Lyell, in his Travels in the United States, says that in the museum of the American Philosophical Society at Philadelphia he was shown a limestone from Santas in Brazil, procured by Captain Elliott, of the United States navy, which contained a human skull, teeth, and other bones, together with the fragments of shells. He was informed that the remains of several hundred other human skeletons, imbedded in a similar rock, were dug out at the same place about the year 1827. He says, "The soil covering the solid stone supported a growth of large trees, which covered the face of a hill on the side of the river Santas. I observed serpulæ in the rock, a stone which the natives would not have carried inland for food."

The author of the "Types of Mankind," a well-known American work, says that fossil bones of numerous quadrupeds are found in the alluvial formation which lies above the rock in which the human skeletons were imbedded.

If the facts mentioned by Sir Charles Lyell and the author of the "Types of Mankind" are correct, as I believe them to be, it is certain that several hundred human skeletons have been dug out of a solid limestone rock, which is covered by an alluvial soil containing the fossil bones of numerous quadrupeds. From this it necessarily follows that the human beings to whom the skeletons belonged must have inhabited some other dry land than the present, before the consolidation of the limestone out of which their bones were dug, and when it formed part of the bed of the sea. This renders probable the assertion of the illustrious Cuvier, that some great catastrophe formerly happened to our globe, which was the effect of an interchange of sea and land, and proved destructive of almost all the human race, as well as of innumerable land and sea animals. He says,-" I conclude with

M. de Luc and M. Dolomieu, that if there be any fact well established in geology, it is this, that the surface of our globe has suffered a great and sudden revolution, the period of which cannot be dated further back than five or six thousand years. This revolution has, on one hand, engulfed and caused to disappear the countries formerly inhabited by men and the animal species at present best known; and, on the other, has laid bare the bed of the last ocean, thus converting its channel into the present habitable earth.'

If the opinion of M. Cuvier, of M. de Luc, and M. Dolomieu is correct, then the human race, in accordance with the traditions of all nations, may have been created as early as all the land and sea animals, whose fossil remains are found in the alluvial soils and strata of the present dry land.-Your obedient servant,

THOS. D. ALLEN.

[These discoveries would seem to prove not only the truth of the deluge of Scripture, but its universality, extending over both continents and covering both hemispheres.-EDITOR.]

RITUALISM.

To the Editor of the Christian Observer.

DEAR SIR, Very lately an article appeared in the Record, entitled "Flowers of Ritualism." It consisted mainly of a letter reprinted from the Somerset County Gazette, in which a most pugnacious Ritualist, the Incumbent of Northmore Green, descends to a level, in point of coarseness and bad taste, with Mr. Spurgeon and his spittoon. Leaving the bouquet part of the letter unmolested, I extract the following passage:-"We are insignificant parts of a mighty band of priests, who by their genuine piety and deep learning have become a great power in the Church, and the Bishop of London, and other Bishops besides, are now lying prostrate at their feet."

་

Now, in your September Number is an able notice of Mr. Orby Shipley's Church and the World.' We read there, (at p. 666,) "On one of the last days of the recent sitting, the Bishop of Oxford rose, with a grave face, and stated that he had been requested to present to Convocation Mr. O. Shipley's volume on the 'Church and the World.' Upon which the Bishop of Salisbury followed with a remark, that it was a very valuable work; and the Archbishop, as president, announced that the thanks of Convocation would be transmitted to the Editor."

Pray, are the Archbishop, and the two prelates of Salisbury and Exeter, "the other Bishops" who, with the Bishop of London, are lying prostrate at the feet of the Rev. Messrs. Hunt and Shipley? As for the Bishop of Exeter, nobody suspects him of being afraid of Mr. Hunt, or Mr. Baring-Gould; though the latter seems to threaten the occupants of the Episcopal bench, that if they do not come over to his view, he will throw them all over-board. (C. O. Sept., p. 649.)

The reviewer says, (p. 657) "at the celebration of the Lord's Supper, the Ritualists turn to the 'altar,' look at the bread and wine, and deem Christ to be really present there. Richard Hooker looks

outside the rail, regards the worthy receiver, and there only can any Real Presence of Christ be found." I will add, that the Bishop of Exeter (agreeing in this respect with Archbishop Cranmer) writes:"The crucified Jesus is present in the Sacrament of His Supper, not in, nor with, the bread and wine, nor under their accidents, but in the souls of the communicants." The italics are the Bishop's. Thus Bishop Phillpott agrees with Archbishop Cranmer and Richard Hooker, in looking outside the rail for the Real Presence in the Lord's Supper.

Should the Bishop of Exeter think it anything but a compliment to have his name coupled with that of the martyred Archbishop, I shall pity him for his own sake, not for Cranmer's." He cannot surely feel displeased at being associated with Richard Hooker.

Like Cranmer, Dr. Phillpott has parleyed with Romanism, when he ought to have contended against her with uncompromising firmness. May he too have grace to see, ere he lays down his mitre for ever, the error of his ways, and to make as public a confession and recantation as Cranmer did, though not in a similar manner and in like circumstances. Thank God the stake and fagot are not in use just now. People are beginning to reject and cast out Protestantism, but have not yet ventured to burn Protestants.

Oct. 16th, 1866.

Z.

NOTICES OF NEW BOOKS.

The Rev. M. H. Seymour on the Idolatry of the Church of Rome, -The Rev. M. Hobart Seymour, in his masterly treatise, entitled "A Pilgrimage to Rome," gives a graphic account of the "High Ceremonies the Monastic Institutions- the Religious Services the Sacred Relics - the Miraculous Pictures and the General State of Religion in that City."

Mr. Seymour devotes himself to the exhibition of the religion of the Church, and the description of the state of Romanism at Rome, where he spent nine months, and accurately noted all he saw. The testimony he bears, as an eye-witness, to the gross and palpable and downright idolatry of the Church of Rome, is exceedingly valuable. At Chapter VIII. Mr. Seymour describes the ceremony of the Coronation of the Virgin. "This ceremony," he observes, "Far surpasses the worst imaginings of English Protestants. The subject is not only represented in statuary and carving, and in painting and fresco, but it is also represented in a dramatic way.. There is a service performed, there is much music, and the priests approach the image and crown it. In the progress of these services and ceremonies, everything is done that could be done, if deliberate idolatry or image-worship were intended. There is the dressing or decking it; there is the burning incense to it; there is the lighting of candles to it; there is bowing and kneeling before it; there is the utterance of prayer before it; there is the crowning it-everything, in short, that could be done, if the special object was the religious worship or adoration of the image itself, as if the ancient heathens of Rome were again worshipping and